The All Blacks were playing France last night (11th Nov;) they had poppies embroidered on their rugby jerseys, the sleeve. For other comments about the wearing of poppies see this thread posts from about #60 onwards.
Jeez - I have no idea how that smiley got in there, none, my apologies, most inappropriate.
I remember seeing the Thiepval memorial. It’s a humungous great monument plastered all over with names, over 72,000 of them. That’s just from the Somme engagement, and only those who have never been found. (When a body is found and identified, and buried elsewhere, the name is removed from the memorial.)
I also have a photo from a graveyard in Ieper; two generals’ headstones with a private’s between them. As I remarked to my Dad (whose own father was at the Somme), there’s no rank in the cemetery.
Anyone who feels like a good lump-in-the-throat moment should visit Ieper some time and attend the nightly Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate memorial. The fire brigade buglers have blown it every night since 1928 barring a four-year spell when Ieper was German-occupied. As per the link, the first night the Menin Gate was out of German hands the ceremony resumed, despite the fighting still going on elsewhere in the town.
The Americans probably asked you what it was because (in my experience) wearing a poppy is strictly a British/former British colony/empire/whatever thing. I’ve never so much as heard of anyone wearing a poppy in the US.
Also, it’s not a personality flaw or mark of satan or such if someone elects not to join the group circlejerk of sympathy. Yes, people died in the war. Some of them were very brave and noble. Perhaps instead of reciting poetry and writing angry letters about newscasters who don’t wear flowers, we should invest our energy in “stopping current wars/genocides/etc”?
Memorial services are fine by me, but the holier-than-thou attitude that surrounds Remembrance Day/Veterans Day/etc bugs me.
My 2 year old (who was born 11/11/04 at 11 am EST) boogied in his stroller to the Last Post while I cried.
An interesting perspective.
From my perspective Remembrance Day, in Canada anyway, is largely apolitical in the context of political parties and who is a hawk or a dove.
It is a time to commemorate those who made a sacrifice, whether of their lives, their health or years in desperate, frightening circumstances, all because they believed it was something that had to be done.
Yes some of those who served were brave and noble, as you said. I expect that also there were the scared, the homesick, the reckless, the petty, the cynics, and those who were wishing themselves anywhere but where they were. In short, I expect you would have seen a complete cross-section of humanity with most of them were young.
Does the fact that they were not all perfect diminish the sacrifice made? In my eyes, it does not. Particularly in WWII, those sacrifices collectively made a difference in the world.
To respect that, to me is not a “group circlejerk”. Nor does it require that a person make a choice between taking the time on Remembrance Day to respect that or to oppose current and/or future wars.
NinjaChick, please don’t shit in this thread too.
I understand your desire to stop current wars, but honoring the dead doesn’t detract from that; I certainly wouldn’t describe it as a “circlejerk”. In fact, I find that sentiment quite disgusting.
If you don’t understand the sacrifices those millions of dead, mainly conscripts, made on behalf of our future, then you need to educate yourself. Read Birdsong. Read The Ghost Road trilogy. Go to a war grave in Normandy, with white crosses in every direction to the horizon, then come back here and try to remain disdainful. The suffering was intense. Entire communities of men died, ripping the hearts out of their communities.
As for poppies - it used to be a habit in the US but died out, according to people posting in the SDMB. Yet poppies grow where hundreds of thousands of American soldiers fell and died too.
While I agree that NinjaChick’s comments were unhelpful, I do believe there’s a debate to be had. (Jon Snow agrees.) I choose to not wear a poppy - if I ever saw white ones for sale, I’d consider that, but it probably comes across as even more of a ‘statement’.
I had a class which ran across 11am yesterday: I made a decision beforehand not to force anything onto the kids, I wasn’t going to mandate a minute’s silence. What actually happened was that the chose to do it themselves, which is fine by me. It’s not my job to impose that on them.
I agree. But not in this thread.
Cool kids you teach, I must say. I doubt I would have volunteered to do that when I was at school.
(Bolding mine)
Well, you’ve just proved that you knee jerked and didn’t even bother to read the whole thread before you posted. If you had read the thread, you’d have seen my post number 18, which mentions that in Kansas of all places there are still poppy sellers. I think you need to take the chip off your shoulder, and look around without it blocking your view. There is no “holier than thou” attitude in Rememberance Day, many people your age don’t even know what it is, so chill.
Now, if I had my druthers, that trend would be reversed. I am doing what I can to explain what November 11 stands for, and let people your age know to at least give a modicum of respect to those who do choose to commerate the day. The people who died in the World Wars deserve to be remembered in particular IMO, and those who died in other wars that we might not agree with still deserve respect because they did what they felt was right and good. FTR, I am a pacifist, yet even I realize that with human nature the way it is, wars cannot be eternally avoided.
The Wall of Remembrance at the Memorial in Canberra has always had lots of poppies on it every time that I’ve visited. Not just on anniversaries.
