November 8, 2023 - 1:30pm
The Y2K era is apparently fashionable again, in politics as well as clothes and music. As the British commentariat works itself into a fever of anticipation over the prospect of disorder at the Cenotaph this weekend, it’s hard to shake off the feeling that the war in Gaza has brought about a strange revival of 2000s discourse. While in London poppies are now rarely beheld on anyone neither on television nor in uniform, and the passage of time has removed the quietly dignified war-veteran poppy sellers from Britain’s streets, today’s expanded cultural salience of “the “Festival of Remembrance” is arguably a product of the War on Terror era.
Like Help for Heroes and Gordon Brown’s sudden and unconvincing creation of Armed Forces Day, the explosion of poppy imagery was, back then, spurred by popular discontent over British soldiers being sent under-equipped to fight pointless wars in the greater Middle East, against a backdrop of insufficient respect at home. Without Osama bin Laden, we can say, there would have been no Captain Tom.
Then as now, anxieties over immigration and integration circled around Remembrance imagery: it was the Islamist provocateur Anjem Choudary’s al-Muhajiroun group’s poppy-burning on Remembrance Sunday, and its heckling of Royal Anglian troops returning home, that gave birth to the EDL. Similarly, the current wave of anxious Armistice Day discourse was sparked by a vague threat from Dilly Hussain, Deputy Editor of the Muslim website 5 Pillars, encouraging a “resounding rejection” of the two minutes’ silence “this year and for many years to come”.
In response, as if by magic, pro-Israel activist and ex-EDL leader Tommy Robinson was unbanned by Twitter, announcing a gathering of his faithful followers to confront the presumed sacrilegious hordes at the Cenotaph. Even the muscular liberals of the War on Terror era, like Douglas Murray — now more muscular, if less liberal — have insisted that “the people of Britain must come out and stop these barbarians.” The Metropolitan Police, in its own inimitable style, has simultaneously urged the protest not to go ahead while insisting it has no cause to ban it, setting off a media cycle of its own.
Whether or not the proposed pro-Palestine march at the centre of this angst is a worthy object of all this cultural baggage is disputable: the event is not planned to pass anywhere near the Cenotaph, and will start hours after the moment of silence itself. Yet somehow this year’s Armistice Day has found itself inextricably interwoven with the current conflict, and Britain’s divided response to a distant war whose outcome it is powerless to influence in any way. Conservatives who anticipate, more in hope than fear, that disorder on the day will shock Middle England into a rejection of multiculturalism may be disappointed: previous protests have been largely peaceful and in any case a majority of Britain’s population supports a ceasefire.
Yet what is most interesting, perhaps, is the response to the planned counter-protests from Britain’s younger Right-wing cohort, no friends to either multiculturalism or mass immigration. Instead of demanding counter-protests, the overwhelming Twitter reaction to Robinson’s rallying cry from Right-wing activists was an insistence such activity would be an optics own goal, or even a trap to reset the media narrative away from pro-Hamas radicals towards a focus on shaven-headed ethnic British louts (citing the outcome of the 2020 George Floyd protests).
Where the Rightists of the New Labour era see the weekend’s protests as an opportunity to defend the British state and its institutions, those of the 2020s are accelerationists, convinced the current order is doomed to failure and happy to let its untenable contradictions reveal themselves without their input. The seeming revival of War on Terror discourse is, then, only an illusory media artefact: the radicalisation of British politics is proceeding in quite another direction.
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SubscribeMaybe he lives in the London metropolitan bubble, because the author has severely underestimated the level of national pride there is for Remembrance Day and Armistice. Wherever I have lived it is always well attended by the public and local organisations in uniform and regalia.
We will never forget.
Poppies are regularly worn wear I live in Hampshire. No less so than in 2003, I’d say.
In London, too. Aris likely mistakes his old mates at Vice for the public.
Mmm… “shaven-headed ethnic British louts”…
How does “scarf-wearing ethnic minority louts” grab you Aris?
Thought not.
We have a Tommy Robinson fan among us!
Pretty sure he has killed less people than Marx.
LOL – don’t worry, I’m sure you’ll get a fan on here as well some day. Maybe you could buy your mum a subscription for Christmas?
I am heading to a ceremony in Canada with my family shortly. Progressives make the same mistake we all do by thinking other people are mostly like them.
