We should remember them, too.

[Steve H]

You might not be here now, if it wasn't for those who sacrificed their lives for future generations.

What a sublimely irrelevant comment, even by your standards!

[Steve H]

Something on which we will have to agree to differ.

The usual weasel words of people who've been defeated in argument but won't admit it.

[Robbie]

LR's opinions are not really irrelevant and don't forget, LR's Guernsey family & friends were particularly affected by WWll. We were fortunate not to be invaded & starved.

Just as people who do not mark the day in any way (that doesn't include you & I because we've bought red poppies as well as white), don't deserve to be criticised, neither do people who do commemorate it.  Each according to their own conscience.  So on this occasion it is a good idea to agree to differ (imo  ).

[Rhiannon]

Weren't most of our families affected by WW2? My family were in the East End and What happened there was different, but still traumatising. I don't think my parents or grandparents even began to have the resources to talk about what they had experienced. I wonder how much of our current MH issues can be traced back to that time and the trauma it caused.

[Roses]

The usual weasel words of people who've been defeated in argument but won't admit it.

I think my argument stands having had the aftermath of the German occupation all around me for the whole of my childhood.

[Rhiannon]

If we are getting into ‘whomsuffered most’ my Jewish friends can come here and see the CI occupation and raise you the Holocaust.

The irony is that the freedoms for which people really did suffer for are being pushed to one side in favour of ‘one opinion fits all’.

[Anchorman]

I think my argument stands having had the aftermath of the German occupation all around me for the whole of my childhood.

Yet others have equally valid views...having lived with my grandfather's experience of the Somme and his brother being blown up twenty feet from him - on one side of the family - and on the other, members of my family working underground for fourteen hours a day, six days a week - for less pay than a soldier - and bringing bits of their friends up to the surface when a seam collapsed.
Many points have validity, and not only folk in uniform were heroes...but they seem to be forgotten.

[Roses]

Yet others have equally valid views...having lived with my grandfather's experience of the Somme and his brother being blown up twenty feet from him - on one side of the family - and on the other, members of my family working underground for fourteen hours a day, six days a week - for less pay than a soldier - and bringing bits of their friends up to the surface when a seam collapsed.
Many points have validity, and not only folk in uniform were heroes...but they seem to be forgotten.

My paternal grandfather was a soldier during WW1, he was on the front line and was gassed. His health never recovered from that experience, and she spent much of my father's childhood unwell. He died in 1943 at the young age of 48, his family were evacuated to the UK in 1939 at the outbreak of the war, so they never saw him again.

One of my father's younger brothers was forced to work as a Bevan Boy in the UK during WW2, not a pleasant experience for a kid of 17!

[Rhiannon]

My great uncles were all naval men but unusually none f my grandfathers went to war. One was severely eplileptic so he was an ARP warden in the Blitz. God knows what he saw. The other was foreman in an iron foundation and had a reserved occupation. He was responsible for ensuring that the blokes down in the pit didn’t die.

My nan nearly died in a home for pregnant women and while there she saw Magdalene Laundry-style treatment on unmarried mothers (she was married so was spared that).

Another great uncle lied about his age. He died at the Somme.

War is unsparing and indiscriminatory in its suffering and sacrifice.

[jeremyp]

Hang on. Have you lookedat WW1? The Germans had universal male sufferage and a rudimentary welfarestate.

Are you seriously trying to claim that Germany was a democracy?

Those young menslaughtered for 'king and country' did not even have the right - unless they were over 25 - to vote. The pension scheme was far more rudimentary. It could be argued that the German state was more 'modern' in outlook than that of britain. In anycase, theconflict was not aclash of civiisations; ideologies or the rest - it was a clash of imperialism; led mainly by those who thought their status in life was better than those who were butchered for them, regardless of whichever flag theywere told to fight for.

That's utter rubbish. Neither state was an acceptable democracy in modern terms but at least Britain was run by an elected government, even if more than half of adults were disenfranchised. Kaiser Wilhelm (the hereditary emperor) ran Germany up to some point in the First World War and then his generals took over.

