The Clap

[NickSTFU]

I refuse to share a 'clapping platform' with the people in my street, who either didn't vote, or voted Tory (mainly the former around my way)

However, I count amongst my friends a GP, two nurses, three care workers, an Argos delivery driver and a cleaner who cleans in two banks.

I tell them they're wonderful all the time.

Also, as someone with a chronic illness, my interaction with the NHS has been a regular occurrence over the past 13 years. I have been metaphorically clapping the NHS well before it was trendy.

[jwdd27]

I don't and won't, especially as some prick has starting setting off fireworks every week. We have no one facing us and no one to the right, so only 3 neighbours we could crane our neck to see if we were out.
The lad next door did it the second week but it's been quiet since.
I hate it because it's becoming another poppy with the performative and competitive aspect.
And I know that the arseholes going the wrong way around our one way system as they drag their 3 kids around the supermarket, and responding very aggressively to my colleagues who attempt to correct them, I know they were out last night banging a saucepan for brave Sir Captain Tom and the Queen.

But, on the other hand, my shielded parents (both left leaning) participate enthusiastically every week, father on saucepan and mother on cowbells, and they enjoy the neighbourly aspect. They even joined in with 3 cheers for Tom last night, led by their neighbour in full RAF dress uniform. He's the one doing their shopping, so I forgive him for acting the prick.
They will not countenance any criticism of the clapping, and they did make me feel guilty when they said they were also clapping for me, a key worker.

[lambers]

My wife is a cleaner at the local GP surgery, which happens to be opposite the entrance to the Minor Injuries Unit that we have in Tewkesbury and she's said that for each of the last few weeks the fire service and police have turned up outside it just before 8 in time for the applause. She thinks it's marvellous and they all line up and clap outside the surgery.

I don't begrudge the good feelings it gives some people, and I imagine that it can be made to look good, but I still think it's a waste of resources.

It's another indicator of style over substance for the government.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

Similar to most replies - me and daughter have joined in most weeks, think the first week we just watched and listened from her bedroom window but we've gone out onto the step each week since - but have mixed feelings about it. I can see that in the future there will be a lot of people who will glorify it, saying how great it was that we all pulled together and beat the virus by clapping once a week and chipping five quid into Captain Tom's justgiving page, and then will be up in arms at the first indication of a penny on income tax.

Seeing "NHS" chalked on paths and roads, like a football club's turf being marked out, feels a bit strange.

On the Word podcast this week David Hepworth (who can often be a tedious bore) put together a decent mini rant about being lectured by pop and rock stars during the One World thing, that he didn't need Eddie Vedder to tell him to respect his local health care workers, as if he'd invented the notion.

[Arturo]

Mixed on this. It's a clap for the right people, it does bring neighbours together, and I'm in a street where I am pretty sure the vast majority didn't vote for the present incumbents in charge (nobody did the ridiculous 'Clap for Boris' the other week). So I can live with that although I personally don't get too involved. Our lovely neighbour hates the government and Johnson but he stays away as well.

But a bit like the Tom thing (through no fault of his own) it's also a distraction and one that has gone from a simple gesture into something getting a little bit out of hand, like the flypast yesterday. Clapping isn't enough anymore, which is when we get gimmicks such as fireworks and fancy dress. Style over substance indeed.

One of the presenters of the irritatingly twee One Show recently chirped something along the lines of "wouldn't it be great if we still did this every Thursday once the pandemic is over?" Erm, not really, no. Just better funding and planning for those involved in the health sector would be a more positive step.

[Sporting]

Only once a week in the UK? Every day here.

[Arturo]

I can see that in the future there will be a lot of people who will glorify it, saying how great it was that we all pulled together and beat the virus by clapping once a week and chipping five quid into Captain Tom's justgiving page, and then will be up in arms at the first indication of a penny on income tax.

I was thinking something similar just tbis week. We're an odd nation that likes to throw money at charity events and telethons in big numbers, but feel grossly offended that we should contribute anything at all from our wage packets. It all comes from the same hole at the end of the day.

We're just an odd nation full stop really.

