The poppy thread

[french frank]

I have no valuable thoughts on this so won't bother to say anything on the subject.

But - the discussion went downhill at the point that one member entered and began to ridicule the preceding comments. That was at Msg #11. Before that (and subsequently) there were thoughtful posts here, and some moving ones. If there's something in them with which you fundamentally disagree, please try to express it in the same thoughtful way - otherwise the whole discussion becomes the usual boring bottle-throwing and point-scoring.

Mr Pee, in Msg #20 you wrote: "Just because you disagree doesn't mean you need to resort to that sort of insulting language." I'll leave you to make the connection.

Please keep the discussion intelligent - message to 'both sides'. :smiley:

[Mr Pee]

My apologies then to all for message 11 and the bad tempered exchange which followed, but as somebody who has served in the military, and played my clarinet as the coffins were being marched off the aeroplanes at Brize Norton, I find the recent tendency to confuse the politics of war, with the simple act of Remembrance distasteful in the extreme. And If dignified and sombre Remembrance of the dead is somehow "glorifying the Military" then clearly some people have a different idea of glorification than I.

I do not think any of my posts justified Mr. GG's insults, however I shall now take no further part in this regrettable discussion. I shall wear my poppy, and remember the repatriation ceremonies in which I took part. That puts things into perspective.

:peacedove:

[Simon]

Good to see that Poundland has now, apparently, backed down from its stance of "poppies not being part of staff uniform". Customer power, apparently. A small victory for the good guys.

Sadly, those of us who understand and respect these traditions may be in a minority in 20 or so years, certainly in the cities.

[Simon]

"How can something you don't read be predictable ?"

Do I really have to explain this or are you only pretending to be foolish?

[Simon]

My gripe is with the militarisation of Rememberance services. Why do they have to bring weapons into churches, even though they are (presumably) only symbolic? Symbolic of what? Killing people, perhaps - and both sides in a conflict do that.

Heros are only people who fought on your own side.

I can't believe some of the things I read on here!

1. As it's the military that largely make the personal sacrifices in a war - i.e. get killed - it's only fair that the military are there to remember their fallen friends.

2. Heroes are people who do noble things in an unselfish way for the benefit of others. I expect there are heroes, many unknown, on both sides in most wars - though those that fight for evil causes may put themselves out of the running in most cases, I suspect.

[MrGongGong]

"How can something you don't read be predictable ?"

Do I really have to explain this or are you only pretending to be foolish?

Ooops methinks it might be a wee petard showing there professor :whistle:

How on earth can you read the postings of someone you profess to be ignoring and not reading ???? :laugh:
It's the psychic powers at work again methinks !!!!

If you REALLY are ignoring (I suggest you might look the word up in a dictionary , or get one of your staff to !) someone ,then ignore them.

Given that Simon is "ignoring" my posts I'm not expecting a response ! (unless there really are dark forces at work !!! :laugh:)

[Anna]

Oh, for goodness sake, this 'who's ignoring who' is really tedious. One would think one was in the Lower Remove of St. Custards! If someone said 'Oh Yah-Boo' I wouldn't be at all surprised :laugh:

As to Remembrance Services, certainly in our local parade and Chuch service there are no weapons taken, merely families, British Legion of course and Parishoners who want a quiet time in reflection of those they have lost and the futility of it all.

[John Skelton]

I can't believe some of the things I read on here!

As it's the military that largely make the personal sacrifices in a war - i.e. get killed - it's only fair that the military are there to remember their fallen friends.

That's certainly not true of the two Gulf Wars or Afghanistan. Dead Iraqi and Afghan civilians vastly outnumber dead British or American or allied military personnel, though the figures for the former are inexact ("we don't do body counts" - US General Tommy Franks).

[amateur51]

2. Heroes are people who do noble things in an unselfish way for the benefit of others. I expect there are heroes, many unknown, on both sides in most wars - though those that fight for evil causes may put themselves out of the running in most cases, I suspect.

