Making the news today....

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

7 minutes ago, Mark J said:

I like other peoples words too:

Howie Turner

23 April at 20:46

Spoke with some UK based friends today about the CV19 situation there. They are living in another world. A world where the mistakes never happened and the lack of PPE is merely a matter of logistics. They were so proud of clapping the NHS on Thursdays and rainbows drawn by kids and genuinely perplexed that we had no common ground on that topic and had barely heard about it on the BBC.

In France the response is completely different. It's surgical. Factual. Efficient. No room for sentiment when you are fighting a killer. And it's working.

I just came across this little essay by Gavin Barber. It sort of sums up how we see the UK right now.

“So, I'm getting increasingly concerned about the longer-term implications of what might lazily be termed the "Diana-fication" of the NHS - a mass outpouring of sentimental expression, and a sudden, rather revisionist clutching to the national bosom, as exemplified by large-scale charity fund-raising and public (social media) expressions of "support".

First problem with this: the NHS is not a charity. It's a national organisation (the clue is very much in the name, here) which is and should be publicly funded via taxation. Treating it as the subject of seasonal/event-driven fundraising efforts undermines the long-standing, democratically-expressed consensus that the NHS is something that everyone should take their fair share of responsibility for funding - not something that you sometimes choose to give money to when you're feeling particularly soppy about nurses.

Second problem: the trend for public "celebration" brings with it an increasingly prevalent portrayal of NHS staff as smiling, benevolent "heroes". They do heroic things, but they're not happy amateurs who put on a uniform when they feel like playing superheroes: they're highly trained professionals performing a range of difficult, stressful, and sometimes boring tasks in a variety of clinical and non-clinical roles. A sentimentalised portrayal of NHS workers risks undermining their professionalism.

(Aside: as others wittier and more articulate than me have pointed out, the Thursday evening "support" events have quickly taken on a grandiose, almost aggressive edge, in much the same way as wearing a poppy in November was once a quietly respectful commemoration of sacrifice but is now a "my poppy's bigger than yours so I care more about dead soldiers than you do" competition. The public gestures of support have quickly escalated from being a nice thing to do, into something that people are *expected* to do - to the point where those who don't join in are on the verge of being portrayed as granite-faced malcontents who want to see all nurses locked in a cage full of snakes and lions and poo, despite the fact that those people might be sleeping off a hospital nightshift or putting young kids to bed at 8pm on a Thursday).

Why does any of this matter?, some might ask. Where's the harm in a public upsurge of support for a vital, life-saving group of public servants?

Why it matters, I think, is because movements of this kind are, by their nature, *transitory*. They capture the public mood at a particular moment in time, and then that moment passes, and people move on to something else. And we are still going to need the NHS once this is all over. (Which, by the way, it won't be, for ages).

More than that: all this love-bombing gives the NHS and its staff a halo - a halo with a lustre that will inevitably fade. And that is dangerous. This is Britain. There will be a Newtonian response to all of this. A backlash. (It's probably already started in some quarters). So, once all of the coronavirus-driven disruption starts to fade, and the NHS is crying out for funding in more 'normal' times, there will be those - and there will be many of them - whose instinctive reaction will be that the NHS have had their day in the spotlight, and should go back to being undervalued and disrespected. "What? Them again? I gave £10 to Captain Tom and now you want me to pay more National Insurance? Fuck that. I'm voting Tory".

Perhaps most importantly of all, throwing charity and applause at the NHS lets the government off the hook. It leaves people thinking that, individually and collectively, we have all "done our bit", because we gave them a few extra quid when we were feeling totes emosh, and banged a saucepan on a Thursday evening. Whereas the more prosaic (but much less Instagrammable) truth is that the parlous state of the NHS is entirely attributable to a government which has spent the last decade running it into a state of deliberate neglect to the point where its only possible salvation is to be sold off, bit by bit, to the likes of Richard Branson. Nationalise the risk, privatise the profit. As ever. But, because the likes of Matt Hancock and Boris Johnson can publicly associate themselves with a time and a movement in which EVERYONE LOVED THE NHS, they dodge culpability for their systematic dismantling of it.

