The Poppy

As usual at this time of year, we begin to see peoples outerwear lightly decorated with a paper poppy as part of the charitable “Poppy Appeal”. This appeal is to honour and support our servicemen and women, who fought for our freedom in historical wars. The most notable are World War I and World War II.

This poppy appeal was started in 1921 by the Royal British Legion as a way or raising funds for its service and ex-service members. They used the poppy, because after World War I, it came to be seen as a general symbol of remembrance. A small reminder of the sacrifices these people made so that we can live in a free world.

On November 11^th, at 11am, many people will stop what they’re doing, be it in work, on the street or at home, to honour and show respect and remembrance for these servicemen and women who gave their lives in war.

However, in today’s society, there is a lot of negativity surrounding the poppy. According to Twitter, it’s been mentioned over 20,000 times this year and not all in positive ways. This is something I don’t agree with.

There is wide spread publicity of people who claim that the poppy is somehow offensive. This chorus of people is relatively small, and in no way represent the majority, yet the publicity they receive is mindboggling. These people claim that we shouldn’t wear a poppy, that it glorifies war, or is offensive to other religions or quite simply some people’s beliefs. A belief that this symbol is in some way pro-war or that acknowledging the military as heroes is glorifying the death and destruction caused during conflicts.

I respond to this by asking, if wearing a poppy is glorifying war, is wearing a pink ribbon glorifying breast cancer? Is wearing black at a funeral glorifying death? No, you are showing respect for someone who is no longer with us, or someone who is or has fought a courageous battle of their own. It does make me ask the question, what is so different about wearing a poppy?

When I wear my poppy, I do so out of respect for the servicemen and women who gave their lives and sacrificed so much for our freedom toady. I know I don’t have to, but I choose to. This is what it’s all about, choice, freedom and the opportunities these heroes have allowed us through their courage and bravery.

Of course, it goes without saying that most people would rather there was never a need for war, bloodshed or innocent lives to be lost, but the reality is, whilst there is oil, religion or items of worth, we will never be rid of wars. This is in no way meant to sound like I support war, I 100% do not, but I’m being realistic, in that, as much as I would love there to be no wars, conflict can, does and will continue to happen.

You do of course; get the usual small minority groups who claim to find it offensive, because of their religious beliefs; the west’s involvement in Iraq, Syria and the like. And obviously you get the even smaller brigade of ISIS supporters and the like, who do things like burn effigies of the Poppy in protest and an attempt to show their disdain for the western world and its heroes. But in reality, these numbers are so small they are insignificant.

So why then, do they seem to be given so much presence in the media, both social and news?

Well, for a start, a few radical Islamists did use social media to criticise the poppy and what it represents and yes these were shared to a degree – but how much really? According to the BBC, not as widely as we are led to believe. In fact, it seems to be that the images shared has had a snowballing effect, but not from the extremists themselves, but from the anti-extremism groups and followers, sharing and re-tweeting the posts from these groups.

Simple example; say an Islamist site posted something once; it may get shared 3 or 4 times around their community. But as soon as it falls onto the news feed of an actively pro-western supporter and they share it, it seems to spiral and gets shared up to 10 times the amount. Is this not hurting relationships between communities and religions? Is this not deepening the resentment already manifested into so many groups of people?

Of course, we cannot focus the anti-poppy lobby entirely on religion. There are other anti-war or even anti-British groups who are actively talking about the poppy on social media, claiming that it glorifies bloody incidents in Britain’s colonial history, often relating to events in Northern Ireland and the Falkland’s.

The tagline for Remembrance Day is “We Will Remember Them”. That is what this poppy is about. Remembering those who fought for our freedom. Without these people, and the sacrifices they made, we would not be living in the world we do today. I know some people love to moan about the government and their policies, but I for one would far prefer to be in this society, under British rule, than the alternative which came scarily close between 1939 and 1945.

The soldiers who fought on both sides are indeed heroes, yes, even some of the German soldiers, who we were fighting against, should be considered heroes. I say this, because like many soldiers in Britain, they too were conscripted. They had no desire to fight, they had no spiritual calling. They wanted to stay home, at peace with their families, but were not given the choice. These people courageously stood up, as they were told and did something which they were terrified of and absolutely did not want to do. Many gave their lives doing so. These people, whatever side of the battlefield they were on, are, in my eyes, all heroes.

For those soldiers and personnel currently serving, we should thank them for their bravery and heroic actions every day. I know I couldn’t go out there on a daily basis, standing in harm’s way, knowing I may be killed and still doing it, in honour and protection of my country and my family. These soldiers are also heroes, heroes of today and heroes of tomorrow.

So when you see a post on social media, showing either a far-right viewpoint or one showing anti-western or anti-Britain, rather than take on any strong political or religious stance, just think; the reason these people publicly post their beliefs, is because of the freedom we live in today – the same freedom that these soldiers fought for in the first place. Show them all the respect they deserve, because whether they intended it or not, they are all heroes.