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.

Why not?

Honestly .. I don’t know anyone who fought in the war . I don’t wear one and hate the silence as I have to stop work and have no idea what I am supposed to think about so my mind feels like time has stopped .

I do feel chatty overload too . Half channel 4 is stand up to cancer . I have no connection to the war

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Personally, I'd rather quietly donate where I like and leave it at that. It's between me and my conscience.

as other posters have said, it is becoming synonymous with St George's flag brandishing, far right, idiots.

I really don’t think that’s true. Of course fools will attach themselves to all sorts of symbols and events, but they’re recognised as foolish and are a tiny minority. I suspect that those who object to poppies on this basis are the sort who cringe at English (but no other countries’) pennants and flags on cars and houses when England play football. It’s a sort of self-regarding snobbery, usually of the metropolitan left.

But this has been the case for years. It's just not the thing it was and that's understandable really. The last people who remember WWII are dying now - it's not like when I was a kid in the 80s when most of our grandparents had lived through it and there were still many people alive mourning someone they lost in WWII or even WWI. It's history and at some point it should be allowed to be so. I know there is a degree of commemorating all wars, but as wars become less a matter of conscription and fewer people know servicepeople, maybe it should just become something for the military and military families rather than a national event? Also, as someone I was talking to, wars have become more physically distant, and fought for more cynical reasons so there's not really going to be popular sentiment towards the Falklands, Iraq etc.

Also, yes, to some extent people are getting sick of the rhetoric around them and the politics they get associated with (which is not the RBL's fault, but govt and media).

It's this cashless society we now have to live in that has had the knock on effect of people not buying poppies. I find it very sad that we are being 'managed' into a way of living that we have not chosen

To me the whole point is to donate to RBL wearing last years one doesn't do that!

Does if you donate online

was ever thus.

ArseInTheCoOpWindow · Today 10:10

GETTINGLIKEMYMOTHER · Today 10:07

I might add that I do get irritated with those people who say out of ignorance and prejudice (while thinking that they’re being virtuously right-on) that poppies and all they stand for, are ‘glorifying war’.
They are not!

Why?

Sorry, bad form to jump in on your question to someone else but if I may? I wear mine in remembrance of my grandfather who fought at the Somme. To me, it’s a symbol of the futility of most wars (I think WW2 was a notable exception) and the terrible, needless loss of so many lives.

The Poppy is the symbol of why we should never forget

This is a slightly tangential issue to poppies but I think it is very dangerous to assume that this progress is secure. The far right is newly emboldened and on the rise. I'm not suggesting that wearing a poppy is the solution but complacency is dangerous.

It seems that most people who wear a poppy do so to honour those who died in the World Wars. I agree with @Echobelly in that as fewer people remain who participated in or even remember WWII, it feels natural that the public's connection to these wars lessens a bit. I don't think that demonstrates a lack of respect to those war dead, just a natural progression as the years pass.

I also feel there's been a kickback from people over the poppy policing we've seen in the last few years.

I think it is very dangerous to assume that this progress is secure.

All it takes for evil to triumph ....

Yes absolutely complacency is dangerous.

Interesting that you talk about the far right. They are who l associate with poppies now.

It’s all gone a bit mad. However l do think Millenials and Z are more peaceful than previous generations.

Don't see any sellers - and haven't noticed any by tills.

It used to be they were sold door to door and in schools and that died out but then could still but on streets fairly easily or train stations - last few years they just aren't there and are hard to source.

Before that they'd moved to metal ones and when we did spot an older seller they were bit rude about us buying them for the kids. So our children have forgotten that they used to wear them every year. FIL make huge deal about getting metal ones - but only one that bothers and it's very much to show off about it and it is bit off putting.

I did read few years ago on here that they had new people in charge of the charity and there was a deliberate move away from paper one and low scale selling - and if true I think that and time probably helped break the tradition - but no idea if it is true or not.

I suspect that those who object to poppies on this basis are the sort who cringe at English (but no other countries’) pennants and flags on cars and houses when England play football.

Quite the contrary. In fact, the only time I don’t cringe at England flags is during big football tournaments. Sometimes I even don the merch myself. But any other time, yes, I do. It has very negative connotations for me.

I have worn a poppy every year until now, but will no longer bother.

Remembrance as a nation is meaningless unless we use it to prevent worse happening but instead we are actively supporting similar atrocities. The whole thing is pointless.

Haven't RTFT, but I wear mine under my coat ( I don't want to put a hole in it. It's waterproof) so it wouldn't show when I'm out and about. My child asked me for a poppy and lots are wearing them at their school and my work.

They're right, though. Wearing a poppy doesn't mean anything. A lot of people wear poppies because it's November and they 'should' wear them, but they don't think about WHY they wear them.

I don't wear poppies, yet I am involved in charities for ex servicemen.

The peer pressure to wear a poppy can be huge, and to judge someone because they don't wear them is ridiculous - you don't know their thoughts or feelings, or how they live their lives.

There are also going to be fewer sellers as there are fewer veterans and people with connections to the military and also fewer able bodied retired people with time to volunteer because now a lot more people are having to work until their health totally gives out.

Quite the contrary. In fact, the only time I don’t cringe at England flags is during big football tournaments. Sometimes I even don the merch myself. But any other time, yes, I do. It has very negative connotations for me

Me too. The only time l don’t cringe is a football matches. All the other times l just feel horrified. That’s the only word l can think of. I find them threatening.

I think with tensions so high currently people might be choosing not to incase they become a target. My children have donated today and will be wearing their poppies.

Some people in Scotland feel a similar way to NI.

But I do not reject the red poppy, I have one that I wore every year. It's actually still in my drawer. I just feel the white poppy encompasses both the past and the hopeful future. I do not know anyone else who wears one. I just felt as a lot of others on this thread, that I no longer wanted to wear one for various reasons, but still wanted to pay tribute and then I came across an article about what it stood for and thought it was more fitting.

My Grandad was only 18 when he died in Normandy. His whole life ahead of him.

I am a grown woman without any issues of social judgement but I appreciate your input.

I hope it's clear that I'm making no judgements. As I have repeated several times it is interesting to me that a cultural norm from my childhood and early adulthood is changing and I happened to notice it quite starkly yesterday.

My perspective is probably also coloured by the fact that I have never felt pressured to wear a poppy, or experienced the 'poppy policing' that pp have described. I'm genuinely shocked by the anecdote from a pp about being challenged in the street about wearing or not wearing a poppy.

Those of my ancestors who fought in the war fought for the British Empire, not for Britain, in the hope of getting freedom. I think people forget that.