So, you know. Show some socially distant love on a Thursday evening if you want to. But remember that you can do far more for the NHS at the ballot box than you ever can from your window or your social media accounts.”

Doubtless some elements of truth in that....

[kevinjohnsonmbe]

4 minutes ago, Woodworks said:

I thought the press on the whole was fairly good to start with but now the gloves are clearly off. It cant be good for the mental health of many with the endless and pointless "what ifs" being thrown around.

 

As I see it the government were pathetically slow out the blocks but have done the best they can since then. 

I can't understand why they went with a national approach rather than a regional one.  Other than the obvious Londoncentric mentality of Westminster maybe.

 

Metropolitan centres with international air / rail hubs and population density are vastly different beasts to the rest (majority?) of the nation.

 

With proper / strict movement restrictions (M25, Wales, Cornwall etc etc - I'm sure there are more that could have been defined) surely there could have been a tiered approach to the whole thing rather than a national one...  

[Johnsond]

17 hours ago, Mark J said:

You never know, you might have to get a proper job if oil goes out of favour.

What is a Proper job ffs do you have any idea of the different roles carried out in support of North Sea operations !!!!! I fear not nor the reality of doing a trip that for those vessel based and not on rotation that might be anything from 4-12 weeks at min 12hrs a day 7 days a week. There’s plenty of lads from mine and your way making a living from it too. This ranks up with the dumbest of your statements. The thousands of guys looking at possible redundancy and subsequent worries about how they house and feed families  would not appreciate the left wing envy bullshit from a tax dodging fake ltd company director. Oil won’t go out of favour it’s just the extreme capitalist shite we have to deal with on a day to day basis that’s causing this and let’s not forget unless you ain’t noticed a worldwide virus issue ?‍♂️?‍♂️. Seriously Mark you don’t half let yourself down at times with the sheer volume of pseudo left wing socialist shit you spout on here. 

[Mark J]

24 minutes ago, Johnsond said:

What is a Proper job ffs do you have any idea of the different roles carried out in support of North Sea operations !!!!! I fear not nor the reality of doing a trip that for those vessel based and not on rotation that might be anything from 4-12 weeks at min 12hrs a day 7 days a week. There’s plenty of lads from mine and your way making a living from it too. This ranks up with the dumbest of your statements. The thousands of guys looking at possible redundancy and subsequent worries about how they house and feed families  would not appreciate the left wing envy bullshit from a tax dodging fake ltd company director. Oil won’t go out of favour it’s just the extreme capitalist shite we have to deal with on a day to day basis that’s causing this and let’s not forget unless you ain’t noticed a worldwide virus issue ?‍♂️?‍♂️. Seriously Mark you don’t half let yourself down at times with the sheer volume of pseudo left wing socialist shit you spout on here. 

A while back, triggered suggested that someone who was wanting to get into tree work should get study something else, in case they needed to get a 'proper job'.
 

"The thousands of guys looking at possible redundancy and subsequent worries about how they house and feed families  would not appreciate the left wing envy bullshit from a tax dodging fake ltd company director."
You know nothing of me, my operations or my political leanings. I dislike the tories, I'll give you that.

 

Edited April 28, 2020 by Mark J

[David Cropper]

36 minutes ago, Mark J said:

I like other peoples words too:

Howie Turner

23 April at 20:46

Spoke with some UK based friends today about the CV19 situation there. They are living in another world. A world where the mistakes never happened and the lack of PPE is merely a matter of logistics. They were so proud of clapping the NHS on Thursdays and rainbows drawn by kids and genuinely perplexed that we had no common ground on that topic and had barely heard about it on the BBC.

In France the response is completely different. It's surgical. Factual. Efficient. No room for sentiment when you are fighting a killer. And it's working.

I just came across this little essay by Gavin Barber. It sort of sums up how we see the UK right now.

“So, I'm getting increasingly concerned about the longer-term implications of what might lazily be termed the "Diana-fication" of the NHS - a mass outpouring of sentimental expression, and a sudden, rather revisionist clutching to the national bosom, as exemplified by large-scale charity fund-raising and public (social media) expressions of "support".

