Right, that's it. I'm angry.

[peterb]

EDIT: The student union banned the sale of the Daily Mail at Leeds University when I was there.

The Student Union was left wing when I was there - at the time the dominant force was "The Broad Left" lead by a mature student who I guess was on a Trade Union Sponsorship. He spent his time conflating the concept of a Trade Union and a Student Union trying to gain funds to support "Our fellow Union brothers, the miners" as "we had so much in common". I suspect Arthur Scargill and the NUM didn't give a flying fig about the issues facing students at the time.

What usually happened is that some lunch time meeting would pass some resolution to the joy of the BL - until the engineers and medics got wind of it. At that time they constituted over half the University numbers.

A call would go out in the Engineering students newsletter (whose name I forget) and the rather more prosaically name medics newsletter (Rectum - "The mouthpiece of Leeds Medical and Dental Students) to overturn it. Which we usually did - to howls of "it isn't fair" from the BL.

Happy days!

[philehidiot]

I am getting a hint that you have a "slight" issue with modern youngsters...I could be wrong..but then I am still in the process of running way....doppler effects and all that.

I think I'm technically a millennial. I actually have an even bigger problem with "Doppler" not having a capital letter. Grrrrrr...

[spacein_vader]

The Student Union was left wing when I was there - at the time the dominant force was "The Broad Left" lead by a mature student who I guess was on a Trade Union Sponsorship. He spent his time conflating the concept of a Trade Union and a Student Union trying to gain funds to support "Our fellow Union brothers, the miners" as "we had so much in common". I suspect Arthur Scargill and the NUM didn't give a flying fig about the issues facing students at the time.

What usually happened is that some lunch time meeting would pass some resolution to the joy of the BL - until the engineers and medics got wind of it. At that time they constituted over half the University numbers.

A call would go out in the Engineering students newsletter (whose name I forget) and the rather more prosaically name medics newsletter (Rectum - "The mouthpiece of Leeds Medical and Dental Students) to overturn it. Which we usually did - to howls of "it isn't fair" from the BL.

Happy days!

Flying fig? Surely a flying picket?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I think I'm technically a millennial. I actually have an even bigger problem with "Doppler" not having a capital letter. Grrrrrr...

this Is what happens when u try to type when runnin away!

[badass]

EDIT: The student union banned the sale of the Daily Mail at Leeds University when I was there.

I'd have never have bought it. My point is that it's a generation of "we don't like it, ban it" rather than wanting to put the effort into arguing the opposite opinion. It's also massively disrespectful to students who might want to read it and do hold opposing views as they're being told that to hold right wing opinions like those expressed in the Mail is so wrong and dangerous that it should be banned.

It's also utterly stupid as once you completely ban something then by definition you're not going to be making an argument against it. Which means that your opponents (who don't just disappear when you censor them) are the only ones making the arguments and the implication is that there must be something to them which is so profound it can't be countered, hence why the establishment needs to ban them. You lend your enemy credibility when you take these kinds of actions.

I hate the Daily Mail. Their health section is a pain in my.... neck. But I'd never seek to ban it. I think banning denial of the holocaust is one of the stupidist things you can do. It just says to those who want to deny it that their arguments have legitimacy because they can't be challenged and so they had to make it illegal. Open debate crushes their arguments in minutes. I have taken great pleasure in doing this on Farcebook and watching as their arguments just fall in the presence of facts. Thousands of people saw this, likely including some of his denial friends and I hope it opened their eyes or at least made them question what they had been told. Banning one side of the argument just stops this happening.

All fair points. Pretty much every side in every argument, ever is guilty of trying to silence the other side whether through thinking the opposing views should be banned or where not possible or just not actually engaging in a proper debate. It just seems that anything in the news has to be polarising. The moderates have their voices drowned out by extremists on either side.

Until recently, I had barely given the whole remembrance day thing any thought at all. It was simply one day a year when we recognised the sacrifice of everyone involved in the wars, and in particular the soldiers.
When I was school age history was perceived as boring, to be avoided at all costs, and was pretty much a series of unfathomable decisions and relentless dates.

Pretty sure the vast majority of these students feel the same way now as I did then.

4 years ago my best friend asked me to join her (a history teacher), her husband and her parents on a trip to Belgium for 4 days over Christmas. I walked among the headstones in the graveyards, listened to stories of the young men stationed in the area told at a candlelight vigil on Christmas Eve, recreated the football match of the great Christmas Truce, and stood for the last post at the Menin Gate.

Out of all of that though, walking through the trenches that still exist there, seeing the mortar craters and the cramped bunkers that men lived and died in for 4 years, wondering how many died from illness brought on by conditions and gangrenous wounds rather than being shot and killed. That hit home the hardest.

Of course we can't force anyone to visit these areas and get a feel for it, and teenagers etc are out to stamp their mark on the world, as loudly as they can, usually without thought as to the further consequences, lets just be glad that currently they get to live that life, and aren't in those trenches themselves.

This is a far more respectful and appropriate action than wearing a poppy and being silent for two minutes each year. However it takes next to no effort to do the latter. It takes little more effort to abuse those that choose not to join in with what is essentially time wasting en masse. The meaning of remembrance Sunday has changed too many times to mean anything. When a significant number of WW2 veterans were still alive, I happily paid a decent amount towards a poppy. Now I pay the bare minimum and choose instead to support a more relevant charity that helps our armed forces after they are almost deserted by their previous employer.