I think you are wrong Aris. The most telling and important response will not by any political group of left or right. And you will never hear it. It will be an unspoken revulsion on the part of the vast majority of British people at the disrespectful provocative and near immoral behaviour and attitudes of the young progressives and Muslims who have marched in the shadow of, within hours of, an Einstazgruppen pogrom with only only flag; that of the Palestinians. They do seem to be marching for peace; the majority are plainly river to sea hostiles. Not a pretty sight on a sacred Armistice weekend. Unspoken too will be a deepening public alarm. Set aside the noisy self promoting always ineffective barks of Suella. It really does appear that our multicultural State and Elite seems intent on selling out, traducing or denying traditional values and beliefs – no rule by diktat, genuine free speech, communal bonds, a love of our history etc. It has not defended free speech, suffocating it in the name of its Equality Cult and Victim Pyramid. Muslim radicals and their spineless vote grabbing allies in the Labour Party are leading the drive to censor any criticism of their religion and ideology. It invites pro Hamas commanders into the Met Ops Room. It has appeased radicals since the first book was burnt and is letting the poison of radical religious and tribal hatred flourish by choking London streets week after week, keeping the Jews away. This is what the majority will feel, think but never say.
The Church of England has been infiltrated: prayers for Gaza and equity but none for Israel or the hostages.
“This is what the majority will feel, think but never say.”
Ah, the famous “silent majority”! Of course, they are neither but that doesn’t prevent the likes of Wally thinking that the desiccated opinions of his OAP group are somehow relevant to rest of the world.
They aren’t.
Yes, the discussion on UnHerd always reminds of groups of old men gathering in Italian cafés and putting the world to rights. I always believed that they didn’t really understand the world – they didn’t watch YouTube presentations, didn’t play computer games, their views of good and bad were all wrong, they were brainwashed by their teachers, they could even write essays and proper sentences, thereby wasting everybody’s time. To cap it all, they were all goggle-eyed.
Better to disenfranchise them all and let the young people get on with their mental problems.
You need to pay a bit attention to the silent part of silent majority, gramps, instead of yelling at the clouds about how young ‘uns don’t know anything these days.
Are you trying to make a point or just be vile for the sake of it?
The point, as you seem to have missed it despite it being spelled out for you, is that the “silent majority” is actually neither of those things, just a highly vocal minority who are seemingly unable to shut up for 5 minutes about whatever it is that is making them furious today.
Got it now, dearie?
You really are a repulsive toad. You have nothing to offer but insults and ad hominem attacks, so why don’t you ‘fade away’ to The Beano or another publication more appropriate to your level of intellectual ability.
Case in point!
So, IF it is all going swimmingly the way you want it to, what’s the cause of all your anger?
I’m interested to know why you mistake my obvious wit and humour for anger? You must be a very dark person to go there.
Oh well – not my problem!
Let us suppose that you are correct. To keep returning to this site must mean that you are in general agreement with what is posted – but you feel bad about agreeing. Yes?
“To keep returning to this site must mean that you are in general agreement with what is posted”
Why must it mean that, gramps?
I agree, with you there, I suspect its because you haven’t anywhere else to go and even if you did, no one willing to go there with you.
Anger is so off putting. Try smiling, you never know, you may find a like minded friend. (I know, one of you is sad enough, but two …..) 😉
Is that a confession on your part, or have you missed your unintentional irony?
I suggest you get your emotional regulation back on course. Debates are won through substantive intellect, not belittling women.
“Dearie”? Ya’gotta be kidding me!
Hmmm. “Highly vocal minority (…) unable to shut up for five minutes.”
Self-awareness not your strong suit, cs.
When all is said and done, you are doing the saying, and the IDF are getting things done.
Unherd does seem to have become a version of ‘Speakers Corner’.
Much less fun though!!
I stand corrected CS, you do have one fan on here. Yourself. 😉
Au contraire, cherie! You are following me around like a lovestruck puppy!
Quite understandable really!
Fifty quid says you have a “tolerance” or “coexist” bumper sticker on your Subaru.
Let’s start saying it.
Start?
You never shut up about it!
You can never have too much of a good thing. Though given your attitude, I suspect you wouldn’t know much about that. 😉
I’m at a wedding on Saturday but shall be wearing my little M&S poppy brooch (which happily goes with my intended outfit, but I would have found a way to incorporate it anyway).
The YouGov poll question “From what you’ve read and heard, do you think there should or should not be an immediate ceasefire in Israel and Palestine?” received a 76% affirmative (likely or probable) answer.
But the question “Do you think it is likely or unlikely that the Israel/Palestine issue will be resolved within the next 10 years?” received a 73% unlikely answer.
