My editorial policy* roughly for this blog roughly aligns with: if rant, post on The Rantimator, if more considered, post here.
I’m going to break that rule: here comes a rant.
I get that Christmas is an important time. I get that families like to hang out together. I get that an awful lot of people (unlike me) have big families and have always had that “25 round a table on Christmas Day” thing that I have never really been a part of. I envy this bigness, I really do – it’d be lovely to have brothers, sisters, a father, a sprawling family – that’d be ace.
But.
I absolutely, no matter how I try and consider this from these people’s point of view – do not understand either the Government’s position on “relaxing rules over Christmas” or the families that are going to take advantage of this.
I’ve spoken to a bunch of people over recent days who are going to make the most of these rules but also obviously intend to consider them with a fairly considerable sprinkling of “meh”. Friends who are travelling to London for the New Year. Friends who “might be heading to a party of about 25”. Friends who are having their 89 year old gran over.
The UK’s vulnerable are about to receive the vaccine. Some people already have. So why the actual fuck would you or your family want to throw caution to the wind at this time – I mean, at any time, but particularly now when there is a small quantity of light at the end of the tunnel?
Does Covid19 just lie down for those 5 days? “Nah, fuck it, it’s Christmas, I’ll stop infecting everyone. No problem, pull a cracker with me”. Does mixing become any less dangerous for the old and infirm? No. No, it doesn’t.
I am in an immensely lucky position – I’m in Tier 1. I’m not vulnerable. I have countryside and space around me. I’m also in the “lucky” position of having this decision taken away from me: my mum is in a nursing home (so no big gatherings there) and my parents’ in law are in Tier3, vulnerable and happier to hunker down in the North East over the next few weeks.
I understand very deeply (having wrestled with mild depression for many, many years) that family and friends are important and that there is a huge mental health aspect to this.
I get all of that. Some may say I’m in no position to understand. I do, I really do. But, FFS, surely the sensible, obvious thing to do is just stay at home. Join your family by Zoom. Get shitfaced on your own or with your close family, beam in and watch the Queen remotely if you have to, fart without your gran telling you off…
It’s 5 days, and by all accounts it’ll make an absolutely enormous difference.
Happy fucking Christmas x
(* LOL)