Thank Goodness Yesterday's "Day Of Reflection" Is Over.

[dave50]

Why do we need reminding of a year of misery? Not interested.

[douglas9401]

Was that yesterday?

I forgot.

[woofgang]

I agree APG, I watch the news to get the facts, but neither do I want to se the heart warming/tear jerking stuff

[naomi24]

Jim, //the Remembrance is capable of expanding its initial scope//

But to events and people past - not as you're suggesting - to that which hasn't happened.

[naomi24]

Woofgang, //I watch the news to get the facts, but neither do I want to se the heart warming/tear jerking stuff //

Nor me. Can't be doing with all the hand-wringing and heart-wrenching.

[emmie]

its sad, but confess i didn't participate in yesterdays day of reflection. not because i am hard of heart but i do find it very depressing, especially seeing the daily figures on the news of how many who have died.

[Bobbisox1]

I didn’t either Emmie , my thoughts for our friend, are in my heart and a minutes silence ( although I probably did as I was in on my own) won’t bring him back

[emmie]

no indeed Bobbi. so sad as i said, lets hope the vaccination programme keeps on going quickly.

[New Judge]

//All the real news has gone from British TV//

Absolutely spot-on, Aunt Polly.

Yesterday was a binge-fest of the “news” that has been presented over the past year. The only things that need to be on the daily news are:

How many people have contracted the virus?
How many have been hospitalised as a result?
How many have died as a result?

Add to that news of the vaccination rollout (numbers only) and any developments in variants or vaccines. Three to four minutes maximum.

Instead we get, daily, footage of people lying in hospital tee’d up to machinery; people having needles stuck into their arms; politicians roaming around hospitals with their sleeves rolled up, achieving nothing other than getting in the way of staff doing a difficult and demanding job; stories of individuals who have died and footage of their grieving families; footage of people who have survived; pictures of boarded up shops, pubs and restaurants; pictures of deserted airports; stories of people who have lost their jobs; tales of people who have taken to loafing about in their nightwear 24/7 since they began “working from home.” I could go on. The low point came in about the second or third week in January, when deaths were running at over a thousand a day, they even showed footage of bodies being wheeled into a hospital mortuary.

Yesterday’s quasi-news bulletins could have been compiled at any time during the last three months. They were an absolute disgrace. The real news - a ship running aground in the Suez Canal and threatening the supply of all sorts of things to Europe, the EU behaving in their usual ***-like fashion over vaccine supplies and a record daily number, thought to be over 150, of illegal migrants "rescued" in the Straits of Dover, was either ignored or given 30 seconds.

The only thing to commemorate yesterday was the day when the UK embarked on a strategy of “containment” which saw people’s livelihoods destroyed, children’s education trashed, businesses thrown to the wolves and the non-Covid healthcare service virtually abandoned. It was also the day when the most severe restrictions on liberties this country has ever known began. Restrictions that still exist today, one year later. When they come to vote on the renewal of the "emergency" legislation later this week, that's what MPs need to remember. Not how Auntie Edna, aged 92, succumbed to the virus in a care home in Godalming.

[davebro]

I look forward to a news bulletin that doesn't mention covid. In my lifetime? Maybe not!

[emmie]

they have no choice it would seem, but the figures are particularly distressing. last nights tv got put on hold because i couldn't take it anymore

[New Judge]

//...they have no choice it would seem,//

Yes they do, emmie. They can return to reporting news - that is, things that have happened in the last day or so. Yesterday's output ws disgraceful. My local news included no news at all other than the latest infection figures - two minutes out of thirty. The rest was all archive stuff extracted from the material I mentioned above. It simply needed a couple of hours work from an editor, cut in with the occasional contribution from the presenter, e.g. "And now a look at your local High street to see all the boarded up shops, dark restaurants and deserted pavements." People know how their local businesses have fared - terribly. They don't need a round up to tell them.

[emmie]

i gave up when they had a dedicated long time for all the reflections.

[Cloverjo]

I didn’t even notice the day, TBH. Just read about it and seen pics in the papers. I’m one of those lucky few people who’ve actually enjoyed lockdown. I suppose it helps to be a bit of a recluse anyway.

[AuntPollyGrey]

I watch France 24 now for 'proper' news. Things are going on in Myanmar, mass shootings (twice in the last week) in USA , Horrendous flooding in Australia, and news from the UK we never hear about a on Btitish T. In English Sky 512. The male presenters are fit too :-)

[emmie]

i do read the online news - sometimes Sky or the BBC