03-19-2020, 11:23 AM -
(03-19-2020, 09:43 AM)Roger H. Sterling Wrote: Been thinking about all the knock on effects of this and things like old folk without corona not getting their usual level of care, to thing like homeless people not being able to make as much as they would to survive. There's a huge breadth of folk who will suffer as a byproduct of this whole thing that we'll not fully know the extent of for years.
(03-19-2020, 09:49 AM)Neaven Staismith Wrote: Totally. There's bairns I see going to Breakfast Club at 8.00 at my kid's school every morning without fail, even in the pishing rain, and it isn't because their parents work. The kids also get lunch at school. One of the families that send their kids there have three boys - that's an extra six meals a day their ma has to provide, with atm no extra help. Taking away the obvious problems with that, you've then got the longer-term problems to the kids' and parents' mental health and problems associated with malnourishment and lack of dental care that gets provided by the school. Every day of inaction just deepens the hole the vulnerable will have to climb out of.
It’s just exposed so brutally how dysfunctional our society is at its core. How can we possibly have got to a situation where schools can’t close because it means thousands of kids won’t eat, or it means they won’t have a responsible adult modelling positive behaviours or enforcing boundaries, or won’t have anyone to look after them at all? When I was younger the vast majority of my peers had a parent at home and one income was enough to support a reasonable, if not affluent, standard of living. People have been saying it for years that wages have stagnated and people are working longer and longer for less recompense (and getting labelled “red begs” etc for it amirite ), and now we live in a society where most families will have two incomes just to pay the bills or have some semblance of comfort. Women joining the workforce has been a great thing in terms of equality and a terrible thing for quality of life - and that’s not a criticism of anyone other than governments and employers who have exploited all of us for decades.
Imagine a society where we are so terrified of looking after our own kids because it will devastate our economy and our livelihoods