Play Your Part, 2020-2022
see book dummy Moving The Goalposts (2024)
https://www.blurb.co.uk/bookstore/invited/10246847/545cc41385e5d5263952e28a01f41bbc3cce1665
Since the beginning of the lockdown, the paternalistic messaging of the government did not equip us with the information and resources necessary to protect ourselves from Covid; instead, it relied on restrictions and punishment. Expecting non-compliance, supported by the scientists of SPI-B, who provide behavioural science advice aimed at anticipating and encouraging adherence to interventions, we were inundated with emotional messaging, coupled with threats that the police had powers of enforcement. Hard-hitting headlines were designed to ensure people followed the guidance.
Instead of using persuasion through rational arguments based on risk and knowledge about the pandemic, they used simplistic, mostly three-word slogans such as “Stay at home,” “Protect the NHS, Save lives,” and “Protect yourselves, Protect your loved ones,” telling us that the vast majority of people were “obeying the rules” however they were “concerned that people might start ignoring the advice, or cutting corners.” They were deploying fear, shame, peer pressure, and scapegoating as a means of cooperation.
I felt threatened by the daily briefings. They spoke of: “people on the frontline; people making sacrifices fighting the virus”; “everybody needs to play their part and that includes you.” I saw and heard empty, repetitive rhetoric containing contradictory information and ever-changing rules and slogans, which changed from a clear directive such as “Stay at Home” to “Stay Alert. Control the Virus, Save Lives.” They adopted a system similar to terrorist alerts for health communications, to give the responsibility to the individual for dealing with the threat of Covid.
For this piece, I overlaid the hand-copied instructions from daily government briefing transcripts starting on 3rd March and ending on 19th June 2020, the day of PM Boris Johnson’s birthday celebration, which took place despite his own rules forbidding social gatherings indoors.
Using chalk on a blackboard resonates with my time at school both as a student and later as a teacher, remembering the screech of the chalk and the air full of dust, reading information and instructions used for indoctrination in the GDR. There is a temporary nature of these marks on the blackboard which were always rubbed away at the end of a school day, mirroring the ever-changing messaging during the first four months of the pandemic in 2020.
The piece should be written on site on 3 blackboards, each 2.440 m wide and 1.22m high using white chalk.
https://www.blurb.co.uk/bookstore/invited/10246847/545cc41385e5d5263952e28a01f41bbc3cce1665
Since the beginning of the lockdown, the paternalistic messaging of the government did not equip us with the information and resources necessary to protect ourselves from Covid; instead, it relied on restrictions and punishment. Expecting non-compliance, supported by the scientists of SPI-B, who provide behavioural science advice aimed at anticipating and encouraging adherence to interventions, we were inundated with emotional messaging, coupled with threats that the police had powers of enforcement. Hard-hitting headlines were designed to ensure people followed the guidance.
Instead of using persuasion through rational arguments based on risk and knowledge about the pandemic, they used simplistic, mostly three-word slogans such as “Stay at home,” “Protect the NHS, Save lives,” and “Protect yourselves, Protect your loved ones,” telling us that the vast majority of people were “obeying the rules” however they were “concerned that people might start ignoring the advice, or cutting corners.” They were deploying fear, shame, peer pressure, and scapegoating as a means of cooperation.
I felt threatened by the daily briefings. They spoke of: “people on the frontline; people making sacrifices fighting the virus”; “everybody needs to play their part and that includes you.” I saw and heard empty, repetitive rhetoric containing contradictory information and ever-changing rules and slogans, which changed from a clear directive such as “Stay at Home” to “Stay Alert. Control the Virus, Save Lives.” They adopted a system similar to terrorist alerts for health communications, to give the responsibility to the individual for dealing with the threat of Covid.
For this piece, I overlaid the hand-copied instructions from daily government briefing transcripts starting on 3rd March and ending on 19th June 2020, the day of PM Boris Johnson’s birthday celebration, which took place despite his own rules forbidding social gatherings indoors.
Using chalk on a blackboard resonates with my time at school both as a student and later as a teacher, remembering the screech of the chalk and the air full of dust, reading information and instructions used for indoctrination in the GDR. There is a temporary nature of these marks on the blackboard which were always rubbed away at the end of a school day, mirroring the ever-changing messaging during the first four months of the pandemic in 2020.
The piece should be written on site on 3 blackboards, each 2.440 m wide and 1.22m high using white chalk.
