why do you wear a poppy?

The thing is.... information is only on Google if people put it there. I often find when looking something up a suggested link is for a Mumsnet thread 😂

"If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori".

Exactly my point (above).
OP, why didn’t you just do a google search? The thing is that your failure to do this makes people doubt your motives.

To honour those who went to war against fascism. My grandfather, my father in ww2, my husband who participated in the defence of minorities in former Yugoslavia and against islamofascism in Afghanistan.
Really, should it be down to a charity to support the victims of conflict and war? Then again could we trust successive governments to look after our troops and veterans?

The OP said she was Russian. About 25 million Russians died as a direct result of WW2, so I think they would have some appreciation of the sacrifice and magnitude of that particular war

I put money in the collection box but wear a red poppy brooch as a symbol of remembrance for those who made the ultimate sacrifice in the two world wars and others since. The red represents the blood that was shed. I generally also wear a white poppy as a symbol of peace but this year l am wearing my red poppy brooch and a brooch with three small poppies - red, white and blue. The blue poppy should be purple because it symbolises the animals that died in the wars.

I put my change in the box every year and donate electronically along with amnesty international and drs without borders. But I stopped taking a poppy long ago. So I don't wear one.

Many many reasons. I contribute, I honour. That's all that matters to me. If anyone has an issue with that then it's theirs alone.

Same

Both my parents served in WW2. Mum in the land army Dad in the RAF. They were both 18 years old. Dad was shot down and spent four years of his life in a POW camp. By the end of the war the only food they had in the camp was turnip and potato peelings which were thrown into the mud for them to scrabble around trying to get something to eat. When he was eventually released he weighed 6 stone. So many other young men and women sacrificed years of their lives or indeed made the ultimate sacrifice.

I remember my dad showing me a school photo of himself and the rest of his 6th form. All grinning at the camera. he pointed to himself and one other lad, and said 'we were the only two to make it through the war'

So that's why I wear my poppy to remember all those who gave so much for our freedom, In that war, the one before it and the ones that followed. And to help those injured or in reduced circumstances who fought for their country.

On a more individual note, 11th November is the anniversary of my Mum's death, so the day has a special poignancy for me.

In respect to past family members who fought in WWI and WWII. My nan always used to get me one as a child (whilst telling me about said relatives including her dad who was in the navy) and have just carried on that. 🤷

Lots of things are tradition, but doesn’t mean they can’t be questioned.

Fireworks are tradition and are questioned all the time, as an example.

To homour the war dead.

Quite honestly, I'm fed up of this question or similar, being asked every bloody year. It's a tradition. Leave it alone.

Yes I agree, it sounded like grief.

Beyond producing white poppies I'm not sure what the Co-operative Women's Guild's plan was to stop Hitler. Emmy Freundlich ended up running away, not really a practical solution on a global scale!

It only becomes problematic if people allow it to. Some people like to hijack things and twist them for political point scoring.

For me it's remembering the Men, Woman and Boys that died to protect those they loved.
My Great Grandfather was invalided during WW1. His wife, my Great Grandmother was repeatedly harassed and sexually assaulted by a neighbour. He also beat up my Grandfather for defending his Mother. The RBL prosecuted the man on her behalf which stopped the abuse. They also helped relocate some of my family during WW2 when they were bombed out. Recently they helped a friend that is a double amputee with home adaptations and job retraining. Personally I don't begrudge people like that support but I can only speak for myself.

Wow.

Because only the British fought in those two immense GLOBAL wars? Or because only British people are capable of understanding history or big concepts like sacrifice?

What an absolutely absurd comment to make.

I don't wear a red poppy, partly because of the RBL's ongoing links to armaments companies through corporate partnerships. The RBL's current corporate sponsors include at least two arms manufacturers (BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin) . RBL is therefore not an organisation I'd ever be willing to support.

This is my first year of not wearing one. I’ll happily donate, but I feel that in the last few years the ostentatious display of poppies seems almost inversely proportional to the actual act of remembrance.

For context. I come from a military family. My father died of injuries sustained from his military service. I married a military man who served in Iraq and Bosnia. Remembrance for all of us was a quiet and thoughtful thing.

Surely a simple google search would be able to answer your question on why brits wear a poppy?

I mean, it sounded like a bit more than remembrance and hope?

John McCrae:
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 .

Moina Michael (in her response poem)
“We caught the torch you threw
And holding high, we keep the Faith
With All who died…
…And now the Torch and Poppy Red
We wear in honor of our dead.
Fear not that ye have died for naught;
We'll teach the lesson that ye wrought
In Flanders Fields.”

PP said she thought the poppy represented the continuing fight against evil, and that that was compatible with remembrance.
Maybe so, but that’s consistent with the point I’m making: that, to many, the poppy symbolises more than remembrance (and not just hope as an addition!).
And it has done so for a long time - the idea of the white poppy was introduced in 1926 and they were first made in 1933. Those who insist the red poppies solely mean remembrance (or hope!) are really only speaking for themselves.

The poppy means different things to different people and I think very, very few have issue with the remembrance part.
However, as well as any additional symbolism, the association with the RBL can be problematic, as is the fact that it has become something that’s forced.

In remembrance of my grandads who fought in WW2

Soldier f and all the other murderers have everything to do with why many do not wear a symbol that represents support for soldiers like him.

I wear one because The Royal British Legion were a huge part of my childhood we went on many holidays with friends my grandparents had made through them, my grandparents both fought in the war, my great grandfather was a POW and my paternal grandmother’s family was completely wiped out on the last Red Cross Ship out of their country. It’s my way of acknowledging them personally. My cousin is in the army we often don’t see him for months on end. A poppy for me signifies my family and all the other families that need to remember.

For my grandad. He was a war prisoner in Germany for 5 years during WW2.
That's my reason.

Wowzers. Someone thinks they’re the main character… the reality is, most people don’t give a monkeys. Wear a poppy, don’t wear a poppy. Just don’t be a prick about it, would be my summary …

I wear one to honour those who sacrificed for us. My uncle was killed at age 19 in the war.

The battlefield poppies were mentioned way before WW1. John McCrae wrote that poem while grieving the very recent death of his friend, so the sentiment of the final verse is understandable. It was Moina Michael and Anna Guerin who championed the poppy as a symbol of rememberance. I agree, it wasn't just rememberance the poppy represented, but also hope.