James McClean

[michaelg]

They don't know who they are. Settlers never do.

What about the Celtic settlers in Ireland?

After say 2000 years you build up a decent back catalogue

And Viking settlers too?  Are they "scum" too? 

[BennyCake]

I see the Fai have been snitched to Fifa by the much despised whataboutery poppy brigade.

Fwiw, I agree with Fifa's uniform stance and regret that they were not so proactive when Irish players took to the field with black armbands to mark the death of ex royal Diana, like a candle in the wind.
If it means that Croats can't celebrate their pro nazi ww2 past on the field of play then it's a good thing and players like Di Canio can't give fascist salutes on the field to the horde.

Did that really happen?

[BennyCake]

I admire James McClean for his stance given where he is from and the whole history of Bloody Sunday. I also understand why the poppy is so popular in Scotland and England where it is genuinely sold and worn in solidarity with a military that is often abandoned by the very government it serves, same happens in the US and Rock Stars such as Springsteen, Mellencamp and Young whilst being anti war do benefits for veterans. In the wee 6 though it has always been used as a means of reminding the croppies of their place. I'm not surprised the IFA are looking to wear one it shows just how committed they are to football for all and fits in with the anthem and fleg. Ulster Rugby mindful of their fan base got the balance right and fair play to them.

Sad you feel that way. I was raised in the unionist community and Rembrance Day Services at school and church were about remembering the war dead.  That was the start and end of it.  Sad that it has been politicised in the way that it has in recent years.  By the way, I too don't like the poppy fascism", as it's called, and fully respect people's right not to wear one.  What I don't like is the insinuation that people who wear them are on the wind up or putting people in their place as you seem to think.
With regards to Ulster Rubgy, what's your view on the permanent War Memorial that was retained when the ground was re-developed?   

No issue with the memorial like many nationalists I have an uncle buried in Italy, killed at Monte Casino. But growing up in the North in the 60's and 70's the poppy like the union flag and the ulster banner were constantly used to remind us of our place. If unionists were genuinely interested in shared space they would not be so reluctant to give nationalist symbols etc equal status, but pigs will fly. Ulster Rugby have taken politics out of it and fair play.

Would that explain the motives of Tony's neighbour?

[michaelg]

I don't have a massive problem with people wearing a poppy or wishing to remember.  In many instances there are very personal motives and on a more general scale there is very much a focus on the two world wars when many young men lost their lives in horrific warfare where in many cases they had been conscripted.  It is pretty sobering stuff if you were to put it in todays context and think of people close to you in those age groups. 

There are also those who will be remembering more recent conflicts with a focus on individuals rather than the detail of the conflicts themselves where the role of the British army is questionable at best.  Again this type of remembrance is fine in my book. 

Where I do have a problem is this more recent trend from those in positions of authority whether it be government or their stenographers in the mainstream media who seem to have complete power in dictating that a poppy should be worn and trying to force this by the serious lambasting of those who do not from television presenters to footballers and football teams etc. 

The great irony of course being that on one hand the original idea of the poppy, and continuing reason for many people was/is to 'remember those who gave their lives for our freedom' in the world wars yet any public person wishing to exercise their freedom of choice not to wear a poppy is not tolerated.

Nail on head.  Excellent post.

[BennyCake]

It appears difficult for people to understand the different connotations with the poppy in the UK. It really is no different to a pink ribbon for breast cancer. Even as an Irish nationalist I can understand that people would support the charity and its ideals without supporting the wars that the army fights. As with the USA it is mainly working class kids who end up as cannon fodder, shipped home with PTSD or missing limbs. The Government which offers little help for injured ex military has no sense of shame given their reaction to the whole Fifa thing. As I said before the poppy is divisive here in Ireland mainly because Unionists mis-used it in the past and the legions over here are no different to orange halls with their fleg flying.

I used to live in the UK and I always thought the poppy was militaristic bollocks. They never looked after soldiers.

That's obviously the impression they try to portray with the pushing of the Poppy. We really care about our boys, and you fought for our freedom etc, we'll look after you when you come home with your legs missing. When in reality it was legalised mass murder. The slaughter of millions and those in charge would do the same in the morning and it wouldn't cost them a second thought.

