White Poppy and Rememberance

Callistemon21

So many misconceptions which get perpetuated on social media sites!

What does a red poppy symbolise?

^The red poppy is a symbol of both Remembrance and hope for a peaceful future^

Yes

So many misconceptions which get perpetuated on social media sites!

What does a red poppy symbolise?

The red poppy is a symbol of both Remembrance and hope for a peaceful future

Elrel

I have worn a white poppy as well as a red one for 30 years. I remember the wars and hope for peace.

As to the superstition, does that inhibit anyone using the Swiss flag and anything connected to the Red Cross? I’ve only heard it in connection with flower arranging.

I know, it is rather daft but I first heard about when watching flower arranging and immediately put blue lobelia in my red and white hanging baskets!

It's just superstition.

White poppies can be purchased from 'Poppies for Peace'. White poppies commemorate ALL those who die in wars, not just the military, but also the many civilian deaths, etc.
Red poppies sold by the British Legion the money goes to them and to their support for ex-soldiers and their families. Those at the ceremonies wear military medals and unforms, and only speak of the British dead..
I will continue to wear my white poppy for Peace. I am more than happy when I am challenged and asked abut the white poppy to explain why I am wearing it.
I have never been agressive or challenging to anyone wearing a red poppy,

I have worn a white poppy as well as a red one for 30 years. I remember the wars and hope for peace.

As to the superstition, does that inhibit anyone using the Swiss flag and anything connected to the Red Cross? I’ve only heard it in connection with flower arranging.

I wouldn't wear a white and red one together because it's supposed to be bad luck.
It's supposed to stem from the fact that red denotes blood and white is for bandages.

I don't mind people wearing a red poppy. I do object to being told to take my white poppy to another day.

To be fair the fact that we can freely discuss it is probably a good sign for peace. Disagreement is not necessarily a negative thing if done respectfully. Its how we process ideas and make progress.

Ilovecheese

What hope is there for peace in the world if a grandparent forum can't even agree that there are equally valid poppy colours and that one does not detract from the other.

Well put and I agree totally. The “my poppy is more valid than your poppy” and all the elaborations on why that is so are just like the claims that my country deserves to be here more than your country, and
we’ve seen what that does.

What hope is there for peace in the world if a grandparent forum can't even agree that there are equally valid poppy colours and that one does not detract from the other.

lemsip

if you want to have a another colour poppy day choose another day don't come on the back of something already in existence.

www.ppu.org.uk/remembrance-white-poppies

Some information about the history of the white poppy for you. It is not a new fad.

White poppies are worn every year by thousands of people across the UK and beyond. They were first produced in 1933 in the aftermath of the First World War, by members of the Co-operative Women's Guild. Many of these women had lost family and friends in the First World War. They wanted to hold on to the key message of Remembrance Day, 'never again'.

M0nica

But WW2 was a different kind of war, not the endless trench based attrition of WW1, with its enormous death toll.

For the British Army, WW2 was a far more traditional war with less than half the casualties of WW1. Even if you take into account the huge civilian death toll,the death toll was still less than half that in WW1driving the enemy across the country infront of you until they were curtailed within their national boundary.

In WW2 Owen's experience of war would have been very different, he would have had the knowledge of WW1. He would have written very different poetry.

Don't know where you are getting your figures from.
This site www.diffen.com/difference/World_War_I_vs_World_War_II#:~:text=Estimated%20to%20be%2010%20million,war%2Drelated%20disease%20and%20famine.
Compares death tolls and has WW1 with approx 20million and WW2 at 60 million.
Perhaps you are just looking at deaths in Europe, or discounting deaths in camps, from starvation of from the nuclear bombs.

The pity of war endures, Owen would still have seen that.

lemsip

if you want to have a another colour poppy day choose another day don't come on the back of something already in existence.

So you are saying that the women whose men died in WW1 had no right to judge the red poppy, or to fear that the original intention of remembrance was being overwhelmed by militarisation, or to develop their own poppy. Surely they knew those men best, they suffered losses few of us will ever equal. They had a right to remember them how they wished and those of us who wear a white poppy have the right to honour those women.

The Kaiser and his Generals wished to expand the German Empire. The allies just wanted the Germans to go home. Ditto WW2, Ditto Stalin post WW2.

lemsip

if you want to have a another colour poppy day choose another day don't come on the back of something already in existence.

Exactly that,

if you want to have a another colour poppy day choose another day don't come on the back of something already in existence.

My grandfathers described ‘their’ war as one that should never have happened. Ww2 though, they saw as absolutely necessary and one that had to be won. My father was a Royal Marine on the Mediterranean fleet, took part in the Battle of Sicily.
These three men were kind, gentle and knew their history. Their influence on me remains important. I dislike the mistaken idea that the red poppy glorifies war

M0nica

But WW2 was a different kind of war, not the endless trench based attrition of WW1, with its enormous death toll.

For the British Army, WW2 was a far more traditional war with less than half the casualties of WW1. Even if you take into account the huge civilian death toll,the death toll was still less than half that in WW1driving the enemy across the country infront of you until they were curtailed within their national boundary.

In WW2 Owen's experience of war would have been very different, he would have had the knowledge of WW1. He would have written very different poetry.

He might have written very different poetry, but his message here for the future applies to all war and is a warning.

One death is one too many and to compare war against war in this context is unimaginative.

But WW2 was a different kind of war, not the endless trench based attrition of WW1, with its enormous death toll.

For the British Army, WW2 was a far more traditional war with less than half the casualties of WW1. Even if you take into account the huge civilian death toll,the death toll was still less than half that in WW1driving the enemy across the country infront of you until they were curtailed within their national boundary.

In WW2 Owen's experience of war would have been very different, he would have had the knowledge of WW1. He would have written very different poetry.

I don't think that the reason or objective of the war would have influenced Owen. His concern for the loss of life and the "pity of war" would remain.

We have to ask tho, if Wilfrid Owen had been taking part in the second world war, would he have been writing the same kind of thing ( doubtful) or even have written poetry at all.

Wifred Owen's Preface to his book of poems

This book is not about heroes. English Poetry is not yet fit to speak of them. Nor is it about deeds or lands, nor anything about glory, honour, dominion or power,
except War.
Above all, this book is not concerned with Poetry.
The subject of it is War, and the pity of War.
The Poetry is in the pity.
Yet these elegies are not to this generation,
This is in no sense consolatory.

They may be to the next.
All the poet can do to-day is to warn.
That is why the true Poets must be truthful.
If I thought the letter of this book would last,
I might have used proper names; but if the spirit of it survives Prussia,—my ambition and those names will be content; for they will have achieved themselves fresher fields than Flanders.

From Wilfred Owen and the Culture of Commemoration.
On the remembrance festival

it rebrands the army as an aid organisation in selfless service of queen and country. Rather than endorsing the credo of “Never again”, the implicit logic of the festival’s dramaturgy demands that British society unreservedly support the military as a tribute owed to Britain’s war dead. When Wilfred Owen in his famous “Preface” spoke of “the pity of War” this, clearly, is not what he had in mind.

writersinspire.org/content/wilfred-owen-culture-commemoration

The red poppy is a token of peace. It does not favour one side or the other, it can remember friend and foe alike and remind us all of the fultity of war.

Unfortunately, as my DH pointed out today. Peace agreements rarely solve anything, just gives a lull between periods of warfare. the only thing that finally solves an intractable conflict is a resounding victory for one side.

Most of us do and realise the true meaning, nanna8.