They are. Doubt you’d have voluntarily turned up every Saturday morning, either 
(Bolding mine)
These days, remembrance services aren’t just about remebering those who gave their lives in WWI and II, it’s about all losses in all conflicts, including those we’re still in.
No-one really thinks war is a good idea, and whilst we should always be trying to stop them from happening, this is the one day a year that we appreciate those who have and currently are making sacrifices to enable us to have these opinions (even if they’re anti-army).
I know you didn’t mention them in your post, so this isn’t directed at you, but I am personally against the white poppies in principle. The red ones are never about celebrating our past battles, they’re a way of raising money and awareness of those that we should never forget. I just think wearing a white one takes away from the original idea, and makes the whole affair into another statement which it shouldn’t be.
I’ve been speaking to a lot of people recently who seem to forget that even though they’re anti-armed forces, people died to give them the right to have that opinion, and people are defending their right to freedom of choice and expression today. Show a little appreciation, people.
I apologize; my comments in this thread were a bit out of place and not in the mood of the thread. That wasn’t my intent and I meant no offense, and do apologize.
There is one minor thing I will reply to, though:
(emphasis mine) This is untrue. The right of free speech was not established in a battle; it was established when a group of guys sat down to write a political document. In European countries during the world wars (and other conflicts which I’m less knowledgeable about) these rights (eg, the basis of the government) were defended by the military. But no military gets credit with establishing those rights, as they were first put on paper through diplomacy.
Also, no military is currently defending my rights, as they are not under attack. I’ve been speaking to a lot of people recently who seem to forget this.
It’s precisely the conflation of past and present, which you’ve demonstrated in this post, that causes some of us choose to not wear a poppy. (And the fact that I typed that, rather than ‘not choose to wear a poppy’, is the problematic culture of automatic poppy-wearing highlighted by Jon Snow.)
NinjaChickWhen I was younger I wore a poppy out of habit I guess, it was all part of the Hallowe’en, Guy Fawkes’ night, build-up to Christmas in a way - a WWll veteran would turn up on the doorstep selling them, at school we would wear as many as three to brighten up our uniforms - not much thought went into it at all. Living abroad I was pleased to be able to wear one when possible, partly through nostalgia for “home” and my parents (who were schoolkids during the war) but also, as I’ve matured can I say?, there’s an added “there but the grace of god go I” feel.
I can more imagine what life and living might have been like for that cursed generation who lived through both world wars; any generation living through conflict; I can empathise with the damage done to families; I’m now seeing war widows younger than myself … the rights or wrongs of any conflict are immaterial to me at this time.
Having said that if I lived in the UK and felt pressure to wear one I’d probably buck the trend (as Jon Snow who wears one in private but won’t on screen because he is expected to!). I do feel however that the tone set by the service of Remembrance at the Royal Albert Hall on the Saturday and the parade & laying of wreathes in London on the Sunday are both respectful and moving. It is one of the things that makes me proud of my country.
BTW GorrillaMan can you answer a question for me ? When I was growing up in the UK the 2 mins silence was always on Remembrance Sunday not actual Armistice day. It seems in recent years there has been a move towards either having both or back to the 11th ? Any idea why ?
My brother was in London last week with some friends. I explained about Saturday being Armistice Day and he remembered seeing guys selling poppies.
These two days aren’t observer in Spain. We’ve gotten to the point where, not only is it unacceptable to “admit” (and I choose that word with utmost care) that your foreparents fought for the currently-wrong side in some war or other, it’s just uncool to have any kind of fighting relatives or friends. In the name of my foreparents (knight-captains of their village for over 1200 years) and of my friends currently in the Spanish army, and of the Dopers who are now or have been in the armies of their countries, Mom and Lilbro and me had a little prayer on Saturday.
God bless y’all.
I was in a public swimming pool on Sat 11th at 11 AM - the staff at the ticket desk had informed me (and everyone else) on entry that two minutes’ silence would be observed at 11 O’clock and everyone seemed cool with that, but it was a truly bizarre experience, standing silently, waist-deep in the shallow end while everything and everyone came to a quiet standstill.
I’m pretty sure you’re right, but I’ve no idea why it’s happened.
According to my Dad, during the years immediately following WWII, the two minutes’ silence was always observed on Armistice Day, whichever day that occurred.
He said that the traffic of London would stop in the streets where it stood; trains would stop on their tracks; buses and trams would stop running, and taxis would stop and their driver and passengers would get out and stand, hats off, in the street; factories would switch off their machines and down tools; surgeons would attempt not to schedule operations during that time. In those raw years there was nobody who hadn’t been affected, and the whole country came to a standstill for those two minutes.
If this is the case, then I speculate it was felt this was too disruptive to the “Young Elizabethan” productiveness, so the Silence was moved to the nearest Sunday instead. Not sure why it’s creeping back, though,