When will this shit end?

[Mr.Tease]

3 hours ago, ace56blaa said:

This is the problem with our economy. Always trying to force the status quo rather than adapt. High Street shops are dying."It's due to covid and not due to the internet, so we have to put tons of schemes in to save the high street" - the sandwich one is the worst because people at work have to spend money on expensive sandwiches when a lot of people would rather be at home, making their own food and saving that money

Exactly, there's a resistance to any kind of change. I'd love to see why not switch to ice cream van style selling of Pret or Greggs or whatever, where they take their products to people working from home or stuck at home, if they're that arsed about them.

Really grates- for years/decades people have essentially been forced to commute to work and pay extortionate train fares or pay extortionate rents or house prices, and no one did anything to help. Now they're expected to risk their lives to maintain an economy that didn't give a toot about them and has zero incentive or reward for them. 

[Fuzzy Afro]

Really ugly numbers today. Hopefully we hear news of another factory outbreak or something that’s driving that, otherwise it’s a really ugly jump 

[zahidf]

10 minutes ago, gizmoman said:

What about hidden agendas and misinformation in mainstream media? Or do we accept what they say without question? There are plenty of people who doubt the official line on Covid many of who are not "far-right" I ask again is Piers Corbyn "Far-Right"? And in any case why do you have to put political labels on people, most people hold a variety of views some of which may be characterised as right or left but their personal balance would probably be somewhere closer to the centre overall, that's certainly the case for me, I hold views that may well be pretty right-wing in some regard but also some quite socialist beliefs. Branding people as "Far-right" or "conspiracy theorist" is actually a method  of political censorship as you are basically saying "nothing this person has to say can have any validity" so it then doesn't matter what their argument is, it gets disregarded whether right or wrong.

Here's the BBC's report on the Berlin protests on 1st August,

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-53622797

it includes this,

"The BBC's Damien McGuinness said some participants were from the far right and some were conspiracy theorists who do not believe Covid-19 exists, but others were ordinary people who simply object to the government's approach to the pandemic."

Ordinary people? So right wingers and conspiracy believers are not ordinary? Not "normal"? See how the use of language demonises people.

They could have simply said "the demo drew people from all walks of life and both ends of the political spectrum" both quotes are factually correct but the BBC ran with one that discredited the attendees, strangely enough virtually every other mainstream report used the words "far right" and "conspiracy theory" too, quite a coincidence. BTW there is a large demo planned for Berlin this Saturday but the government have now banned it and say the police will act against any demonstrators so it will be interesting to see what happens this weekend.

I'd say people from the far right aren't normal people, especially in Germany when they are neo nazis

Edited August 27, 2020 by zahidf

[shoptildrop]

3 hours ago, Ryan1984 said:

I started a new job remotely over lockdown and they are currently in a temporary office space with no parking.
It’s a 60-mile round trip (plus parking) or daily £30 train fare (need to look into weekly cost). I will go in soon to meet my colleagues but I’m hoping to stay mainly remote for as long as possible - I’d rather spend two or three hours working than commuting.
I’d be taking my own lunch in anyway so Pret are not missing out! Let’s hope the businesses continue the good fight.

I was only 6 months into new job when I was furloughed in April, I have a 76 mile round trip drive which is really hard tbh and work did not do any flexible working as very bums on seats..

Finally back next week part time 3 days but WFH (thank god), I hope this can continue as long as possible as hate my commute and can easily do job from home, but know my old school manager (well most of the managers) struggle with remote working and not being sat with your team day in day out. I did 5 years previously with manager in NZ, team in China and peers in various locations in the UK and I managed, I suppose it's what you used to.. 

I'm hating this narrative you have to get back to your office desk to do your job effectively as it's just flaming the divisions between office workers and folks who can't do their jobs from home  

 

[Quark]

10 minutes ago, Mr.Tease said:

Exactly, there's a resistance to any kind of change. I'd love to see why not switch to ice cream van style selling of Pret or Greggs or whatever, where they take their products to people working from home or stuck at home, if they're that arsed about them.