[michaelg]

I admire James McClean for his stance given where he is from and the whole history of Bloody Sunday. I also understand why the poppy is so popular in Scotland and England where it is genuinely sold and worn in solidarity with a military that is often abandoned by the very government it serves, same happens in the US and Rock Stars such as Springsteen, Mellencamp and Young whilst being anti war do benefits for veterans. In the wee 6 though it has always been used as a means of reminding the croppies of their place. I'm not surprised the IFA are looking to wear one it shows just how committed they are to football for all and fits in with the anthem and fleg. Ulster Rugby mindful of their fan base got the balance right and fair play to them.

Sad you feel that way. I was raised in the unionist community and Rembrance Day Services at school and church were about remembering the war dead.  That was the start and end of it.  Sad that it has been politicised in the way that it has in recent years.  By the way, I too don't like the poppy fascism", as it's called, and fully respect people's right not to wear one.  What I don't like is the insinuation that people who wear them are on the wind up or putting people in their place as you seem to think.
With regards to Ulster Rubgy, what's your view on the permanent War Memorial that was retained when the ground was re-developed?   

No issue with the memorial like many nationalists I have an uncle buried in Italy, killed at Monte Casino. But growing up in the North in the 60's and 70's the poppy like the union flag and the ulster banner were constantly used to remind us of our place. If unionists were genuinely interested in shared space they would not be so reluctant to give nationalist symbols etc equal status, but pigs will fly. Ulster Rugby have taken politics out of it and fair play.

Aye right.  I am afraid you are contradicting yourself here somewhat.

[Orior]

I see the Fai have been snitched to Fifa by the much despised whataboutery poppy brigade.

Fwiw, I agree with Fifa's uniform stance and regret that they were not so proactive when Irish players took to the field with black armbands to mark the death of ex royal Diana, like a candle in the wind.
If it means that Croats can't celebrate their pro nazi ww2 past on the field of play then it's a good thing and players like Di Canio can't give fascist salutes on the field to the horde.

Did that really happen?

Yep - 6 Sept 1997 against Iceland (I think) in a World Cup qualifier

Was she ex'd before Chuck had her stamped out?

[seafoid]

They don't know who they are. Settlers never do.

What about the Celtic settlers in Ireland?

After say 2000 years you build up a decent back catalogue

And Viking settlers too?  Are they "scum" too?

The Vikings integrated, Michael.
Lochlannaigh. They brought in words like bord.

The Normans integrated

But the Ulster Scots never did.  And they are not scum.
They are just lost. And easy to manipulate

Now is really strange because for the first time in centuries Ireland is coherent and England is fucked

[BennyCake]

I see the Fai have been snitched to Fifa by the much despised whataboutery poppy brigade.

Fwiw, I agree with Fifa's uniform stance and regret that they were not so proactive when Irish players took to the field with black armbands to mark the death of ex royal Diana, like a candle in the wind.
If it means that Croats can't celebrate their pro nazi ww2 past on the field of play then it's a good thing and players like Di Canio can't give fascist salutes on the field to the horde.

Did that really happen?

Yep - 6 Sept 1997 against Iceland (I think) in a World Cup qualifier

Forget FIFA taking action. Why were Ireland players wearing black armbands?!

[stew]

I see the Fai have been snitched to Fifa by the much despised whataboutery poppy brigade.

Fwiw, I agree with Fifa's uniform stance and regret that they were not so proactive when Irish players took to the field with black armbands to mark the death of ex royal Diana, like a candle in the wind.
If it means that Croats can't celebrate their pro nazi ww2 past on the field of play then it's a good thing and players like Di Canio can't give fascist salutes on the field to the horde.

Did that really happen?

Yep - 6 Sept 1997 against Iceland (I think) in a World Cup qualifier

Forget FIFA taking action. Why were Ireland players wearing black armbands?!

Correct, maybe the starting 11 were all from Dublin!

I had a lot of time for Diana, fine hen and all that, wonderful caring person but wtf were the FAI thinking? How was that ever a good idea?

[Main Street]

Maybe the armband was for the Merc.

[BennyCake]

Maybe the armband was for the Merc.

Or Big Dodi. Maybe he had an Irish granny.

