Poppy etiquette for Germans

[Fanta4]

Nc but long time member.

I am German. I have lived in the UK pretty much all my adult life (my choice, not circumstance). Every year I have an internal debate about whether I should/ should not wear a poppy. Mindful also that I work in a formal, customer facing environment and don’t have a noticeably German accent.

Pros:
_Good cause I support
_On a personal level, very grateful for the sacrifice, particularly WW2, which my parents vividly and horribly remember
_Feel fully part of British society, my children are British etc

Cons
_Feels strangely disrespectful to wear a poppy when my quite recent ancestors caused so much death and destruction
_I’ve had an elderly neighbour at the door selling poppies who would only sell to my husband, so feelings obvs strong in that generation and I don’t want to offend

So over to you, wise Mnetters. AIBU to wear a poppy?

Winebottle That's precisely what worries me about people like FoxySoxy01. German wasn't occupied by the Nazis in the same that they occupied other counties.

Winebottle

Honestly I think you are wilfully misconstruing what I am saying. I clearly didn't make any sweeping blanket statements.

If you look into the Nazi's rise to power you will see that they didn't start of by preaching 'let's kill all Jews, gas anyone that doesn't agree with us, etc' it became more radical as Hitler gained power obviously.

I'm not going to argue that a huge amount of German people either had no problem with Hitler and the Nazi party or had got too far along to back out when it started getting more hate filled and radical. (Not to mention the fact of if they did try to abandon the Nazi party at any point then it was backs against the wall time if they were lucky)

But there are always people that get caught up in wars, normally when they are protecting loved ones and they have no other options open to them. These people deserve to be remembered.

I agree that Germans and Nazis were indistinguishable. There’s no debate as far as I am concerned. I do worry that in any other context people would shout cultural appropriation if I wanted to wear a symbol of their culture/ heritage. This is a minor topic but I have found all replies illuminating so it has been useful to me.

At the beginning of their rise to power I don't believe that they hid the fact that they were a) a fascist organisation b) extremely anti-semitic. They still garnered huge support within Germany.

Thank you Fanta4. I am glad that everything I ever learned about Germany in WW2 wasn't a complete fantasy! This stupid Brexit decision has really changed how a lot of people think in the UK but we shouldn't forget any nation's inconvenient truths (including the UK's).

A large number of Germans welcomed Hitler because the Weimar republic was in a mess, and he didn't hide the fact that he was anti-Semitic. He did become more bloodthirsty as it went on but from early on the party went to violent extremes (when he was sent to prison).

OP YANBU by the way, please wear a poppy if you want to!

(eg when he was sent to prison...)

it should be remembered that the poppy dosnt represent all soldiers it remembers British soldiers the clues in the name the royal British legion

I don't think many Brits take it personally tbh re ww2 towards German people.

At least I don't.

The past is past. Wear a poppy if you like

It was not ordinary Germans who were the enemy in the world wars.

Young British men were fighting young German men on the battlefields, which is where most of them died. All those men were the same. Following orders. These men when faced with each other 1:1 often behaved with humanity. The vast majority of them (both sides) were just men that wanted to go home.

Your ancestors were not responsible for the suffering. Hitler and the like were responsible.

my advice would be wear one the debate about german citizenry in ww2 is irrelavant to what the poppy symbolises and the poppy predates ww2 anyway

Your elderly neighbour sounds revolting

Please wear a poppy if you would like to. When I was younger I saw them purely in a lest we forget way, I feel they have been taken over rather by a more pro war sentiment in the last 15 years or so and I am more ambivalent about them now. We should not forget the dead on either side, who had little or no choice in either world war about what they were doing, we are lucky not to live in those times. My grandparents all fought in the 2nd world war in different ways and would have no truck with cheap, racist sentiments.