Really grates- for years/decades people have essentially been forced to commute to work and pay extortionate train fares or pay extortionate rents or house prices, and no one did anything to help. Now they're expected to risk their lives to maintain an economy that didn't give a toot about them and has zero incentive or reward for them. 

Don't disagree, but the key here has to be transition.  Whether we like it or not (and as a one of those fleeced commuters I don't!) if there isn't a transition pathway then you just end up with a massive chunk of workforce unemployed and effectively a repeat of what happened to the mining communities when the industry was killed and they were given nothing to replace it.

Granted a bunch of Prets and Costa Coffees going under isn't as romantic (I know, best word I can think of, don't @ me over that bit please) as the miner's strikes, but the end result could be the same.

EDIT: re-read, probably overstating it tbf, but I'll leave it up as I think the basic principle stand and I'm too lazy to completely re-write it 

Edited August 27, 2020 by Quark

[shoptildrop]

22 hours ago, shoptildrop said:

The librarian deserves a medal IMO that's brilliant  

Great day out for the PM - get's called an arsehole by young child, looks of disdain from a group of 11 year old's and epic trolling from the school librarian 

awww it turns out the book layout was for the School rather than Boris 

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/castle-rock-school-librarian-didnt-arrange-book-boris-johnson_uk_5f4767b7c5b64f17e138dbdd?ncid=other_twitter_cooo9wqtham&utm_campaign=share_twitter&guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly90LmNvL1BMWldEQ3FFdHQ_YW1wPTE&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAIzWRwZNM-O__q8HOtaS1r_82uHZ2ZuYM82bt0ly7K12KIr-RZMKVrTM5Akf32K7nYoU4xt4mFA5NCdoWeBbQq0I6jl3_j98Dnb-ZNNBTCMirgKuUSQPg7TGLYf7oa-ZfcZrsbsaIqB8m9wXykWq3_eHEHu1UU7LXL8F-yvMWy7P

 

[Chapple12345]

13 minutes ago, Fuzzy Afro said:

Really ugly numbers today. Hopefully we hear news of another factory outbreak or something that’s driving that, otherwise it’s a really ugly jump 

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-norfolk-53919320

This is probably why...

[Fuzzy Afro]

2 minutes ago, Chapple12345 said:

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.bbc.co.uk/news/amp/uk-england-norfolk-53919320

This is probably why...

Thats +75 when the average is up by a few hundred. Hopefully the article is out of date and we’ve got 200+ cases in this cluster. 

[steviewevie]

23 minutes ago, Fuzzy Afro said:

Really ugly numbers today. Hopefully we hear news of another factory outbreak or something that’s driving that, otherwise it’s a really ugly jump 

it's just more lies from msm trying to keep us ordinary folk down.

[Chapple12345]

7 minutes ago, Fuzzy Afro said:

Thats +75 when the average is up by a few hundred. Hopefully the article is out of date and we’ve got 200+ cases in this cluster. 

It's on my local news they expect this number to grow massively so perhaps its confirmed cases in there that haven't been released yet 

[mcshed]

15 minutes ago, Quark said:

Granted a bunch of Prets and Costa Coffees going under isn't as romantic (I know, best word I can think of, don't @ me over that bit please) as the miner's strikes, but the end result could be the same.

The big difference is staff turnover, in those kind of catering jobs it is incredibly high so rather than a loads of people losing what was likely to be their job for life a load of people are losing temporary work that they'd likely do for a year or two at most. The disruption won't be great but it won't gut whole communities in the same way.

[Mark E. Spliff]

19 minutes ago, gizmoman said:

What about hidden agendas and misinformation in mainstream media? Or do we accept what they say without question?

...

I ask again is Piers Corbyn "Far-Right"?

...

So right wingers and conspiracy believers are not ordinary? Not "normal"?

