Blitz Spirit

[Spinney 777]

Anybody else watch this programme on BBC1 last night, presented by historian Lucy Worsley?
I sincerely hope it was being watched by all the whingeing gits who think they’ve been so hard done by over the last year, due to the pandemic. Having been born not long after the end of the war, I’ve always been well aware, from what my parents told me, of what it was like during the blitz. 
Seeing film of the period again last night, it really puts any perceived pandemic hardship into perspective. You just can’t imagine what it must have been like, being bombed night after night, not knowing if you or your family would survive until the next day, let alone knowing there was a good chance your home and all belongings might be destroyed. 
Every person who complains about their anxieties and loss of personal freedom at the moment, should be made to sit down and watch film such as those shown last night. Then ask them if they still feel so hard done by!

[exeterjeep 318]

Most younger people can't manage a day without facebook/twitter etc, so there is no way they would cope if all tech was taken away by some sort of seismic event.  I remember an article asking some youngsters where things come from they did not know that peas grow in pods and have to be shelled to get the peas out, and that they are not grown in tins. We just have to live through covid as best we can and  expect things will improve later this year from then on. 

[Chillidoggy 4,466]

I read recently that 'Nomophobia' has been proposed as a specific term for a phobia caused by the lack of a mobile phone signal.

 

[Spinney 777]

Stories touched on last night such as the young volunteer nurse given the minimum of training and then thrown in at the deep end were particularly emotive. At one point she was lowered by her ankles into a hole in a bombed out building so she could administer chloroform to a mortally wounded fella to put him out of his misery. She was traumatised by that, not surprisingly, yet still she just got on with it. 

What, for me, was particularly interesting about the programme last night was that it followed the lives of, I think, 5 people who lived through that horror, from their personal diaries which are now kept in the Imperial War Museum and showing their live descendants on screen afterwards only served to confirm they were real. Extraordinary people, just like the millions of other extraordinary people who went through a similar experience.

Very humbling I think and if you weren't able to watch it last night, I would urge everybody to pick it up on iPlayer.

[LotusLeftLotusRight 1,408]

I don’t think any UK citizen born after 1945 has endured anything like that sort of experience, unless they are ex armed forces. Sure most of us lived through the Cold War, IRA atrocities, 21st Century terror attacks and now CV-19, but that’s nothing like what the civilian populations of both sides endured in WW2.

As an aside, the town in Germany where my employer is based has had a power cut for the past 2 hours due to a substation fire. Apparently it’s chaos: no traffic lights, no phone lines and no broadband! May as well all hide under the desks!

[910Esprit 577]

Its a bit rich coming from the BBC.   Particularly during the first lockdown, they were going out of their way to undermine a lot of what the government were trying to achieve.  

[mayevora 1,354]

I had this same conversation last weekend with one of my daughters who stormed out of the room screaming “You don’t know what it’s like or how stressed I am!!”

Well, love her to bits but as I told her, (still lives with us and is 23) you haven’t got a f#%kin clue what stress is! - Roof over your head. Heating. Lighting. Electricity. Food and drink. Running hot water. No financial issues. Good health. A job she’s furloughed from getting paid to have a lye in most mornings. Phone. Laptop. Game Systems. TV. Netflix. Sky. Wifi and a car you can use ect ect.- What the Kin hell have you got to be stressed about!!

Youngsters (not just mine and most likely not all of them) cannot seem to prioritise what is and what is not important in life. They have had everything given to them and they have never had it so easy!

Kids 🤬

Another issue with a lot of the younger Generation is the War was something that happened shortly after the dinosaurs died out, so Covid is the first time ever in their short lives that any restrictions of any sort has impacted on them.

 

[C8RKH 6,737]

5 hours ago, LotusLeftLotusRight said:

Apparently it’s chaos: no traffic lights, no phone lines and no broadband! May as well all hide under the desks!

But luckily "Not zee R. A. F.!"

1 hour ago, mayevora said:

Well, love her to bits but as I told her, (still lives with us and is 23) you haven’t got a f#%kin clue what stress is! - Roof over your head. Heating. Lighting. Electricity. Food and drink. Running hot water. No financial issues. Good health. A job she’s furloughed from getting paid to have a lye in most mornings. Phone. Laptop. Game Systems. TV. Netflix. Sky. Wifi and a car you can use ect ect.- What the Kin hell have you got to be stressed about!!

And her answer was?

[LotusLeftLotusRight 1,408]

4 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

But luckily "Not zee R. A. F.!"

Last time the RAF paid a visit, our company offices ended up looking like this.

 

[mayevora 1,354]

7 minutes ago, C8RKH said:

 

And her answer was?

After suffering from Dramaqueenitus for about an hour - an apology.

I explained even 30 years ago (1990 feels like 10 mins ago to me lol) no mobiles, no internet, no laptops, most people were not bought their first car. A choice of 4 tv channels - oh, and if you want to continue this conversation even further, go speak to your Grandad about having to go the bottom of the garden to use the outside loo in the middle of the night in winter holding a candle!

