Blindly obeying every rule strips us of our humane and caring instincts | Nicci Gerrard
Coronavirus restrictions are there to protect us, but we must look to our hearts before enacting every single one of them
Several years ago, a charity shop worker in Hampshire had an epileptic seizure and fell into a shallow lake. Firefighters called to rescue him said they could not enter water higher than ankle deep because of health and safety rules. The man lay face down, drowning, while the firefighters measured the depth of the water with a pole.
He died, and everyone was aghast because it was so blindingly obvious that a set of generic regulations had blotted out all basic human instincts of rescue, of kindness, of common sense. When should rules be obeyed, and when should they be bent and broken? When should they be like solid, unbreachable walls, and when more like membranes, porous and yielding to the pressure of specific circumstances? When should we jump into that water?
Read the original article at The Guardian