And there you have it. Very few want war or suffering but similarly very few see an end to suffering of some sort.
I think it is very disingenuous to report the results of one poll question and not the other.
And to the question:
From everything you’ve seen and heard, do you think that Hamas are or are not a terrorist organisation?
66% think they are and 6% think they are not. And on:
Which side in the Israeli‑Palestinian conflict do you sympathise with more?
It’s a 50/50 split with 28% supporting both sides. So, the UK public think that Hamas are terrorists but there should be an immediate ceasefire, they support both sides and anyway the problem won’t be solved after ten years. In other words, not our problem and why can’t everyone just be nice.
According to the YouGov poll “Sympathies for the Israelis Palestinian conflict” in the UK it breaks down as
10% Israeli
24% Palestinians
32% Neither
34% Don’t Know.
While Britons accept Hamas is a terrorist organisation, they don’t believe killing 10,000 people (and nearly 4000 children, Hamas murdered 30 Israeli children for comparison) in a bombing campaign is a justified response, hence the call for a ceasefire. If those 10,000 were all Hamas fighters there would be no calls for a ceasefire but they’re not, unfortunately they’re almost exclusively civilians
Gosh, it’s a good thing we disnt think that in
Ww2. British bomving casualties 39 to 45, 36000. Gernan civilian bombing casualties, several hundred thousand.
The next bombing of young girls at a pop concert in the UK will change those percentages.
Very well summarised, David. It’s not an issue the British people care much about, so it’s hardly surprising their responses are wildly inconsistent.
Speak for yourself. Some of us care very much, both about the welfare of Jews in this country and in Israel.
Why should we care? What has a Middle Eastern country with which we have never had any historical or religious ties got to do with Britain?
Err BB that’s quite a misguided point. The Balfour agreement first gave a commitment to a Jewish state; we administered the Protectorate prior to 48; we got ourselves back involved in 56 with Suez; we had a role in current middle east problems with the intervention in Iraq; we are part of a containment alliance against Iran; we’ve bombed elements in Syria; we’ve always committed to supporting the right to exist of Israel and the importance of stability in this world region etc etc. And that’s just a smattering.
We then also have significant minorities in our Country either Jewish or Muslim with a range of perspectives and feelings about this.
We also changed our mind on the Balfour agreement and tried to limit Jewish immigration to the area. Israel came into being by the Jewish terrorist groups murdering British citizens, and they also armed the Argentinians during the Falklands.
Our involvement in the quagmire ended the day the mandate finished, I wouldn’t want to see Britain sink another penny into the place.
Also less than 0.5% of British citizens are Jewish. I don’t really class that as a significant minority
There’s at least one sane person on here it seems. Most Unherd commentators are either baying for blood like neocons.
Exactly Billy Bob. The UK should’ve stopped having any thing to do with zionism/Israel when they treacherously launched a terrorist campaign against the British forces in Palestine. Or when Israel murdered the PLO rep in the UK in 1984. See also USS Liberty. Israel has no respect for any country
So what does the Manchester Arena bombing mean we should stop having anything to do with? Immigration? Islam?
What has Manchester’s Ariane Grande concert to do with anything Islamic?
“previous protests have been largely peaceful” – Good try. Remind me “fiery but mostly peaceful protests”
Why bother coming back. Don’t.
Don’t ‘cancel’ DL – lest the down-tick button will wither and die.
The Poppy and the Act of Remembrance has become strangely distorted. Or perhaps I should say predictibly distorted. If you were to consult the objections raised to it’s institution in the 1920s you would see that all this was forewarned.
The first alteration to the Prayer Book came about because of a rift between those who wished to honour the dead and those who warned, in the words of the 1662 prayer book that extraneous ceremonies although ‘of godly intent and purpose devised … at length turned to vanity and superstition”
Remembrance is about a pyramid of public service which culminates in the ‘ultimate sacrifice’. It cannot be ‘defended’ by force of arms or an act of will. It can only be sustained by a society that gives the ultimate honour to those who serve others. Which is why our King is pledged to be servant of all. Why the ‘unnamed warrior’ is unnamed. It is service that is honoured and in honouring it we perpetuate it in our own lives.
It was always feared that prayers and ceremonies for the dead would breed superstition, and that a distortion of this understanding would degrade into mere ancestor worship or worship of the state.
The expression, ‘Lest we forget’ is one of those, like ‘WInter of Discontent’ which have been extracted from their original context and had their meaning completely inverted.