[exeterjeep 318]

5 minutes ago, mayevora said:

I explained even 30 years ago (1990 feels like 10 mins ago to me lol) no mobiles,

Should show her a picture of the 'mobile' that was available at this time. The car phone brick that you could take to your car and back.

[Chillidoggy 4,466]

Facebook is inundated with people moaning about how the government has now buggered-up their holiday plans. Not COVID-19, the government.

Oh, and on R2, people moaning about “vaccine passports” being unfair and divisive to those who refuse it. As a merchant seaman years ago, I carried a certificate for every vaccination I’d had, typhoid, yellow fever, small pox etc. It was either that or you had no choice to remain on the ship in any foreign port. So, I can’t see what their issue is. 

 

[Spinney 777]

26 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

Facebook is inundated with people moaning about how the government has now buggered-up their holiday plans. Not COVID-19, the government.

Oh, and on R2, people moaning about “vaccine passports” being unfair and divisive to those who refuse it. As a merchant seaman years ago, I carried a certificate for every vaccination I’d had, typhoid, yellow fever, small pox etc. It was either that or you had no choice to remain on the ship in any foreign port. So, I can’t see what their issue is. 

 

I’ve lost count of the number of street interviews I’ve seen on tv over the past year where people have said things such as, “it’s so unfair that just as we’re able to get back to work, the government are closing things down again.” As you pointed out, not Covid but the government!

I’m not saying Boris got it all right, he hasn’t, but maybe if more people had listened to advice about social distancing and not meeting up covertly, then the death toll wouldn’t be quite so high and we could all resume a normal life that bit sooner. 
 

 

[Chillidoggy 4,466]

3 minutes ago, Spinney said:

I’ve lost count of the number of street interviews I’ve seen on tv over the past year where people have said things such as, “it’s so unfair that just as we’re able to get back to work, the government are closing things down again.” As you pointed out, not Covid but the government!

I’m not saying Boris got it all right, he hasn’t, but maybe if more people had listened to advice about social distancing and not meeting up covertly, then the death toll wouldn’t be quite so high and we could all resume a normal life that bit sooner. 
 

 

For the most part, a prime minister is damned if he does, and damned if he doesn’t, and Covid would be a nightmare scenario for ANY government, of whatever flavour. With 20/20 hindsight (sadly not exclusively available to the BBC, but also to all manner of other organisations), of course mistakes have been made, I’d be surprised if they weren’t. But it’s abundantly clear to me that transmission rates have been increased by those who choose to ignore the guidelines. No contact = no transmission. Simple.

[yeller77 122]

On 24/02/2021 at 08:35, mayevora said:

Well, love her to bits but as I told her, (still lives with us and is 23) you haven’t got a f#%kin clue what stress is! - Roof over your head. Heating. Lighting. Electricity. Food and drink. Running hot water. No financial issues. Good health. A job she’s furloughed from getting paid to have a lye in most mornings. Phone. Laptop. Game Systems. TV. Netflix. Sky. Wifi and a car you can use ect ect.- What the Kin hell have you got to be stressed about!!

Youngsters (not just mine and most likely not all of them) cannot seem to prioritise what is and what is not important in life. They have had everything given to them and they have never had it so easy!

 

I must admit we only have ourselves to blame. The growing affluence of the last 50 years has allowed us to (mostly) have anything of the above that we want, so it naturally filters down to the young ones, hence they expect it. It takes a lot of "tough love" to build independence and resilience in our kids which is most difficult as we all in each generation want our kids to have it better than we did. They have no framework with which to appreciate what it took to get them there. I'm sure I and my siblings caused just as much eye-rolling in my folks who were born into a Great Depression then endured a Dust Bowl and a World War as they heard me complain about my friends down the street getting cable TV while we still had rabbit ears and 4 channels.

[Chillidoggy 4,466]

Four channels? Luxury!

i remember when there were only two. @pete never had a TV.

[exeterjeep 318]

16 minutes ago, Chillidoggy said:

Four channels? Luxury!

And of course there was not much in the way of 24hr broadcasting either.  C4 - and the start of the series Countdown...Do remember one of the early days had an hour of Hot Gossip.

[pete 1,967]

1 hour ago, Chillidoggy said:

Four channels? Luxury!

i remember when there were only two. @pete never had a TV.

Couldn't fit one in our shoe box

[Dave Eds 289]

10 minutes ago, pete said:

Couldn't fit one in our shoe box

You had shoes?   😯😯

[pete 1,967]

No! Just the box

[mg4lotus 184]

Luxury

[Sparky 2,941]

Aye.  Kids these days...

[Spinney 777]

14 hours ago, Chillidoggy said:

Four channels? Luxury!

i remember when there were only two. @pete never had a TV.

You had two channels? I’m that old I can remember when we only had one!
When ITV came along, my father had to have a separate box installed in the back of our 9” Ferguson.
Mind you, he did work for an electrical shop at the time, so was able to get discount. 

[Chillidoggy 4,466]

I can remember when the only channel we had was the English Channel.

[Bibs 11,665]

And even that was in black and white