Covid restrictions - protests/disobedience, and are people just getting fed up with it?

[nedchester]

If you are going to make potentially slanderous comments like that, can you please identify a) who you are referring to, and b) what this 'plenty of evidence' is.

Thanks

That's hilarious!

 

[DB]

That's hilarious!

Why? Can you please answer the question.

 

[nedchester]

Why? Can you please answer the question.

No.

 

[DB]

No.

Why?

Let's clarify then - are you referring to me?

 

[XAM2175]

If you really want to feel empowered, you could start by writing to your local MP and local councillors about the chronic lack of capacity in the NHS, particularly ICU compared to some of our European neighbours.

I hope that is something that everybody here can take away from this experience, and that they can recall it particularly when next presented with a ballot box.

 

[yorksrob]

Perhaps they should read this article from The Spectator

The percentage testing positive in the Imperial College REACT study was 1.58%, which is below the 5% level at which the WHO considers a pandemic to be under control.

Why Imperial College’s REACT study is so problematic

There was very gloomy news this week. ‘Coronavirus infections are not falling in England, latest REACT findings show,’ said a press release from Imperial College. It was widely covered in the press in this vein: Covid levels ‘may even have risen’ since the latest lockdown, BBC news reported...

www.spectator.co.uk

Thanks. It's interesting to see some academic criticism of Imperial College.

 

[notlob.divad]

Good for you, but if you can't prove beyond reasonable doubt that they do anything, then don't force others to wear them.

I am not forcing anyone to do anything. Please provide evidence where I have.

Surely you could feel.even prouder of yourself if you were doing it of your own volition rather than because of an arbitrary and unjustified law?

I was doing it well before it became UK law. I saw how grassroot campaigns in other countries were responding with homemade masks so as not to add to pressure on those required for medical environments. This was after having previously been vocal against people wearing medical grade masks due to the obvious shortage of those at the time.

Just because it has been made law in the UK, doesn't undermine my empowerment for making a personal choice based on the available evidence to me at the time.

 

[Yew]

I am not forcing anyone to do anything. Please provide evidence where I have.

You've expressed support for laws that do exactly that.

 

[notlob.divad]

If you really want to feel empowered, you could start by writing to your local MP and local councillors about the chronic lack of capacity in the NHS, particularly ICU compared to some of our European neighbours. After that you could try to rally other people to do so, maybe join groups with similar ends, create your own, or if you really want to make a difference consider actually moving into politics, or at least supporting someone who is.

Or you could continue to signal your virtues by trying to convince others that you wear a bit of cloth over your face "for the good" of others.

My constituency MP is perfectly aware of my position re funding of the NHS, not that he particlarly needs reminding.

Doing any or all of the above doesn't prevent me from also doing the latter, and vice versa. Of course doing the former, also only helps out people in the UK, whereas doing all I can (including any minute potential benefit of wearing a mask) to prevent a virus spreading and thus potentially mutating is also doing my part for people who live across the rest of the world and may not have access to healthcare facilities such as the NHS.

I have also spent time during lockdowns buying and delivering groceries to vulnerable shielding people in my local neighbourhood amongst a number of other things. All of it empowers me, and is far better than sniping away on a keyboard at people who are trying to play their part just because you don't think it is worthwhile.

 

[35B]

If you are going to make potentially slanderous comments like that, can you please identify a) who you are referring to, and b) what this 'plenty of evidence' is.

Thanks

There have long been a number of posters on here whose representation of their exemptions has left me wondering just how valid their claims of exemption are - bearing in mind not just the list of conditions, but also the test of serious distress.

As I respect the medical confidentiality that underlies individuals' claims and the assumption of the law that those exemptions shouldn't routinely be questioned, I have not and would not challenge such a claim. On the other hand, the combination of exemption and strongly anti-mask views leaves considerable doubt in my mind.

Only those who have posted in that vein will know the full truth as it applies to themselves.

 

[RomeoCharlie71]

@notlob.divad @nedchester I assume you both wore face coverings long before they were mandatory in shops, yes? I'm curious, that's all.

Otherwise your arguments for masks are nonsensical and scream that you're only doing it because the government said you have to.

 

[Bantamzen]

My constituency MP is perfectly aware of my position re funding of the NHS, not that he particlarly needs reminding.