[HORN]

A few weeks ago I was in the midst of paying for my groceries when the cashier warned me there'd be a short delay. Suddenly everyone around me began clapping wildly. It was like a flash mob of glassy-eyed yet well-meaning fanatics. Trapped, I folded and joined in. Finally the customer at the adjacent checkout (eyes glued resolutely to his phone) buckled, put his phone away and began half-heartedly applauding.

Everyone clapped.

I've since pulled my weekly shop forward to 6am.

[Felicity, I guess so]

I get fed up of hearing “half of them voted Tory” because it’s quite common in my Facebook bubble. How do we win people away from that, then- not by sneering at them, Id suggest.

Prefer to clap (with no illusions) while brandishing slogans about tests and PPE on a big Unison hand-shaped placard which is left in the window between Thursdays.

[3 Colours Red]

They've taken to banging pots and pans around here like a fishwife calling her good-fer-nothin' husband in for his tea.

And doesn't anyone find the act of clapping slightly painful right now, what with having red raw skin from washing their hands 20 times a day?

[Sean of the Shed]

Me and Mrs of the Shed are both key workers working full time right now (often working more hours) and if anybody started applauding us specifically I would a) feel embarrassed and b) tell them to stop immediately because it is weird.
I don't join in myself for the same reason and only a couple families in our street participate, including the nobheads next door whose friends from round the corner come over and bang saucepans with them. In the case of our neighbours I think this is about the most action those saucepans have seen.

[Walt Flanagans Dog]

My work sent out an all users email to remind us to observe the minute's silence this week. Given that everyone is working at home most of us were observing it whether we intended to or not.

[slackster]

I don't take part in this virtue signalling exercise. Maybe I'd feel more pressured if we could see & hear neighbours doing likewise en masse, but we live rurally.

[Duncan Gardner]

My work sent out an all users email to remind us to observe the minute's silence this week. Given that everyone is working at home most of us were observing it whether we intended to or not.

I was watching an episode of Jimmy McGovern's Accused the other day. After a gangland killing, members intimidate local shops into closing during the Funeral.It reminded me of Diana's death a bit. And by association- an extended rehearsal for when the Queen expires

[kokamoa]

There is a quote attributed to Tom Baker that in a just society, everyone who worked in an office job/manual job/shop job - basically anything not attached to the performing arts - would receive a round of applause from their street when returning home from work, once a week.

In a sense, I feel the applause is a long overdue public recognition of the work done by people in the NHS/care sector. They are expected to be “heroes” 24/7, but the crisis has jolted the complacency that there is about the health service - “Yeah, they’re wonderful, we all know that but Corbyn...” because there is now nationwide recognition that this virus could kill any of us at any time and just how necessary and vital the health service is. I applaud happily and will do so for as long as necessary.

[Freestyling buck wilding Stijn Stijnen]

I think I know what most people's reaction would be if we saw applause at mandated times in say a North Korea, same if we saw them attempt to raise money via their war veterans, it would be dismissed as propaganda, there would much solemn head bowing and a hope that they could move past such hollow gestures.
Conversely I see their neighbour's to the south, their thorough approach and decided lack of applause for either their leader or health service, and think that's what you need to be aiming for.
I don't think I'd have cared one jot for it when I worked for the NHS as a health advisor. It's as fleeting as a wank.
I mention the two Korea's, because the UK resembles both right now, depending on what parts you're focusing on.
The glee in which I saw people celebrating the 100000 test figure being hit (via some very creative finagling) has been pure 'brave new world'.
The only applause should be very slow, very sarcastic hand claps while booing with all of your might.

[Patrick Thistle]

This quote from a nurse on Panorama:

"They call us heroes because that makes it easier when we die."

Clapping serves the same function. They died, but, you know, we went out and clapped.

[ale]

There are NHS staff living either side of us. When shifts permit they are both out clapping. Which kinda makes it difficult to try & make a political point or personal principle by leaving the front door closed-the area went Tory after decades of Labour domination. But like others I do appreciate the fleeting feeling of community it provides.

[laverte]

This quote from a nurse on Panorama:

"They call us heroes because that makes it easier when we die."

Clapping serves the same function. They died, but, you know, we went out and clapped.

