why the brits wear those orange/red lapel pins.

[RepublicanElephant]

i kept seeing british politicians and reporters wearing these and it was driving me crazy why. then i found this:

"November is the time of the year when we wear a red poppy in memory of those who sacrificed their lives for us during wars."
http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/customs/Remembrance.html

[Swamp Rat]

1. I guess they like upside down crosses and mass murder like Bushler.

[DeepModem Mom]

9. I don't know about this photo, but there are no crosses on the poppies

worn in Britain. I lived there a few years. The sale of the poppies, for any amount the donor wishes to give, benefits veterans. The memory of the bombing of Britain, and the sacrifice of lives, is still fresh in the memory of many there -- and reminders of the destruction still visible in lots of places.

[Swamp Rat]

16. Thanks

I was just being sarcastic about that particular photo above. I forgot the :sarcasm: thingy :)

[DeepModem Mom]

19. It's a rather strange photo!

:)

[AlCzervik]

2. they're the same ones we get on Veterans day.

[wryter2000]

4. That's what I thought

Charles' was sure big, though.

[AlCzervik]

6. hmmm, never pictured him having a big one, it's always those quiet

ones you gotta watch out for.;-)

[wryter2000]

23. ROFL

Now, there's an image I could have probably done without. :) :rofl:

[newscott]

3. Looks like a poppy to me.

[Debi]

5. It's Roger Daltrey's fault

[Lindsay]

7. In Flanders Fields

In Flanders Fields

By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

IN FLANDERS FIELDS the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

[Debau2005]

8. Armistice Day

They celebrate Armisitice Day when we celebrate Veterans Day. This year it is November 11. The poppy is the symbol.

I was in London during Armistice Day a few years back. They go all out. And the ceremonies seem to truly honor the sacrifice made by their people in WWII, unlike our Veterans Day Mattress sales!!!!

[achtung_circus]

11. In Canada, too.

It's Remembrance Day, and my birthday.

For government employess and schools it is a Holiday.

[Bozita]

17. CBC TV news folks all wear them for the month

You gotta love 'The National.'

[EuroObserver]

13. Every year it's November 11th. End of the Great War.

[kskiska]

22. It used to be Armistice Day here, too.

And Memorial Day used to be called Decoration Day (decoration of soldiers' graves). I also remember when Washington's Birthday and Lincoln's Birthday were two separate holidays that didn't necessarily fall on weekends (now they're combined as Presidents' Day). Our holidays have been watered down beyond recognition and used as devices for 3-day weekends. I'm not against 3-day weekends, but the effect has been to obliterate the true meaning of these holidays.

[enigmatic]

10. Rememberance Day

here in Canada; I've got a Poppy pin on my coast and on my hat.

[the_spectator]

12. It's John McCrae's fault:

He is remembered for what is probably the single best-known and popular poem from the First World War, "In Flanders Fields" at least the best-known and popular at the time. He wrote it in 1915.

"In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields."

I had to google myself to learn that the poppies appeared in McCrae's poem not because there was already a tradition to plant poppies in the military cemetaries at the Western Front at the time; it turns out that poppies grow wild in that Belgium/North-East France region.

The poem is very "rah-rah" and to be deplored, but it remembers the most bloody war in history, at least in European history. I tend to be respectful of the tradition of the poppy, as it was born in that worst of wars.

[Geoff R. Casavant]

14. The thing about poppies

is that they grow best in tilled soil. You can imagine the effects of hundreds of miles of trenches and earthworks -- the fields would be covered in bright red poppies.

[newspeak]

15. you know, my history professor

in college said that WWII was just the extension of WWI. WWI was so devastating to Europe and the British Isles. So many men lost their lives, and the economic devastation was horrendous; but don't worry a lot of American industrialists made money off of the blood of millions. maybe, WWI is the reason so many Europeans were against another act of aggression, to bad Hitler had so many friends to finance his aggression.

[Bridget Burke]

21. So many lies had been told to justify WWI.....

That people were terrified of another useless war. Hitler had supporters, of course. But others were skeptical about just how bad the Nazis could be. They remembered the stories of "Huns" skewering Belgian babies on their bayonets.

WWI was supposed to be "The War to End War."

[Nihil]

20. That is exactly right.

> The thing about poppies is that they grow best in tilled soil. You
> can imagine the effects of hundreds of miles of trenches and
> earthworks -- the fields would be covered in bright red poppies.

The repeated incredibly heavy bombardments combining massive earth
movement with high watertable and far too much "organic fertilizer"
meant that the whole of no-mans-land became ideal poppy-growing fields.

The survivors of the trenches described that effect as the most moving
sight - literally poppies growing where their friends died. There was
no distinction between ally and enemy, just the red poppies to mark
the bloodshed.

Nihil

[Wrinkle_In_Time]

18. NZ and Oz equivalent is ANZAC Day: April 25 (FYI)

Originated from service in WWI and Gallipoli.