First problem with this: the NHS is not a charity. It's a national organisation (the clue is very much in the name, here) which is and should be publicly funded via taxation. Treating it as the subject of seasonal/event-driven fundraising efforts undermines the long-standing, democratically-expressed consensus that the NHS is something that everyone should take their fair share of responsibility for funding - not something that you sometimes choose to give money to when you're feeling particularly soppy about nurses.

Second problem: the trend for public "celebration" brings with it an increasingly prevalent portrayal of NHS staff as smiling, benevolent "heroes". They do heroic things, but they're not happy amateurs who put on a uniform when they feel like playing superheroes: they're highly trained professionals performing a range of difficult, stressful, and sometimes boring tasks in a variety of clinical and non-clinical roles. A sentimentalised portrayal of NHS workers risks undermining their professionalism.

(Aside: as others wittier and more articulate than me have pointed out, the Thursday evening "support" events have quickly taken on a grandiose, almost aggressive edge, in much the same way as wearing a poppy in November was once a quietly respectful commemoration of sacrifice but is now a "my poppy's bigger than yours so I care more about dead soldiers than you do" competition. The public gestures of support have quickly escalated from being a nice thing to do, into something that people are *expected* to do - to the point where those who don't join in are on the verge of being portrayed as granite-faced malcontents who want to see all nurses locked in a cage full of snakes and lions and poo, despite the fact that those people might be sleeping off a hospital nightshift or putting young kids to bed at 8pm on a Thursday).

Why does any of this matter?, some might ask. Where's the harm in a public upsurge of support for a vital, life-saving group of public servants?

Why it matters, I think, is because movements of this kind are, by their nature, *transitory*. They capture the public mood at a particular moment in time, and then that moment passes, and people move on to something else. And we are still going to need the NHS once this is all over. (Which, by the way, it won't be, for ages).

More than that: all this love-bombing gives the NHS and its staff a halo - a halo with a lustre that will inevitably fade. And that is dangerous. This is Britain. There will be a Newtonian response to all of this. A backlash. (It's probably already started in some quarters). So, once all of the coronavirus-driven disruption starts to fade, and the NHS is crying out for funding in more 'normal' times, there will be those - and there will be many of them - whose instinctive reaction will be that the NHS have had their day in the spotlight, and should go back to being undervalued and disrespected. "What? Them again? I gave £10 to Captain Tom and now you want me to pay more National Insurance? Fuck that. I'm voting Tory".

Perhaps most importantly of all, throwing charity and applause at the NHS lets the government off the hook. It leaves people thinking that, individually and collectively, we have all "done our bit", because we gave them a few extra quid when we were feeling totes emosh, and banged a saucepan on a Thursday evening. Whereas the more prosaic (but much less Instagrammable) truth is that the parlous state of the NHS is entirely attributable to a government which has spent the last decade running it into a state of deliberate neglect to the point where its only possible salvation is to be sold off, bit by bit, to the likes of Richard Branson. Nationalise the risk, privatise the profit. As ever. But, because the likes of Matt Hancock and Boris Johnson can publicly associate themselves with a time and a movement in which EVERYONE LOVED THE NHS, they dodge culpability for their systematic dismantling of it.

So, you know. Show some socially distant love on a Thursday evening if you want to. But remember that you can do far more for the NHS at the ballot box than you ever can from your window or your social media accounts.”

Long winded, self important twat.

[difflock]

13 minutes ago, David Cropper said:

Long winded, self important twat.

David, needless to say ah nivver even read the link provided, but gave you a like based on your previous impeccable judgement on such matters!

EDIT;

Make that "Cogently and concisely expressed impeccable judgement"

Edited April 28, 2020 by difflock

[Mark J]

5 minutes ago, David Cropper said:

Long winded, self important twat.

You should be a writer.
 

[David Cropper]

1 minute ago, Mark J said:

You should be a writer.
 

And you Sir, should have been a Politician.

[donnk]

1 hour ago, Mark J said:

The gov classed 500,000 pairs of gloves as 1m pieces of PPE. They like manipulating figures, when they can pronounce them.

latex gloves come in boxes of 100, for the irish thats 50 pairs. Bit offensive to the one handed though.

[Mark J]

Just now, David Cropper said:

And you Sir, should have been a Politician.

Is that because I'm full of shit?
If so, then you should be a comedian too.
I'd be a terrible politician.