[seafoid]

Robert Fisk: Why I will never wear this symbol of betrayal again

05/11/2016 | 02:30
Yes, the boys and girls of the BBC and ITV, and all of Britain's lively media and sports personalities and politicians, are at it again.
They're flaunting their silly poppies once more to show their super-correctness in the face of history, as ignorant or forgetful as ever that their tired fashion accessory was inspired by a poem which urged the soldiers of the Great War of 1914-18 to go on killing and slaughtering.
But that's no longer quite the point, for I fear there are now darker reasons why these TV chumps and their MP interviewees sport their red compassion badges on their clothes.
For who are they commemorating? The dead of Sarajevo? Of Srebrenica? Of Aleppo?
Nope. The television bumpkins only shed their crocodile tears for the dead of World War I and II, who were (save for a colonial war or two) the last generation of Britons to get the chop before the new age of "we-bomb-you-die" technology ensured that their chaps - brown-eyed, for the most part, often Muslims, usually dark skinned - got blown to bits while the British chaps flew safely home to the mess for breakfast.
Yes, I rage against the poppy disgrace every year.
And yes, my father - 12th Battalion, The King's Liverpool Regiment, Third Battle of the Somme, the liberation of burning Cambrai, 1918 - finally abandoned the poppy charade when he learned of the hypocrisy and lies behind the war in which he fought.
His schoolboy son followed his father's example and never wore his wretched Flanders flower again.
Oddly, the dunderheads who are taking Britain out of the European Union on a carpet of equally deceitful lies - and I include Theresa May and her buffoonery of ministers - are guilty of even greater hypocrisy than the TV presenters whose poppies, for just a few days a year, take over the function of studio make-up artists (poppies distracting viewers from the slabs of paste on their TV faces).

For the fields of Flanders, the real mud and faeces and blood which those vile poppies are supposed to symbolise, showed just how European the dead generations were.
British soldiers went off to fight and die in their tens of thousands for little Catholic Belgium, today the seat of the EU where Nigel Farage disgraced his country by telling the grandchildren of those we went to fight for that they'd never done a day's work in their lives.

In France, British (and, of course, Irish) soldiers bled to death in even greater Golgothas - 20,000 alone on the first day of the Somme in 1916 - to save the nation which the British are now throwing out of our shiny new insular lives.
When Poles fought and died alongside British pilots in the 1940 Battle of Britain to save us from Nazi Germany, we idolised them, lionised them, wrote about their exploits in the RAF, filmed them, fell in love with them. For them, too, we pretend to wear the poppy.
But now the poppy wearers want to throw the children of those brave men out of Britain.

Shame is the only word I can find to describe our betrayal.
And perhaps I sniff something equally pernicious among the studio boys and girls. On Britain's international television channels, Christmas was long ago banned (save for news stories on the Pope).
There are no Christmas trees any more beside the presenters' desks, not a sprig of holly.
For we live in a multicultural society, in which such manifestations might be offensive to other "cultures" (I use that word advisedly, for culture to me means Beethoven and the poet Hafiz and Monet).
And for the same reason, our international screens never show the slightest clue of Eid festivities (save again for news stories) lest this, too, offends another "culture".
Yet the poppy just manages to sneak onto the screen of BBC World; it is permissible, you see, the very last symbol that "our" dead remain more precious than the millions of human beings Britain has killed, in the Middle East for example, for whom we wear no token of remembrance.
Lord Blair of Kut al-Amara will be wearing his poppy this week - but not for those he liquidated in his grotesque invasion of Iraq.
And in this sense, I fear that the wearing of the poppy has become a symbol of racism. In his old-fashioned way (and he read a lot about post-imperial history), I think my father, who was 93 when he died, understood this.
His example was one of great courage. He fought for his country and then, unafraid, he threw his poppy away.
Television celebrities do not have to fight for their country - yet they do not even have the guts to break this fake conformity and toss their sordid poppies in the office waste-paper bin.

[Main Street]

When James received all the abuse, vitriol, death threats, outrage, hate and condemnation from the general public, newspapers and  political leaders,  all that certified the wearing and not wearing of the poppy in the present day, as a political issue.

[Rossfan]

 There was an English soccer game on Sky earlier and neither team had poppies on their jerseys.