[Closed] What happened to the White Poppies?

Good. Hopefully they got banned.

they sold out after the second album - MoR shite after that 😕

(actually I quite like the idea of pacifist/anti-war remembrance but they did seem to stir up quite a lot of shit)

Why?

I think jingoism probably did for them.

Good. Hopefully they got banned.

Hmmm... Care to unpick that for me?

They went to to arrange their own day instead of being a parasite on an established date?

if you wear one you get reactions like this so people stopped wearing them - i am generalising from my own experience.

http://www.ppu.org.uk/whitepoppy/index.html

gives other examples of how whe you remember you must do it jingoistically rather than just remember and want peace which is obviously a bad bad bad thing to do.
I dont wear a poppy I do observe the silence.

If i recall, their website continually has a pop at the poppy appeal which probebly does it no favours in some people's minds.

I've never approved of them for the reasons suggested by uplink.

Good idea in principle - wear a white poppy to show your commitment to peace, I think that was the idea behind them. But I would never wear one in place of a red poppy. Remembrance Day is a time to remember all those to died in armed conflicts, whether or not you approved of those conflicts.

If you want to make a point about peace then fine, but do it at another time - don't snub the war dead.

It just makes you look attention-seeking and immature, IMO.

I've never approved of them for the reasons suggested by uplink.

Good idea in principle - wear a white poppy to show your commitment to peace, I think that was the idea behind them. But I would never wear one in place of a red poppy. Remembrance Day is a time to remember all those to died in armed conflicts, whether or not you approved of those conflicts.

If you want to make a point about peace then fine, but do it at another time - don't snub the war dead.

It just makes you look attention-seeking and immature, IMO.

End of thread I think.
Well said ernie.

Care to unpick that for me?

Sure. They hijacked Remembrance Day, diverting (frankly embarrassingly piss-poor) funds away from Veterans in order to line their own pockets and fuel their own agenda, and corrupting what the red poppy stands for.

Now, I'm no war fanatic, but that's pretty shitty form whatever your political leanings. If they sold, I don't know, white roses in June, I'd probably by one myself. As it is, a pox on them.

I think ernie's post is the best I've read on here.

Ernie's nailed it.
I have no problem with an anti war statement but I don't like the symbol or timing of the white poppies.
The choice to use a poppy was a very bad one and is confrontational at a time where emotions are very high with people remembering dead friends and relatives.
A white ribbon worn at another time of year would be more appropriate IMO. I'm sure a lot more people would join in too.

My feeling is that the White Poppy stands for what the people we are remembering died for.

What's the point of remembering those who died in wars if we don't make an objection to war?

can you not remember the fallen whilst also making a statement about peace- i dont see why you think these are mutually exclusive.
I dont really understand the vitriol of some [ though not all] posters on this thread either.
I dont think i will start wearing it anytime soon though though they died for my freedom and democracy and my right to say what i wanted etc

Sure. They hijacked Remembrance Day, diverting (frankly embarrassingly piss-poor) funds away from Veterans in order to line their own pockets and fuel their own agenda, and corrupting what the red poppy stands for.

Lining their own pockets? was this not a charity as well? How did they corrupt what the poppy stands for?

must admit, I didn't know the funding went elsewhere - thought they contributed to the Haig fund (or whatever it is these days)

that is fairly poor form

🙁

[url= http://www.ppu.org.uk/whitepoppy/white_faq.html#_4 ]Where do white poppy funds go?[/url]

PS Every year there is always someone, often in the media, who implies that money raised is used for some suspect activity; others categorically insists that the white poppies are 'taking money from the valuable work the British Legion is doing' and we get a lot of intemperate emails.
If you happen to hold this view why not check with the British Legion whether this is true before complaining to us.

You may also like to know that the Peace Pledge Union's annual turnover is similar to the annual salary (£95,000+) of the British Legion's chief executive.

When Ernie and I agree, you know it's right.

On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, the First World War ended. Civilians wanted to remember the people who had given their lives for peace and freedom. An American War Secretary, Moina Michael, inspired by John McCrae's poem, began selling poppies to friends to raise money for the ex-Service community. And so the tradition began.

No need for a White Poppy when a Red Poppy will do. This statement is on The British Legion website. A desire for peace is an INTEGRAL part of The Poppy Appeal..
[img] http://i1.trekearth.com/photos/10285/dsc01177.jp g" target="_blank">http://i1.trekearth.com/photos/10285/dsc01177.jp g"/> [/img]

If you want to make a point about peace then fine, but do it at another time - don't snub the war dead.

That's rubbish, how is saying 'no more' snubbing the war dead?

I find it more incompatible to remember the senseless killing of millions [i]without[/i] wanting to strive for peace as well.

