Poppies and the "Heroes Industry" ?

[ahinton]

The Military is a strange country: they do things differently there.

True - or at least there are times when it seems to be - but, since military personnel are still subject to the laws of the land that employs them and to the Geneva Convention, it behoves the courts to make everyt reasonable effort to ensure that they are not given the kind of preferential treatment that might suggest to others that they are to some degree above the law.

I have no objection in principle to the setting up of this petition for clemency, nor in Mr Pee's decisions to sign it and to encourage others to do so - these are basic human rights - but that doesn't mean that such clemency should be granted.

[ahinton]

Boris does seem a little confused doesn't he !
I'm still puzzled why this man continues to be referred to as "Marine A" ??

Indeed - it appears as though it might be intended to imply that he's only one of a group of marines who did this kind of thing.

Anyway, the whole thing could be taken as conferring a whole new perspective on the old chestnut "tell that to the marines!", n'est-ce pas?!...

[Beef Oven!]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/poli...n-warfare.html

And I hope at least one or two will click the link in that article and join me in signing the Telegraph's petition for clemency in this case.

I certainly did Mr Pee! I forwarded it to my friends too. It's gone viral on Facebook too. A sure sign that cultural Marxism hasn't affected everyone (yet)!

[ahinton]

I certainly did Mr Pee! I forwarded it to my friends too. It's gone viral on Facebook too. A sure sign that cultural Marxism hasn't affected everyone (yet)!

Forgive me, but I fail to understand that; might you care to explain the connection that you evidently perceive between what you call "cultural Marxism" and the rights and wrongs of both the actions of which "Marine A" has been convicted and the application of exceptional clemency in his case?

[amateur51]

I certainly did Mr Pee! I forwarded it to my friends too. It's gone viral on Facebook too. A sure sign that cultural Marxism hasn't affected everyone (yet)!

I'm sure this initiative will play well with locals in Afghanistan.

[ahinton]

I'm sure this initiative will play well with locals in Afghanistan.

Like Iraq, Afghanistan is an especially heinous case. At least Neville Chamberlain had the courtesy to announce that "the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German Government a final note stating that, unless we heard from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us; I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany"; on the other hand, Britain has meddled in the affairs of those two countries without even having the grace to declare war on them first and without their having invaded Britain. When British troops have all finally left Afghanistan, what will have been achieved there and what will happen there thereafter? Yes, let us indeed remember the 400+ British military personnel who have lost their lives on service in Afghanistan and let us also remember the considerably larger number of Afghan military pesonnel and civilians who have lost their lives as a direct consequence of British military involvement there and hang our heads in shame in respect of both that the lessons that one would have hoped might have been learned from two world wars have so obviously not been learned.

[amateur51]

Like Iraq, Afghanistan is an especially heinous case. At least Neville Chamberlain had the courtesy to announce that "the British Ambassador in Berlin handed the German Government a final note stating that, unless we heard from them by 11 o'clock that they were prepared at once to withdraw their troops from Poland, a state of war would exist between us; I have to tell you now that no such undertaking has been received, and that consequently this country is at war with Germany"; on the other hand, Britain has meddled in the affairs of those two countries without even having the grace to declare war on them first and without their having invaded Britain. When British troops have all finally left Afghanistan, what will have been achieved there and what will happen there thereafter? Yes, let us indeed remember the 400+ British military personnel who have lost their lives on service in Afghanistan and let us also remember the considerably larger number of Afghan military pesonnel and civilians who have lost their lives as a direct consequence of British military involvement there and hang our heads in shame in respect of both that the lessons that one would have hoped might have been learned from two world wars have so obviously not been learned.

Yes we never seem to learn anything from those two solemn minutes of silence each year at this time.

[ahinton]

Yes we never seem to learn anything from those two solemn minutes of silence each year at this time.

To me, they're the only justifiable and relevant minutes in the annual services of remembrance, not least because, during them, no one is pontificating as to how anyone present (or listening) should think and no one is wittering on about the "heroes" and the "glory" supposedly attaching to those who participated in wars and "gave their lives in service of their country"; how profoundly insulting that last cliché is! No one "gave his/her life" in service of anything; those who lost their lives on active service in wars had those lives taken away from them, yet the received wisdom that continues to be perpetuated with such fervour on these occasions seeks nevertheless to promote the synoymity of theft and donation, which would be quite bad enough with cars or intellectual property but is utterly inexcusable and indefensible when it's about human lives - but then what does one expect when it's all done under the guise of a so-called "Festival of Remembrance"? - aren't "festivals" supposed to be about celebration?

[amateur51]

Boris does seem a little confused doesn't he !
I'm still puzzled why this man continues to be referred to as "Marine A" ??

According to the report in The Guardian:

"The case has also been a test for the principle of open justice. The marines were afforded anonymity throughout because of the danger that their lives could be under threat from extremists if their identities were known"

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2013/nov/08/royal-marine-guilty-executing-afghan

This is surely an own-goal because by so doing the Army has effectively created an open season on all its troops who might be thought to have been involved.

[Beef Oven!]

Forgive me, but I fail to understand

For single-handedly restoring Sorabji to us, I can almost forgive you anything.

[ahinton]

For single-handedly restoring Sorabji to us, I can almost forgive you anything.

Almost?(!) You're very kind, but I don't think that I could claim single-handedness in this; I (and indeed anyone else interested in his music) am eternally grateful to the editors, performers and scholars who have undertaken so very much sterling work - not least the one whom we both heard 9 days ago!

[Richard Barrett]

A sure sign that cultural Marxism hasn't affected everyone (yet)!

So let me get this right: anyone who regards this incident as a sadistic murder has been too affected by cultural Marxism? How does that work exactly?

[ahinton]

So let me get this right: anyone who regards this incident as a sadistic murder has been too affected by cultural Marxism? How does that work exactly?

I would be curious to receive a definitive answer to that as well.

[Beef Oven!]

So let me get this right: anyone who regards this incident as a sadistic murder has been too affected by cultural Marxism? How does that work exactly?

No, that is another one of them there straw-man arguments that we're all so fond of in here. Quite apart from putting words in my mouth, it does not logically follow, that 'anyone who regards this incident as a sadistic murder' must have been affected by cultural Marxism or its off-shoot, political correctness.

I regard the incident as a sadistic murder, but I have not been affected by cultural Marxism.

If you want to 'get this right' and understand 'how it works', it works like this - people who are suggesting clemency, are taking a view on the response to the incident. I contend that people who have the objective mind to see beyond that the individual Marine in question and what he did, and not scapegoat him, will likely be unaffected by the false consciousness of political correctness.

It works in much the same was as it does when you or I do not become hysterical with suicide bombers etc.

False consciousness is a double-edge sword these days. I may have mixed my theoretical metaphors somewhat, but I tend not to limit myself to a single paradigm, these days.

[Ferretfancy]

But we will ......... as the original article that you found so obnoxious says
who does remember the Boer War ? etc

Or the Opium wars ? are we supposed to suspend our critical facilities about ALL history ?

It's hard to believe, I know, but my father, aged 17, joined the army in 1900 for the Boer War,stayed in the army in India until 1910 and joined up again for WW1
in1914

I arrived in 1935 when my father was 52 years old. Growing up with parents who in some sense seemed like grandparents was a rather odd experience. Dad worked in the War Office in Whitehall during WW11, so as a child I was rather used to reminiscences.

It's a little like Lady Bracknell's remark in The Importance of Being Earnest -- "The General was essentially a man of peace, except in his domestic life "