Does this man ever dip into the myriad books and films about personal experiences in war? :doh:

[Simon]

As to Remembrance Services, certainly in our local parade and Chuch service there are no weapons taken, merely families, British Legion of course and Parishoners who want a quiet time in reflection of those they have lost and the futility of it all.

Same up here. Though I would take issue with you on the use of the term "futility". Those who fight against evil are hardly, in my view anyway, doing something futile. Indeed, they have on occasions won the victory, with the defeats of Nazism and Hussein being cases in point.

[Pabmusic]

Same up here. Though I would take issue with you on the use of the term "futility". Those who fight against evil are hardly, in my view anyway, doing something futile. Indeed, they have on occasions won the victory, with the defeats of Nazism and Hussein being cases in point.

Yes, I agree with you. There's a prevalent view that all war is futile and therefore 'wrong'. Now my dictionary (I'm using Collins) gives three meanings for futile, basically: unsuccessful, pointless and foolish. I suspect it's possible to see most conflicts - from the point of view of those who are most immediately affected - as falling within at least one of those, but not always when one steps back a little way. If a proven belligerent state invades your territory in an effort to punish you, or to keep some of it for itself, or to overthrow your political system, or to have a suitable base from which to threaten someone else, a subsequent war may well be justified. That was the position of France and her allies in the West in 1914 (but it could similarly be said of the Serbs and Italians). The result was that after four years of truly horrific fighting (of a scale unimaginable in 1914), enemy troops were pushed back to her borders. In 1940, when a similar thing happened, France had been so weakened by the previous conflict that she could not sustain the fight and sought peace - which meant occupation by a foreign power and a puppet government for four years. Is France to be regarded more highly for her actions in 1940, because she avoided another 'futile' war? The truth is that she didn't have much choice on either occasion.

Our more recent experience has been of a number of small wars of varying dubiousness, often closely associated with particular politicians; and our views of their 'rightness' often reflect our feelings for those politicians. We should be conscious of extending such views (whether justified or not) to all conflicts unthinkingly.

[aeolium]

Is France to be regarded more highly for her actions in 1940, because she avoided another 'futile' war? The truth is that she didn't have much choice on either occasion.

I think there is a significant distinction between the first and second world wars, in that diplomacy could have avoided the first one whereas the second was not avoidable by diplomacy. There are historians who dispute the inevitability of the first war - A J P Taylor for one.

The second world war, in which allies sought to resist the aggressive intentions of a totalitarian state, was a justifiable war but it has created an undesirable precedent in that subsequent leaders have wrongly invoked its memory to justify quite different interventions, from Vietnam to Iraq. Those leaders have often compared the opponents of those wars with those advocating appeasement of Hitler, yet those are completely false comparisons which ignore the fact that war is a great evil which should be the option of last resort by those resisting aggression.

[Pabmusic]

I think there is a significant distinction between the first and second world wars, in that diplomacy could have avoided the first one whereas the second was not avoidable by diplomacy.

I don't disagree with this, but would comment that as soon as the Austrians got German support for their ultimatum to Sebia (July 1914) it was probably impossible to stop the steam-roller. Britain did in fact try to mediate between Austria, Serbia and Russia, as did Kaiser Wilhelm (blatantly dishonestly, since Germany had already given its support to Austria - not that anyone else knew, of course). But none of this alters the fact that when, like France, you find an aggressor on your soil, trying for a repeat of what they did to you some 40 or so years before, war is effectively inevitable, and hardly 'futile'.

Like you, I entirely despise the tendency to use the war against Nazi Germany to justify - well - just about any intervention in a dictatorial state. We are also very selective about who we regard as dictators.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

1. As it's the military that largely make the personal sacrifices in a war - i.e. get killed - it's only fair that the military are there to remember their fallen friends.

Of course they can "be there", but they don't have to carry guns of dress up in their aggressive uniforms, as is if to suggest that "might is always right".

[Mary Chambers]

I wonder what would happen to any TV newsreader/presenter who had the courage to refuse to wear a poppy, or wore a white one? They'd be savaged by the majority of the press, at the very least.