Who makes the white poppies?
The groups that initiated the white poppies in 1933 asked the British Legion to make them so that any money raised could go towards the Legion but the Legion refused. Since then the Legion has been asked twice by the Peace Pledge Union and refused on both occasions. The white poppies are made commercially and provide employment for women who might otherwise find employment hard to find.

the peace pledge union where the white poppy idea originated was on the surface (and to be fair to most members) a perfectly decent organisation but it also had quite a few links in its leadership to appeasement and the profascist movement during the 1930s and 1940s, so IMO is a much less wholesome symbol than just a support for 'peace'.

mrlebowski - Member

On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month in 1918, the First World War ended. Civilians wanted to remember the people who had given their lives for peace and freedom. An American War Secretary, Moina Michael, inspired by John McCrae's poem, began selling poppies to friends to raise money for the ex-Service community. And so the tradition began.

No need for a White Poppy when a Red Poppy will do. This statement is on The British Legion website. A desire for peace is an INTEGRAL part of The Poppy Appeal..

Doesn't say anything about a desire for peace.

I take it you can't see the line about giving "their lives for peace & freedom" then?.......

how kind I choose the white poppy ThanksI a not having a political ding dong on this of all days here is what I wrote on the do you wear a poppy 7 hours ago and no one had a pop

used to wear a white one but you just get aggro for it so i dont bother now.
Travelling the battlefields and graveyards as a 16 year old was on of the the most significant events in my life and made me a pacifist.Such a waste of life..to see so many crosses and so many deaths then realise it was often just one days battle. I will never ever forget the sacrifice these people made.
Last post at the menin gate made 16 year old lads cry after a week of seeing all that - that what I think about mainly the sacrifice and the waste of generations
They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

So why don't the makers of white poppies simply transfer any money made to the British Legion ?

That's touching without a doubt..

But..

I still fail to see how one cannot conceive that a Red Poppy isn't sufficient..A desire for peace is part of The Poppy Appeal. I don't see the need to wear a White Poppy..Truly I really don't..

Civilians wanted to remember the people who had given their lives for peace and freedom.

Remembering people who gave their lives for peace and freedom is not saying "I want peace and freedom".

I understand that the British Legion want to stay out of politics, a statement for peace is a political statement which is why they didn't put 'no more war' in the centre of the poppy.

I am not saying that the Royal British Legion doesn't want peace and freedom but that they are not an organisation whose remit is the pursual of peace.

Pretty sure that's going to be misconstrued but ho-hum.

it also had quite a few links in its leadership to appeasement and the profascist movement during the 1930s and 1940s

Really? Where? who? when?

Lining their own pockets? was this not a charity as well?

The money primarily goes on selling / promoting their poppies. What's left over goes on 'education' which as far as I can glean is anti-war propaganda. "Charity" or no, the only people to benefit from your 'donations' are the people flogging poppies.

Having sly pops at another charity doesn't exactly endear me to them either. But if it's still not clear, let me summarise:

It's disrespectful. Whether you agree with it or not, people have [i]died[/i] to defend their country.

You want to celebrate / promote peace, go ahead. There's 364 other days in the year, pick one.

Some PPU supporters were so sympathetic to German grievances that one member, Rose Macaulay, claimed she found it difficult to distinguish between the propaganda of the PPU and that of the British Union of Fascists (BUF), saying, "Occasionally when reading Peace News, I (and others) half think we have got hold of the Blackshirt by mistake."[8][9] There was Fascist infiltration of the PPU[10] and MI5 kept an eye on the PPU's "small Fascist connections".[11] George Orwell, always hostile to pacifism, accused the PPU of "moral collapse" after Dick Sheppard's death in October 1937 on the grounds of its links with the BUF.[12] The historian Mark Gilbert said, "it is hard to think of a British newspaper that was so consistent an apologist for nazi Germany as Peace News," which "assiduously echoed the nazi press's claims that far worse offences than the Kristallnacht events were a regular feature of British colonial rule."[13] David C. Lukowitz said that, "it is nonsense to charge the PPU with pro-Nazi sentiments. From the outset it emphasised that its primary dedication was to world peace, to economic justice and racial equality," but it had "too much sympathy for the German position, often the product of ignorance and superficial thinking.

Wiki

The money primarily goes on selling / promoting their poppies. What's left over goes on 'education' which as far as I can glean is anti-war propaganda. "Charity" or no, the only people to benefit from your 'donations' are the people flogging poppies

That seems inefficiently circular

That seems inefficiently circular

Yeah, funny that.

Yeah, being a [s]charity[/s] not for profit and all.

(actually I quite like the idea of pacifist/anti-war remembrance but they did seem to stir up quite a lot of shit)

So it would seem

anti-war propaganda

Is that what the word peace now means ?

I have mixed feelings about anything that could potentially glorify war. WW1's 'glorious dead'. I also would like to see our lads taken out of Afghanistan ASAP. Sick of hearing about young lads being mutilated for a Afghan leader who openly admitted that he would side with ****stan if America ever attacked Afghanistan.

Only one side wins any war; the defence industry.

For once, amazingly, I find myself in total agreement with ernie! Very well put, I would struggle to say it better myself. And hora, I think everyone here would like to see our troops brought out of Blair's vainglorious foreign adventures.

That seems inefficiently circular
Yeah, funny that.

No, i mean it doesn't seem like an efficient scam