h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

As soon as members of a religious cult start telling other people to abide by their beliefs it becomes the stupid blind arrogance of a minority imposing thier beliefs on everyone else. No-one is forcing them toi do anything they don't want to on a Sunday.

Unless of course they work for the ferry company, or in one of the local shops which will be open for these tourists, or in the guest houses that will require extra staff.

I really am rather bored with the religious intolerance group. Why can it not just be that 1 day a week we get away from the worship of Mammon in his guise of the Global Economy and spend time with our friends and families ?

Because the only other people supporting that view are religious and, for some, agreeing with a religion is a step too far

I don't mind this getting away from w**k business - but it has to be the same for everyone. My has to have his days off when the rest of us are working or at school.

So how about EVERYONE putting down tools at the same time? nah... i thought not.

I've spent 5 weeks on Lewis- and it was great - I'm not religious, but having a day of downtime in the week where you did nothing was fantastic.

You knew that Sunday wasn't a work day so you had to get your work done on the Saturday.

It was really peaceful and totally unquie. I don't see why athetists shouldn't demand a day of rest as well.

I can really see why they don't want Sunday sailings, it would change the island. It's one of hte few places in the UK that's genuinely different from other places- why let it become the same as everywhere else?

If the islanders don't want it - they why not having it.

In the Hebridies Christians are the majority not the minority - but it's not just the Christians that want a day off a week.

As a thought, how many of the non-residents (who want Sunday ferries) are former residents, or locals who've gone to the mainland, who want to go home for the weekend?

Good point - I'm not sure.. but surely if they've left they shouldn't have a say on the matter?

Mibbes aye, mibbes naw.

What if they have a home there as well? Would that give them more of a say in the matter?

>>Why Sunday? Why not Saturday or Friday?<< anhaga

Because Sunday is a cultural tradition as well as a religious one. Seems to me like fundamentalist atheists often want to throw the baby out with the bathwater.


>>Shucks - when I was growing up, NZ seemed to pretty much shut on a saturday afternoon never mind Sunday.<< Johnny P



Actually I think it closed at 9pm on a Friday night and then reopened 9am on Monday morning (but maybe I'm a bit older than you, I can remember when shops weren't open on Saturday morning ).

We used to have late night on Friday nights, where all the shops stayed open til 9pm so that people that worked long hours during the week could go shopping. It was a static cultural event - you knew what was happening when, and things like teens meeting up on the main street was a given.

Now you never know when anything is going to be open or shut. Friday nights sees small shops closed because they now have to be open on a Saturday, but the big shops are open til 8pm or 9pm or 7pm?? Some things are open Sat mornings, others 10 - 4.

We might want to ask ourselves what's happened to society that we can't buy our week's supplies within a 3 hour time slot. In NZ, and presumable elsewhere, shopping has become recreation.


I agree with MacKay, the Judeo Christian god has just been replaced with the consumerist globalisation one. And the flow on effects are not pretty. People work too hard and are too stressed and the world's going to hell in a handbasket

Well I agree that people often do work too hard and get too stressed and then have no time to enjoy what they worked for. But, is that really the result of commercialism? There's the saying about farmers working sunrise to sunset, and not so long ago the majority of people were farmers or farm labourers.

I'm one of those who is out early and home too late to do shopping - part of the reason is that I have school age children to take care of.

When I get home we have time for homework checking, a story and bed. Shopping for groceries doesn't come in to it, let alone emergency things and parts for the car etc etc.

And I'm not the only one who has to book a hair appointment too far in advance to see if I can actually keep it... same for the dentist and anything else.

sorry, meant to add: it's not that I think I work too hard or too long.

Perhaps I should have said I also work Sundays and Saturdays, and nights.

Of course people in some services can't have the same day off as everyone else - but a move to a six day week would make live les stressed for many.

Kea - my folks emigrated to NZ in the early '60s - Dad remembers the 6 o'clock swill, when pub opening hours were extended from 17:30 to 18:00!

All that was open on Saturdays when I was a kid were Dairies and the occasional bakery - iirc.

I seem to remember that Saturday morning shopping was a new thing when I was in my early teens (late 70s). Might have been the provinces though. Dairies were open on weekends, and hospitals and police stations . I remember when bakeries first opened though! Before that you bought bread from the dairy or supermarket. No 24 hour anythings though. You had to remember when to buy petrol or you were out of luck.

>>There's the saying about farmers working sunrise to sunset, and not so long ago the majority of people were farmers or farm labourers.<<

Bouncy, I come from a family of farmers and they certainly didn't work from sunup to sundown. But they were reasonably well off landowners farming in the land of plenty. Sheep farmers too. Maybe dairy farmers work longer hours? And farm hands work harder for less dosh I guess.

There is research to show that we work harder now than we used to say in the 60s, and again there will be class differences here, but the general gist is that we are working more hours to support our consumerist lifestyles. Apparently NZ is one of the worst places in the developped world for this (although maybe that is white collar work?). Also women are now required to do paid work AND housework (that's new for middle class women at least). And more people seem to have second jobs.