I have a similar struggle my grandfather was a German pow who was sent to work on a farm where he met my grandmother the war stirs up a lot of feelings for me but without ww2 they wouldn't have met had children and I wouldn't have been born, I wear a poppy and go to church on remembrance Sunday

Mustbemad17 “There became a bit of a tradition to leave stones on gravestones or markers as a sign of respect”

This is actually a Jewish tradition when visiting a grave

My father fought in WW2. He was a German Jew, who emigrated to the US in 1930, and then fought in US intelligence. Many of his German relatives died in the camps. He always said that many of the Germans he had to fight and to negotiate with were victims, in terror for their lives, and he held no resentment against them.

Many of the Oxford colleges, at the end of a horribly long list of war dead from their college, have a few German names- men of the college who fought for the other side, and still need to be remembered.

OP I think that you can wear a poppy either to remember all the dead in those horrible wars, or to show gratitude to the British soldiers who liberated Europe.

In my experience, most modern Germans do a good job of remembering the past and trying to learn from it. Look at how many refugees Germany has welcomed. Anyone holding a grudge against modern Germans is part of the problem.

“I ask whether it is polite and proper for me as a German to commemorate the British forces.”

As someone born many many years after the end of WW2 I wouldn’t bat an eyelid at you doing so. However I can see that it could potentially raise some eyebrows among some of the generation who were alive at the time, as it did with your neighbour. Not to say I agree with them, but I’m just stating a fact that I think it could. However, this would only be relevant if they knew you were German which I imagine most people wouldn’t.

Ahh .. the old ‘let’s move on’ chestnut. No, millions of Europeans died and we want to know who armed, funded and supported the liquidating creeps because that sort are totally at it again with support from quarters we never expected.

I thought that poppies were supposed to be a way of marking the massive, pointless loss of life, and the wastefulness and destructiveness of war, to help ensure we don't continue to rush into them. This applies to all sides, not just the winners. I think that this has been lost in the last few years and it has become more of a jingoistic "supporting our brave boys and girls" thing, so I don't wear a poppy any more.

I also think we could do with a reminder in this country that there was not something intrinsically flawed in the German psyche that led to the rise of the Nazis, and there is not something intrinsically noble and superior in the British psyche that makes us immune to a similar thing happening here. Particularly post-Referendum, and particularly given how too many non-British residents are now being made to feel.

Doobi

No, red Poppy Appeal poppies are officially to remember deaths on the British side, hence a lot of Scots and Irish people take offence at them and many people believe the glorify war and are largely used for virtue signalling.

I come from somewhere very close to your country in WW2 (just guess ) , and I'm wearing one. Your first point is very valid.

I just think I'm going to hand it over to my husband who will be waiting outside this Saturday morning when I have my "Life in the UK test" - it's November 11th at 11.15 so I'm afraid to look a bit pretentious otherwise

I was merely thrown by the elderly neighbour who was alive during WW2 and made it clear she thought it would be inappropriate

Maybe they were trying to be polite and having the same conversation in their head that you had in your OP.

I think whether you wear a poppy or not is a personal choice.

Look up the allports scale, it's a tool that was developed after WW2 which shows how hatred can escalate bit by bit into full blown genocide.

On the poppy note OP wear it will pride.

We Did not start WW2 but we were not blamless during it, what we did in Dresden for example was despicable.
Also if you look through our countries past we have done some awful things not just to other counties but to our own people.

Each and every country has a past they would rather forget and those that blame everyday Germans for what happened in WW2 are very ignorant. If someone knocked on your door and told your husband to fight for his country or your sons and daughters would be taken to a camp and gassed what would you do? and yes that did happen. They would find something in your past like a slight connection to a Jew or gypsy or you would be accused of being a homosexual or mentally ill. They had no bloody choice

Dippy I do have family in a country which was occupied

When fascists came knocking they joined the resistance at great personal cost

People did

We are not doing anyone any favours by finding good reasons for people to have done nothing, or worse, collaborated

The urge to do so is highly suspect and should be examined closely