If you trawled back through to my last political appearance within this very thread, I was arguing a very unpopular position which was in opposition to all the mainstream media and political parties.  I won't regurgitate it and thereby derail this discussion  - the only point I'm making is simply: no, hidden agendas and misinformation ought to be challenged regardless of which part of the media or political spectrum they're from.

...

Who's Piers Corbyn?  What relevance to this discussion is it what I think of him?

...

I made a point of using the phrase 'post truth society' in my last reply to you.  That was deliberate.  In a world where doubt is being cast on 'experts,' conspiracy theorists can run riot, and covid is rapidly descending into a fact-free swamp.  It just so happens that most of the conspiracy theorists are extreme right-wing, in that they fear big government is using fear to take away our freedoms and impose some kind of authoritarian state.  The reverse is, of course, true - national Governments have lost any real power to regulate corporations due to the rise of global capitalism and the removal of financial regulation.  I see the rise of conspiracy theorists (or to put it another way: the loss of faith in facts and experts) as the most dangerous trend in the age of social media.  Whether I see conspiracy theorists as 'ordinary' or 'normal' isn't important - they're peddling lies and there's a real danger a flood of scientifically-illiterate fact-avoiders are going to do massive harm to the world.

There was an excellent radio series recently explaining how corporations learned how to sow the seeds of doubt in order to create crackpot conspiracy theories in the face of all the scientific evidence to avoid regulation.  The right wing tend to mistrust the BBC, but they've made sure they've quoted their sources, so feel free to check them out:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000l7q0

[steviewevie]

2 minutes ago, mcshed said:

The big difference is staff turnover, in those kind of catering jobs it is incredibly high so rather than a loads of people losing what was likely to be their job for life a load of people are losing temporary work that they'd likely do for a year or two at most. The disruption won't be great but it won't gut whole communities in the same way.

yeah as mcshed says,  miners losing the strike ended up destroying whole communities and towns...some that have really struggled to recover...so comparison isn't good. But this isn't just pret and costa, it is loads of small businesses that rely on people commuting and working in town/city centres...pubs etc. But, does feel a bit inevitable this is how it's going to go. Maybe businesses in london will be less inclined to pay london weighted wages to workers who live and work elsewhere.

[Crazyfool01]

More factories then ... id like to know if the Ppe they use is adequate ... seems like a prevention of these outbreaks is going to be key to containing the virus 🦠 
 

ive just been told my company had masks delivered to stores last week and we have yet to see them ... possibly in a box in our wearhouse ... wonder if they would say we have adequate Ppe also ... ? 

[parsonjack]

Switzerland, Jamaica and Czech Republic added to quarantine list now.

[Leyrulion]

21 minutes ago, Fuzzy Afro said:

Thats +75 when the average is up by a few hundred. Hopefully the article is out of date and we’ve got 200+ cases in this cluster. 

Apparently 250 of the cases are more then 7 days old. Some sort of backlog in publishing the results. When you look by date conducted the average is flat or declining.

 

 

[Chapple12345]

Switzerland, Jamaica and Czech Republic added to quarantine list 

[parsonjack]

1 hour ago, ace56blaa said:

1522 New Cases today with 186,000 tests. 

186,500 is yesterdays testing number.  No number for today (27th) yet.....and the tests/positive cases ratio graph looks like this up to and including yesterday....still no significant climb to anywhere near where we were a few months back.

Edited August 27, 2020 by parsonjack

[March Hare]

1 hour ago, Quark said:

Something tells me the War on Christmas is going to start early this year.

Eid gatherings were, in effect, cancelled for significant numbers in the north with 24 hours notice. If there is a spike leading up to Christmas you might be eating that turkey alone.  If the pubs are open and parties are a happening...

[Quark]

13 minutes ago, mcshed said:

The big difference is staff turnover, in those kind of catering jobs it is incredibly high so rather than a loads of people losing what was likely to be their job for life a load of people are losing temporary work that they'd likely do for a year or two at most. The disruption won't be great but it won't gut whole communities in the same way.

