Poppies and Remembrance

[yrieithydd]

It was Remembrance Sunday today. We marked it at church with silence at the start of the service this morning and then a 'parish service of remembrance' this evening. I finally managed to do what I've been intending to do for years today and wore both a red and a white poppy.*

I'm aware that by doing so I'm probably annoying extremists on both sides, but I think that it gets the balance right. I don't just want to wear a white poppy because I think that that is potentially too much of a political statement (especially given how some chose to interpret the white poppy)** but nor am I entirely happy just wearing a red poppy especially given some of the more extreme views I have heard.

I'm basically a pacifist -- in that I think that in the long run violence doesn't solve anything and that we should work for other ways of solving international conflicts but I'm aware that in a situation like 1939 with an aggressor like Hitler, it's hard to see what else should have been done but fight him, though I still won't justify everything we did.*** Also, my dad's dad was a conscientious objector who was in the ambulance corp and was involved in the liberation of Japanese concentration camps. I think that wearing a white poppy for me has a connection to that.

It might be coincidental in that I only really started coming across white poppies after I went to Cambridge in 2001, but I think the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan which I do not believe were justified have made me more wary of the red poppy because I don't want to be seen as supporting those wars, although I still mourn all those who have died in them.

I will also comment that I only wore my poppies today. This is partly because I didn't get my white one until Thursday and by then canteen shop had run out of red ones and so I couldn't wear both until I got a red one at church this morning. However it is also that I find they start appearing on the telly a fortnight or more ahead of time and this seems too long ahead for me. I also find that if I wear one too early, I'll just lose it! I have not yet decided whether I'll wear them tomorrow and Tuesday. Possibly I'll take them to work (because cycling wearing them would be a sure way of losing them) and then decide.

*Some of my colleagues had ordered some.

**Though I find it very hard to understand the visceral dislike of the white poppy.

***But had we not been so aggressive and unforgiving after the first world war, would Hitler have been elected? And were there things which could have been done prior to 1939 which could have solved the problem without a war which killed millions.

Comments

[curig.livejournal.com]

I wore both red and white today as I did two years ago. [I didn't wear any last year on account of being in the US where they don't do poppies.] I would normally only wear poppies on Remembrance Sunday and not on any other day, but I'm singing in a remembrancetide service tomorrow and we have a remembrance service here in Wesley House on Tuesday so I'll probably wear them for both of those too.

I got three comments relating to my white poppy this morning in church (I was preaching). One asked what it was, one person said she approved of it, one person she couldn't abide it.

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

Nobody commented on mine! This morning during the service it wasn't that obvious because I was wearing them on my cotta. Tonight they were more obvious because they were on my gown! Now they're on my white blouse so again the white poppy tends to vanish!

[curig.livejournal.com]

I was in all black so they stood out...

[atreic.livejournal.com]

Interesting argument on this in other corners of the internet.

Having read and thought about that, I think the right thing to do may be to wear a red poppy and a white dove (or a peace sign).

However, I am Very Confused about how pacifist I am. So I need to think about that myself so I understand what I want to say first!

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

That post of woodpijn's is what prompted my post! It's is very similar to a comment I posted there!#

However, I am Very Confused about how pacifist I am.

I was surprised by how nuanced my pacifism turned out to be when I tried to express it.

[sashajwolf.livejournal.com]

A white poppy does seem like an appropriate way of honouring your grandfather.

I find it very hard to understand the visceral dislike of the white poppy.

My (great-)aunt had this (just before I read this post, I'd actually used the word "visceral" elsewhere to describe her reaction against the white poppy.) My great-uncle was in the Merchant Navy and permanently ruined his health on the Arctic Convoys by giving away bits of his uniform (against direct orders) to women and children who were freezing to death in St. Petersburg, where my uncle's ship was iced in. He was never the same again afterwards, but it took him till 1968 to die. My aunt took the white poppy as a statement that the war should not have been fought, that my uncle should never have been sent on the convoys. How could she have got through those 23 years, and then another 26 of widowhood, believing that? The cognitive dissonance would have killed her. She had to believe that the PPU was wrong, and she had to believe it vehemently, just to keep getting up in the morning. It may be a mistaken belief - it depends how far back you go with the what-ifs - but it's a very natural one.

I wore a white poppy in her sight once. I never made that mistake again, and I will never put one on again now that she's gone, because I will not be seen to say to a grieving relative that their loss was not worthwhile, when it means so much to them to believe that. If I had ancestors who were conscientious objectors, maybe I would, because honouring my ancestors means a great deal to me. But mine made different choices, and in November I honour those, and the choices that others in my family are still making. There's time enough the rest of the year to express my pacifist leanings (which are getting stronger over the years, as it happens.)

[keith-underdown.livejournal.com]

Actually your grandfather wasn't a conscientious objector but he took a principled decision to be a non-combatant. He was a medical orderly (read nurse) in the RAF and the RAF regiment. He was left mentally scarred by the experience; first of all trying to help injured men back to health and then, and much worse, trying to help civilians liberated from Japanese concentration camps.

I believe that he would have been much happier and more able to come to terms with his experiences if had ben able to be a nurse in civvy street but male nurses were only to be found in mental hospitals back then.

Your maternal grandfather was also a non-combatant. He chose to be a naval chaplain not an army or air force chaplain as naval chaplains were not expected to bear arms, unlike army chaplains.

[yrieithydd.livejournal.com]

Ok. So what's the difference between conscientious objection and a principled decision to be a non-combatant?

[keith-underdown.livejournal.com]

A conscientious objector will not serve in the armed forces even if called up and risks going to prison or having to g on the run. To be a non-combatant means serving in the armed forces but in role that does not involve fighting. As a medical orderly my father did receive the same basic training as everybody else and did have a service issue revolver but ti was never used.

I would guess that going in as a non-combatant would almost be harder than being a CO. The latter is likely to have a good support network but a non-combatant is likely to get all sorts of stick from fellow recruits until he or she starts performing their full duties. Being first on the scene of a crash at an airfield demands a certain kind of courage.