It now means ‘Remember the fallen’ whereas, in Kipling’s poem it explicitly meant ‘Remember God’ in humility offering a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving.
“The tumult and the shouting dies;
The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget—lest we forget!”
Para 1: its, not it’s
3rd to last line: A humble not “An humble…”
Proselytising on behalf of your god is in my opinion pretty distasteful in the context of the subject under discussion.
Sorry but you’re wrong again. It is in fact ‘An humble’. Look up the poem. This is Kipling’s way of being a common man of the time.
In that case, Kipling’s wrong – not for the grammar, but for his attempt at “being a common man of the time”.
And… again? You’re trying too hard there, CW.
It was traditionally an. I don’t know when an in front of h changed to a, but it was relatively recently.
Fair enough, a sensible response that i can take on board.
I remember people saying ‘an hotel’ quite recently. The ‘h’ was not aspirated in Kipling’s time generally. Language changes in time and (as you know) these changes happen in just a few years. Kipling was certainly not wrong because that was how people spoke.
A pamphlet was written and circulated in 1854 called ‘Poor Letter H’. This pointed out the error of saying words like hotel as ‘otel’, like the French. Very slowly in Britain people started to try to seem educated by aspirating the ‘h’ and this led to the error of saying haitch for the letter instead of aitch.
American English continued for longer to not aspirate and even today they have (h)erbs rather than herbs.
‘After the Norman Conquest in 1066 French quickly replaced English in all domains associated with power. French was used at the royal court, by the clergy, the aristocracy, in law courts. But the vast majority of the population continued to speak English.’
French was the language of the elites and diplomacy. To speak French was to be cultured. This is reflected in the English language. Often there are two versions of a word in English (or more, there are four words for a half: semi – Latin; demi – French; hemi – Greek and half – English), the French is the ‘posh’ word and the English the common word, for example smell and odour, smell is the English version and has negative connotations, odour is the French version and has positive connotations. Hotel is a French word, the English version is Inn.
I don’t think ‘odour’ has positive connotations; most of all it brings to mind the term ‘body odour’.
‘Aroma’, perhaps.
The term body odour is formal English. Would body smell have more positive connotations?
And further to that: with Wales being a colony, you’d be the last person i’d have thought would be a fan of Kipling, by jingo!
Quote by George Orwell: “Kipling is a jingo imperialist, he is morally i…” (goodreads.com)
Don’t really understand this. You seem to be emphasising Englishness, rather than Britishness. So, do you think we’ve never heard of Shakespeare over here?
Hmm, so CS was plagiarizing Orwell some topics ago, or did he give credit where it was due?
Thank you for your corrections. I’m sorry that you found my observations distasteful but I hope it has given you pause to read Kipling’s poem more closely.
The passage you mention as being misspelt is actually a direct quotation by Kipling from the 1662 Prayer Book (a theme which runs through the poem) and is thus germane to my initial point – how our understanding of the words and meaning of Remembrance have altered with the decline in Christianity.
The passage quoted is from the opening of The Order For Morning Prayer and Psalm 51
“Scripture moveth us in sundry places to acknowledge and confess our manifold sins and wickedness, and that we should not dissemble nor cloke them before the face of Almighty God our heavenly Father, but confess them with an humble, lowly, penitent, and obedient heart”
“The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit: A broken and a contrite heart, O God, thou wilt not despise.”
Kipling’s initial readers would have recognised this immediately. It is largely lost on our generation.
I’m the last direct family member left to lay a wreath in remembrance of my Uncle and his mates killed in the already forgotten war in Korea.
The author might understand that there are still plenty of people for whom this is not a fashion choice, or virtue signalling, or a political football.
If anyone in authority or otherwise attempted to interfere with our 70 year old family tradition on the day then I would not be held responsible for the consequences.
Its only proper that before we go into the festival of Christmas, we have a Festival of Rememberance to remember those who gave up there future Christmases so that we could have ours.
There are 365 days a year. On one day in that year you do not get to march in support of Hamas and anti Jewish sentiments. I don’t think that’s too much to ask is it?
And this obsession with the far right is laughable. It exists as a counter balance to the far left. Which for some reason gets a free pass on the ‘politics and atrocities index’.
Very perceptive article. But to me it all shows just how deep-rooted those Armistice poppies are. And how flexible the Remembrance Day symbolism is. Now it links back to WW1 and the cessation of hostilities after a long and bloody stalemate. Big echoes with Ukraine and Israel/Palestine.