A valid point. But even if you take the community part of it away that's still a lot of jobs, transient or otherwise, that would go.

I'm just wary of saying "fuck 'em" without thinking of what comes next.

[steviewevie]

9 minutes ago, Mark E. Spliff said:

If you trawled back through to my last political appearance within this very thread, I was arguing a very unpopular position which was in opposition to all the mainstream media and political parties.  I won't regurgitate it and thereby derail this discussion  - the only point I'm making is simply: no, hidden agendas and misinformation ought to be challenged regardless of which part of the media or political spectrum they're from.

...

Who's Piers Corbyn?  What relevance to this discussion is it what I think of him?

...

I made a point of using the phrase 'post truth society' in my last reply to you.  That was deliberate.  In a world where doubt is being cast on 'experts,' conspiracy theorists can run riot, and covid is rapidly descending into a fact-free swamp.  It just so happens that most of the conspiracy theorists are extreme right-wing, in that they fear big government is using fear to take away our freedoms and impose some kind of authoritarian state.  The reverse is, of course, true - national Governments have lost any real power to regulate corporations due to the rise of global capitalism and the removal of financial regulation.  I see the rise of conspiracy theorists (or to put it another way: the loss of faith in facts and experts) as the most dangerous trend in the age of social media.  Whether I see conspiracy theorists as 'ordinary' or 'normal' isn't important - they're peddling lies and there's a real danger a flood of scientifically-illiterate fact-avoiders are going to do massive harm to the world.

There was an excellent radio series recently explaining how corporations learned how to sow the seeds of doubt in order to create crackpot conspiracy theories in the face of all the scientific evidence to avoid regulation.  The right wing tend to mistrust the BBC, but they've made sure they've quoted their sources, so feel free to check them out:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000l7q0

https://www.theguardian.com/science/audio/2020/may/05/covid-19-the-psychology-of-conspiracy-theories

[Quark]

4 minutes ago, March Hare said:

Eid gatherings were, in effect, cancelled for significant numbers in the north with 24 hours notice. If there is a spike leading up to Christmas you might be eating that turkey alone.  If the pubs are open and parties are a happening...

Was a response to the "patriotic majority vs the woke left" bollocks in that article; bogus "War on Christmas" crap gets rolled out every year as an example of how traditions are being destroyed by liberals. Should have quoted to make it clearer!

[Chapple12345]

8 minutes ago, parsonjack said:

186,500 is yesterdays testing number.  No number for today (27th) yet.....and the tests/positive cases ratio graph looks like this up to and including yesterday....still no significant climb to anywhere near where we were a few months back.

The biggest issue is that cases don't equal hospitalizations so even if theres a big surge in cases it doesn't necessarily guarantee people will need hospital treatments, it seems as if we are currently in a lucky stage where we aren't seeing a big need for hospital care which some other countries have seen. Any news on any other european countries figures today? 

[ace56blaa]

11 minutes ago, Quark said:

A valid point. But even if you take the community part of it away that's still a lot of jobs, transient or otherwise, that would go.

I'm just wary of saying "fuck 'em" without thinking of what comes next.

if only there was so sort of, I dunno lets call it a "universal basic income" to help people transition from job to job when the business goes under or covid cause job losses. That would help normal changes to the economy and free market not decimate peoples lives and communities.  

That's just me being vastly over optimistic though I guess, but surely it would fix so much of what is failing in our economy atm

[parsonjack]

3 minutes ago, Chapple12345 said:

The biggest issue is that cases don't equal hospitalizations so even if theres a big surge in cases it doesn't necessarily guarantee people will need hospital treatments, it seems as if we are currently in a lucky stage where we aren't seeing a big need for hospital care which some other countries have seen. Any news on any other european countries figures today? 

Agreed...and most likely (but not entirely) due to spread of infection between younger people, illegal raves, lockdown parties etc. and subsequent lesser degree of illness.