Parallels with the beatification of the military and security services are troubling. Some folks seem to get super thrills from thinking about all the DUTY and HONOUR that are being demonstrated when the government sends people off to die. Decades of fetishising Our Boys hasn't translated to better policy or better working conditions, or prevented the Sacred Armed Forces from suffering deep budget cuts and shoddy privatisations. No reason to think the new heroes of the NHS will fare any better. However if you are a patient who has been mistreated or if you're a worker who wants to blow the whistle on your bosses, you're about to become a traitor to the nation as well as an ungrateful whinger.

i'm happy to stand on my doorstep and clap my hands because i don't like the idea of not clapping. i don't agree that it's an empty gesture and i strongly dislike the alt-right term 'virtue signalling' in any context. Of course it isn't enough but at least it is something, for instance, for the people isolating-isolated in their houses, who feel completely useless and overwhelmed by this enormous event, who have a lot of time to think about how they are affected by it and to worry about the consequences, and who have few outlets to express their fear and gratitude. i think this idea that an emotional response can be organised, can be ritualised, is difficult to understand for people who consider 'emotion' to be something that only happens spontaneously in reaction to some trigger. But for those of us who find that emotions are things that stick around, indeed are things that tend to stick to us like, i guess, an infection that we cannot shake off, then clapping may feel like the opportunity to grab some control of our emotions and put them in a kind of order, rather than being overwhelmed by them all day, every day.

[NickSTFU]

I get fed up of hearing “half of them voted Tory” because it’s quite common in my Facebook bubble. How do we win people away from that, then- not by sneering at them, Id suggest.

Prefer to clap (with no illusions) while brandishing slogans about tests and PPE on a big Unison hand-shaped placard which is left in the window between Thursdays.

It's not about winning people away from the Tories, it's about getting people aren't voting back to the ballot box to vote Labour.

[NickSTFU]

Parallels with the beatification of the military and security services are troubling. Some folks seem to get super thrills from thinking about all the DUTY and HONOUR that are being demonstrated when the government sends people off to die. Decades of fetishising Our Boys hasn't translated to better policy or better working conditions, or prevented the Sacred Armed Forces from suffering deep budget cuts and shoddy privatisations. .

And girls.

Anyway, this isn't strictly true.

Working conditions, accommodation, pay and policy (though it depends on what you mean by policy), have improved considerably over the past 10 years. They improved over the 22 years I served, up to 2009.

[Nurse Duckett]

I'm in the "too self-conscious, but mostly uneasy about the politicization of it all" camp.

Any desire I might have felt to join my neighbours has been drained away by this message in our recently-formed, and up to now, helpful and neighbourly, street WhatsApp group:

"Disappointed by the clapping response tonight from the top half of our Avenue. Good job the nurses, doctors and carers carry on for us.

Apparently it's now a naming, shaming competition - as alluded to above, just like poppymania.

[Sean of the Shed]

That's the key thing that puts me off it. I'm surprised the tabloids haven't been taking pictures up streets where people have not been coming out to clap.

[pebblethefish]

I hope next Thursday the top half are out in force, intimidating the bottom half. You could sing "We're the Top Half over here!" or "Can you hear the Bottom Half clap?" That's community spirit, right there.

[laverte]

i'm more than averagely likely to die from the virus if i catch it, and i don't know what state i'll be in if i have to go to hospital. On the doorstep i'm clapping for the hospital staff who will have to look after me if i do get it, as i can't guarantee i'll be in a position to express my gratitude as lucidly as i'd like at the spur of the moment. i'm aware that this – giving thanks before the event – makes it sound a bit like prayer, so i understand why it may seem futile and wouldn't resonate with everyone. At the same time, it doesn't seem like very much to ask. And i guess i may have a different take on what the neighbours might say, given that at previous addresses at least one of them desperately longed to believe that i lived with my sister, and another tried to report me to the authorities for faking a disability.

Working conditions, accommodation, pay and policy (though it depends on what you mean by policy), have improved considerably over the past 10 years. They improved over the 22 years I served, up to 2009.

That's interesting, not a view i heard in Portsmouth from navy people, but of course i shouldn't have generalised from that. Accommodation has been a big issue there, the MoD flogged off lots of the newer builds and with the huge expansion of the university there isn't much private housing available locally. The transition to civilian life after service seems to be a bone of contention too, especially since BAE scaled down its activities in the city. i would be interested to hear more about the other side of the story though.