Very few people wearing poppies this year?

[YippieKayakOtherBuckets]

Anyone else noticed this?

I was in some very busy parts of London today and saw maybe half a dozen people wearing poppies in total. I’m watching Question Time now; the panel are all wearing poppies (the Plaid Cymru representative is wearing a red and a white poppy side-by-side) and at a glance I’d say less than a quarter of people are wearing them.

Is this primarily because of Gaza or did the trend start a while ago? Are people who used to wear poppies now choosing not to? I know this probably sounds very journalisty but I’m not, I promise. I’m really struck by what feels like a dramatic cultural shift in the last ten years or so.

Like others have said I carry no cash on me these days so never have any to give to anyone collecting for charity, including poppy sellers. Booths has started an optional 25p donation to charity when you pay for your shopping which is probably a result of charities realising they aren't getting the donations by shaking a tin as you leave the store.

For the no cash people. The poppy boxes have a QR code you can scan and donate so no cash needed.

You are absolutely right but as far as they exist I was in some of the less cosmopolitan corners of London yesterday: a commuter train to and from the Midlands, Euston at rush hour full of Brummies, Mancs and Glaswegians travelling home, and a conference where the delegates were approx 95% British and Irish.

Interesting too to see the observation from a pp upthread that the biggest market for poppies on one stall has been tourists.

Mine fell off !

I don't wear a poppy.
I support the victims of war not those that fight them.
What is happening in Israel and Gaza and Ukraine is at the forefront of my mind.

my hubby bought a poppy and gave up trying to put it on!!! where the hell is the pin meant to go?? probably many people encountering the same problem with this new all paper poppy!!

I don't wear one. However I always donate....in the past I have made poppies, sold them, counted money from the collections.
I just don't feel the need to wear one.

Can I just ask, do you have actual poppy sellers? As in a dedicated stand only selling poppies??
We don't! We can only get them on shop counters...

I go to Remembrance Sunday, our local peace walk and donate money but the poppy thing has been adopted by the right wing. They change their Facebook picture to have poppies on and bang on about the importance of St George's day, nationalism and are just generally unpleasant. I don't want to be associated with that.
Sorry if that makes me seem like a snob, but I find the poppy thing all a bit like people wear them to make a point about themselves rather than actually caring about our armed forces or (crucially) civilians caught up in fighting around the world at the moment.

In King’s Cross last week there was a trestle-table in the middle of the concourse rather than a branded stand or structure. Friends who work around Westminster are still seeing uniformed service personnel and veterans volunteering as poppy sellers but I don’t know how widely this extends.

We have far fewer sellers in our town. I know the elderly ones had money stolen a couple of times in the past so I assume they have given up (age and and not wanting to be assualted) and there are fewer young people who can help. We just have one seller stall in our large town centre now. It's first time none of the veterans have been out there helping. I only buy a tiddly metal poppy as it doesn't get lost, but I forget to transfer it coat to coat.

Haranguing people for not wearing them for the last few years and one of the last veterans that hit the public consciousness (to the extent of drone displays of his image at New Year) having a grifting, dodgy as hell family hasn't helped, I'd imagine.

I think there have been some serious questions raised about the efficacy of the rbl and how much they actually use to help veterans. A pp is right that the gov don't fund veterans well and wearing a poppy is a bit like saying we should all pay through big society rather than the state actually looking after its own staff as it were.
Also it clearly does not mean never again, for at least 25 years it is a kind of pro war symbol to many younger people.

I’m like some others on here in that I’ve gone off it since it became as much about virtue signalling than anything else.

Poppies on Premier League shirts. Big poppies on lamp posts in town. People with them strapped to their cars. More about ‘Look how much I care’ than a quiet and reflective thi by and a donation to a good cause.

There’s also a trace of nationalism in some of the people who get most passionate about it, which I also don’t like. Much like the St George’s Cross flag / Union Jack which has been taken up by a thuggish set some of the time.

I still go to the local memorial on Sunday for the ceremony. Just without wearing a poppy.

Yep, and I've heard that at least some of the sellers do now have card machines.

I buy one most years and most years I lose it. Or I don’t wear it because I don’t want to make a pinhole in my proper outdoors coats and I don’t wear my wool one very often.

So this year I bought a wristband. And I lost that too. It must have come off with my gloves when I was walking the dog. 😳

I personally think it’s possible to support veterans and their well-being without supporting the policies that made them veterans in the first place. I just can’t keep hold of a poppy to save my life.

Interested in a link about this.

Presumably, as they are COBSEO members, the same criticism may apply to all?

(off to go and look at their most recent annual report)

I never wear poppies. I observe the two minute’s silence and have respect for those who have lost their lives or had their lives permanently damaged by war, but for me the poppy itself doesn’t symbolise what I stand for morally or politically. I know I can wear a different colour poppy to represent different things, but I feel that in itself is a political statement and will lead to conversations that I just don’t have the mental energy for.

The poppy 'brand' was damaged when everyone noticed that all the unpleasant comments made in their local Facebook group were made by people who cover their profile picture in poppies.

Exactly this. It’s almost as if it’s used as a measuring stick to test your “loyalty” to Britain by right wingers.

I donate every year but I don’t wear one because the mawkish “why aren’t people wearing poppies” self-righteousness pisses me off.

Um.. Through the paper stalk. Or the paper poppy if you prefer. You know, being paper the pin goes through quite easily.
Are you seriously saying he didn't realise that because no one else has commented other than how easy it makes it to put it on.

Lots of people now have the little poppy pins or the reflective clip on poppies on bags so they're not so obvious

I think this is right, it's moved from being something you choose to do on an individual level to an 'official' thing.

I also think that the meaning of it has diminished as ( showing my age) all the WW1 survivors are dead and most of the WW2 ones too.

The government or armed forces or quite possibly the monarchy have failed to successfully make it a wider remembrance so it's vulnerable to being hijacked by extremists.

This all puts people off

I haven't seen them for sale near me.