Doing any or all of the above doesn't prevent me from also doing the latter, and vice versa. Of course doing the former, also only helps out people in the UK, whereas doing all I can (including any minute potential benefit of wearing a mask) to prevent a virus spreading and thus potentially mutating is also doing my part for people who live across the rest of the world and may not have access to healthcare facilities such as the NHS.

I have also spent time during lockdowns buying and delivering groceries to vulnerable shielding people in my local neighbourhood amongst a number of other things. All of it empowers me, and is far better than sniping away on a keyboard at people who are trying to play their part just because you don't think it is worthwhile.

Now that last paragraph is empowering, and if you had used that as your example I would have said no fair play. But you used mask wearing as your empowerment, and that is virtue signalling.

 

[yorksrob]

Being able to go out for a walk in the countryside empowers me.

Having the authorities telling me to "stay at home" all the time, disempowers me.

 

[notlob.divad]

You've expressed support for laws that do exactly that.

Where? please provide the evidence, as to where I have expressed support for the law on this.

 

[py_megapixel]

Being able to go out for a walk in the countryside empowers me.

At this point, going for a walk is pretty much all that's keeping me going...

For me, lockdown is just about working, but it's certainly not sustainable. I know some people are in a much worse state than myself.

 

[notlob.divad]

Now that last paragraph is empowering, and if you had used that as your example I would have said no fair play. But you used mask wearing as your empowerment, and that is virtue signalling.

Both would be virtue signalling because I told you about them. Not telling you about them would be the only way to not virtue signal.

But someone asked if wearing a mask had empowered me, it has certainly contributed to it.

 

[yorksrob]

At this point, going for a walk is pretty much all that's keeping me going...

For me, lockdown is just about working, but it's certainly not sustainable. I know some people are in a much worse state than myself.

Yes, in many ways work is my saviour through all this. In other ways, having it continually with no alternative is a strain.

 

[notlob.divad]

@notlob.divad @nedchester I assume you both wore face coverings long before they were mandatory in shops, yes? I'm curious, that's all.

Otherwise your arguments for masks are nonsensical and scream that you're only doing it because the government said you have to.

See Previous post.

 

[nedchester]

@notlob.divad @nedchester I assume you both wore face coverings long before they were mandatory in shops, yes? I'm curious, that's all.

Otherwise your arguments for masks are nonsensical and scream that you're only doing it because the government said you have to.

No, I didn't because back then it was early days in the pandemic but when law I decided to follow the law.

It used to be a 30 mph down my road but they've recently introduced a 20 mph limit for safety reasons. I decided to follow the 20 mph limit because the law requires me to and that it might be safer.

As I say I'm not a 'maskavist' but think it might help matters during the current time.

There have long been a number of posters on here whose representation of their exemptions has left me wondering just how valid their claims of exemption are - bearing in mind not just the list of conditions, but also the test of serious distress.

As I respect the medical confidentiality that underlies individuals' claims and the assumption of the law that those exemptions shouldn't routinely be questioned, I have not and would not challenge such a claim. On the other hand, the combination of exemption and strongly anti-mask views leaves considerable doubt in my mind.

Only those who have posted in that vein will know the full truth as it applies to themselves.

Agreed

 

[Bantamzen]

Both would be virtue signalling because I told you about them. Not telling you about them would be the only way to not virtue signal.

But someone asked if wearing a mask had empowered me, it has certainly contributed to it.

No pretending you are making a difference, i.e. praising yourself for mask wearing is virtue signalling, but actually doing something to help that makes a perceivable difference is not.

Which is why I am baffled as to why you chose the former over the latter first.

 

[DB]

Some people on here are very much the online equivalent of the person who hassles people without masks on trains. They don't know what reason the person has for not being able to wear one, but make it clear that they think it's not a real, proper reason.

They also seem to assume that someone being completely unconvinced of the benefit of masks means that they are probably just pretending and could wear one really. It seems not to have occurred to them that many people not able to wear masks have made a point of reading up on all this 'evidence' behind the law which makes them a target for hassle, and are unsurprisingly not at all impressed that the scientific justification for it is largely non-existent.

 

[Moderating team]

OK folks the moderating team have reviewed this thread and decided to close it as it is starting to get a bit personal and we are also starting to go round the circular debate about masks again.