If you don’t want to observe two minute silence- don’t be out

The ‘/‘ between willing and forced doing quite a lot of work there. You do realise the British army murdered innocent civilians on their own streets for being like me and my children. So when you rightly say that remembrance has taken on more meaning than just WWI, perhaps you can see why some of your fellow citizens want nothing to do with it.

It's also a long time since the Holocaust - should we stop reflecting on that too?
Even if someone did choose to join the armed forces, they are still willing to risk their lives if needed. Would you?

I'm pretty sure few soldiers gave their lives to defend the freedom to be a twat between 11am and 11.02 on the 11th November each year. Or for the freedom to piss all over other people's celebrations and commemorations.

If you want to make a meaningful contribution to honouring veterans and service people, volunteer, donate, vote so we don’t end up in the shit again.

Surely you can do both? I think having a time set aside for remembrance matters. So many people are indifferent politically, don’t understand how privileged we are to have the freedoms we do and have little idea that those freedoms aren’t afforded in many countries. I also think remembering the very high price of war - all wars - is important especially at a time when there is fighting in so many places. Remembrance helps remind people why voting, donating etc matters.

There are very few times now when people are involved in collective acts, we’ve become such an individualistic society, a two minute collective act of remembrance isn’t much to ask of people, either to observe themselves or to respect that others might want to observe it and not disrupt that process.

Very well said.
It's a sign of how selfish some people really are. It hasn't affected them so it cannot possibly be important. They also think that it's about government policy and don't realise it's about those who were/are willing/forced to sacrifice themselves.

👏👏👏👏👏👏

It's a long time since conscription. Everyone fighting a war made an active choice.

Some people in the UK will be from the countries the UK invaded. They're not likely to want to show respect to the UK forces are they.

People can choose not to respect it but don't then complain when people don't respect what is important to you. Mutual respect goes a long way to keeping the peace.

Put your money where your mouth is. I actually do care. Which is why I volunteer with veterans for the blind, and donate and fundraise to help for heroes. What has more effect for veterans and service people? Things like that, or standing quietly in the supermarket for 2 minutes?

You don't, but you do have to accept you might not be served in a shop for 2 minutes because other people do choose to observe the silence.

It was started for that purpose, but it's taken on more meaning.

It's performance remembrance that became popular in the 90s. Prior to that the 2 minute silence was pretty much the preserve of remembrance services.

The first time I saw it on armistice day was when I worked in retail. A woman who was being served suddenly stopped, went silent and bowed her head. Everything else just carried on around her as nobody had a clue what she was doing. The person behind her in the queue was really annoyed but the rest of us were just confused.

Well, ideally zero from my perspective, which incidentally is the number of times you’ve explained it. I mean, you’ve said it a few times, but that isn’t quite the same thing.

I am actually shocked that nearly half of Mumsnetters seem to consider it acceptable to not observe the 2 minutes silence if they are out and about.

This isn't just about WW1. It is about all soldiers who have made the ultimate sacrifice for our country. I may not support all of the conflicts our military were involved in, but I'll always support individual soldiers.

I have relatives whose lives were utterly devastated by the loss of their father/brother/husband/nephew in Afghanistan.

It's 2 minutes in a year for goodness sake!

I think it's the messaging around this that gets my back up, like the howling about whether a celebrity or newsreader is wearing a poppy or not, and the performative nature of it.

Maybe it's because of the whole banging pots and clapping the NHS during Covid as well, which there was a stupid amount of social pressure to support.

I don't have a problem with remembrance, it's just the whole lecturing about it and pressure to conform. How about OP stays home or goes to a service if it's that important to her?

Specifically the marking of the armistice, yes. Remembrance Sunday is about remembering all conflicts, but the silence is at 11 on the 11th to mark the moment of the enforcement of the Armistice de Compiègne in 1918.

Well two of my Grandma's brothers died at Ypres so I don't see the two minute silence as some sort of infringement of my civil liberties.

Take a minute to consider why people choose not to observe the silence or are unable to.

You're suggesting that people with a variety of disabilities, mental health conditions, beliefs, ethnicities, nationalities etc etc etc should stay home and not be welcomed in public.

No one should intentionally be a dick, but no one is obliged to observe the silence either. I wouldn't observe it but I wouldn't get in others way of doing so. That's fair enough.

Agree OP. If our older deceased family members hadn't sacrificed so much we wouldn't have our liberty.

Not sure how many ways you want me to explain that its about sacrifice.

Maybe they didn't realise. I've definitely talked at the start before, not having realised it was happening. Why assume malice when it could be incompetence?

Wow.
just fucking wow.

I’m not personally endorsing the Argos business (side splitting, btw) but obviously yes, freedom of expression and personal liberty include things you don’t like

I do it because it has meaning.
I don't do it because of peer pressure.

I disagree with your statement.
I also think the government foreign policy isn't what we're marking. It's sacrifice.