In 2003 (I always think of the silent vigils in Wootton Bassett) yes, it was about expressing a deep respect for the troops, with the implication that their sacrifice had better mean something, and it wasn’t clear that it did.
What the early 2000s and the Armistice commemorations we have just had shared was the expression of a view of ongoing wars independent of the government of the day.
Very perceptive article. But to me it all shows just how deep-rooted those Armistice poppies are. And how flexible the Remembrance Day symbolism is. Now it links back to WW1 and the cessation of hostilities after a long and bloody stalemate. Big echoes with Ukraine and Israel/Palestine.
In 2003 (I always think of the silent vigils in Wootton Bassett) yes, it was about expressing a deep respect for the troops, with the implication that their sacrifice had better mean something, and it wasn’t clear that it did.
What the early 2000s and the Armistice commemorations we have just had shared was the expression of a view of ongoing wars independent of the government of the day.
There will be five Premier League fixtures on Armistice Day, and five on Remembrance Sunday. The idea that this is an established weekend of “solemn national contemplation” is balls. Will the pubs be shut? Will the betting shops? Will the lap-dancing clubs? At 11am on Saturday, will most people stop shopping for two minutes?
This is a march for an armistice, an armistice that three quarters of the population supports, and it will begin, hours after the two minutes’ silence, nearly two miles from the Cenotaph, from which it will then proceed even further away. In any case, there will be no one at the Cenotaph on Saturday apart from “Tommy Robinson” and a handful of his fanboys, either wondering where everyone was, or thinking that they had frightened them off.
Rishi Sunak and Suella Braverman will believe that anything is traditional if the Daily Telegraph says so, that anything is the view of Middle England if the Daily Mail says so, and that anything is the view of the white working class if The Sun says so.
There are no good solutions to the Hamas-Israel conflict, but I have very little sympathy with people characterising these as marches for peace.
If “Pro-Palestinian” protesters denounced Hamas, and demanded the release of hostages taken on 7 October, they’d have a much stronger case. Instead they call for Jihad, and chant “from the river to the sea”. It’s an Islamist show of strength.
Do you honestly that there are a million Islamists in Britain? Imagine what Britain would be like if that were true. The march is for a ceasefire, so according to YouGov, 76 per cent of people agree with the marchers, 58 per cent strongly so. Strong disagreement is confined to three per cent, one person in 33. Are there well over 50 million Hamas sympathisers in Britain? Are there 40 million staunch supporters of Hamas? Or, my dear three percenters, could it be that you are the ones who are out of step? And which other opinion that was held by only about two million people should be aggressively promoted by both main political parties and by the entire news media?
Muhammad Kathem Sawalha, a former Hamas commander is the leader of Muslim Association of Britain, one of the groups organizing the ‘March for Peace’. Other groups involved have direct links and funding from Hamas.
The same Hamas who’s covenant has as its central goal the destruction of the state of Israel through Jihad.
Suella Braverman’s description of the March as a ‘hate march’ is reasonable.
If the marchers are so respectful of everyone, why can’t they hold their demonstration on another day? The meaning of their cause would still be the same. Having the march on November 11th attracts attention for them, but the 1918 Armistice has no real relation to it. The demonstration itself will make no difference to the war, but is liable to promote hostility towards people seen as being on both sides of the conflict, whether they are directly involved or not. The demonstrators should stand down if their intention is to promote peace.
Let them do it, they’ll have the same effect on observers as Champagne Charlie’s posts do on here if they behave as they have previously. i.e make one wonder what’s wrong with them.
Where did the numbers come into it?
MG is right, ‘from the river to the sea’ is no cry for peace.
Those words remind me of Calgacus,
“they make a desert, they call it peace.”
Anyone yet had the stomach to see if the videos of what Hamas did on the 7th are still available on the internet? I’ve not, but one day they will be looked at in the same way we look at the Nazi Death Camps.
I doubt even the SS, had they had mobile phones, would have called up their mums and sent videos of what they had done for parental approval.
Quite frankly anyone who supports that march needs their moral compass examining.
I read, fascinated, the BBC (even then clearly pro-Hamas) report on how the Israelis rang up residents in a target block and told them to get out, even waited for the Arab contact to tell them it was clear, saying we don’t want to kill civilians, but we see things you can’t. They even dropped ‘bangers’ to prove they weren’t a hoax call.
Hamas on the other hand only phoned home after slaughtering, defiling, decapitating and kidnapping civilians. What is it with Islam and young girls?