Britain joined the war, by the way, because Germany invaded Belgium and we had a treaty that obliged us to come to their aid.

[Anchorman]

Of course niether nation was a democracy by our standards. However more male Germans per head of population were enfranchised than in 'britain'. In both cases, the lot of the disenfranchised was to bleed and die while the rich grew richer, arms dealers prospered, and the aims of Imperialism were pursued. That only one empire survived the hell - thankfully in a terminal condition itself - was fortuitous.

[Nearly Sane]

The usual weasel words of people who've been defeated in argument but won't admit it.

I don't think it's an argument you win or lose. I disagree with LR but it is in the end just a matter of opinion.

[Enki]

Of course niether nation was a democracy by our standards. However more male Germans per head of population were enfranchised than in 'britain'

True, but, how much democratic emphasis should we put on this when the Reichstag had very limited powers compared with the British Parliament, when the monarch could easily overrule it if he so choose, and when the German military was outside of any democratic control?

I don't think these  'democratic' systems in 1914 are really comparable at all.

[SweetPea]

As this is our annual remembrance thread, I will post my annual link to the Best Bits threads where Gonnagle saved FastFlint's post

I think Nearly Sane means this comment:
http://www.religionethics.co.uk/index.php?topic=9431.msg482089;topicseen#msg482089

which reads:

"My observations are these. The RBL is a Charity and the poppy appeal is part of its marketing for funds. It has been very successful and the effect of this is the almost complete poppy coverage that currently exists on TV, on football shirts and the like

The history of the RBL is of interest. It was (I read) formed rather quickly, when WW1 vets found the govt had no plans for injured soldiers and the possibility of revolution was quite high (there were millions of trained ex army around and jobs were rather thin on the ground)

I find the organised and "compulsory" remembrance somewhat overdone in its current form.  A view my late WW2 vet father shared. He (and many soldiers quoted in many forums) think that the remembrance "industry" has been high-jacked by politicians and the establishment - so that we do forget and allow more young men and women to be killed by the whim of politicians. My WW1 vet grandad's (gassed but survived on the western front) view of the RBL are not printable. Just to say he thought it (this was a while back...) full of those who were never near the sharp end and liked the image.

I have found the odd visit to cemeteries in France and Belgium more powerful than the choreographed "poppy season" I  don't need to be told when and how to pay my personal respects and feel that the current position is counter productive

I also think that the RBL is doing work that the Govt should have full responsibility for.

I also think that I would like to make those who bravely online call deserters cowards and the like face live firing and see if they feel so brave.

The best remembrance would be not to send off our young people to die for failed politics."

The bold highlights are mine, which I entirely agree with.

It is appalling that serviceman leaving the armed forces have no assistance from the government. Some leave the forces with no family or home to go to and land-up on the streets, very often with mental health issues. There is no form of provision to be found. Just despicable. This is why I donate to RBL.

*******

I wear a red poppy in remembrance of my uncle, my father's brother, his only sibling, who was reported missing - lost at sea. My grandmother and father waited and waited for news that he was safe, knowing really that none was going to arrive - his submarine had been torpedoed.
         

[Robbie]

Thanks for posting that link Sweet Pea. Gonnagles post was good!

I feel for your grandparents - just imagining what that must be like, never knowing what happened to your child. So many like cases in wars.

[jeremyp]

Of course niether nation was a democracy by our standards. However more male Germans per head of population were enfranchised than in 'britain'

Yes but you understand that their votes had very little influence on what their government did. In Britain the voters elected the government.

In both cases, the lot of the disenfranchised was to bleed and die while the rich grew richer, arms dealers prospered, and the aims of Imperialism were pursued. That only one empire survived the hell - thankfully in a terminal condition itself - was fortuitous.

The only people who prospered from the First World War were the Americans and that was because they loaned us and the French money and equipment to prosecute the war. That's the main reason why they joined in - to protect their investment.

You really do need to do something about that enormous chip on your shoulder.