[philehidiot]

This is a far more respectful and appropriate action than wearing a poppy and being silent for two minutes each year. However it takes next to no effort to do the latter. It takes little more effort to abuse those that choose not to join in with what is essentially time wasting en masse. The meaning of remembrance Sunday has changed too many times to mean anything. When a significant number of WW2 veterans were still alive, I happily paid a decent amount towards a poppy. Now I pay the bare minimum and choose instead to support a more relevant charity that helps our armed forces after they are almost deserted by their previous employer.

Agreed, I wear a bit of WW1 artillery and Spitfire around my neck all year round although under my clothes to avoid rubbing it in people's faces. It's a permanent reminder. I also spend a lot of time listening to the war stories from my patients (both civilian and ex military both have some extraordinary tales) and whenever we're away me and the missus visit the remnants of the war and the museums. We're hoping to do a trip to Northern Frogland sometime soon.

Some of the stories I hear really do remind you what real suffering and hardship is like and really does put our easy lives into perspective.

[Smudger]

I wouldn't class myself as outraged. More .... sighingly amused.

Nor would I pretend for a nanosecond to have served in uniform. Further, I don't necessarily agree, politically, with all occasions troops have been sent to war, but I will never, ever do less than give my support and admiration to those that risk, or sadly way too often lose their lives serving our country.

I am painfully aware that they serve, and sacrifice (be it lives or life-changing injury) to protect us all, and I honour them for that.

It's worth also bearing in mind that I had friends that went to the Falklands and didn't cone back, and having done family genealogy, am aware of a disturbingly high number of uncles and cousins that we lost in WW2 and even WW1.

We don't need to have been in the milltary to honour snd respect those that were, and indeed, we'd be better as a country if we did a lot more respecting.


EDIT - Rereading that, I think I need to clarify. I quoted you, Smudger, but comments about doing more respecting are emphatically not aimed at you. Something nags at my memory that you're ex-forces, and if so, you're among those deserving of respect from those of us, like me, that aren't. But either way, it wasn't a pop at you.

I got that it wasn't a personal dig - I do have the utmost respect for those who fought and died. Like most of us, I had grandparents who fought in a major war - and would never speak of it because they didn't want to re-live it, and possibly because they wanted to shield us from the horrors they experienced. I was made aware from a very early age that because of their sacrifices, the likelihood was that I would never be forced to fight, and I am grateful for that. I also have friends who have served (I myself have not), and whilst I may not agree with the reasons they were sent, I completely appreciate and am grateful that they go and put their lives on the line, regardless of their feelings about why they're there.
What I can't stand is these sacrifice-by-proxy people who have never fought, who immediately jump on any hint of not respecting Remembrance Day, like these from the CA, then make a whole storm in a teacup about it because they don't get their own way. I've already seen the memes on Facebook from the likes of Britain First calling the young lady a traitor, calling for her to be chucked off her course.

[peterb]

What I can't stand is these sacrifice-by-proxy people who have never fought, who immediately jump on any hint of not respecting Remembrance Day, like these from the CA, then make a whole storm in a teacup about it because they don't get their own way. I've already seen the memes on Facebook from the likes of Britain First calling the young lady a traitor, calling for her to be chucked off her course.

And that of course would also be unacceptable - and stifling debate. She has a point of view and should not be punished for it.

However the act of remembrance is also a very local act - and while carrying a talisman as a permanent reminder is laudable - going to a (usually church service) remembrance event where the names of local people who died is very moving. It is particularly moving in villages and small towns, where the same name crops up again and again - and where those descendants may still be living.

[Zak33]

I wonder - Do people think that Remembrance Day/ Poppy Day is for WW1 and WW2 veterans only?

Is that what people think?

Are people considering NOT buying a poppy because the veterans of WW1 (the Great War) are all gone and so too are many of the WW2 vets?

Perhaps that's what people think?

The Royal British Legion isn't just for raising money to support the survivors of the Great War...but to support the survivors AND familes of our armed forces SINCE The Great War.
https://www.britishlegion.org.uk/get...onations-help/

And please everyone remember that because 11am on the 11th Day of the 11th Month doesn't always fall on a Sunday....

Remembrance Sunday is slightly different to Remembrance Day (Armistice Day)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remembrance_Day

the offical document "Treaty of Versailles" wasn't sorted until 28 June 1919!

[Zak33]

Here's a thought for you all, young and old.

Imagine a world without the internet, and with a truly rubbish communication system. Imagine a world of couriers and letters,. horses and almost no planes. Only ships to cross the water.... and now picture the entire globe....
the entire of earth... and nearly all of it, at war, shelling and shooting the sh1t out of each other for years. Utter hatred, utter exahustion and starvation, and death on every continent.....

now imagine trying to STOP THE FIGHTING all at once..... how would you do it?

Imagine knowing that the war will end later today, and yet you might have to shoot a bunch of blokes at 9am... and endanger yourself... wheras if you left it for a few hours.. you've be able to stand up and go shake their hands.

And imagine... not getting the letter/radio message - and shooting someone who knew "it was over" and you didn't...until you realised ..after you'd stuck a bullet in him and he'd bled out in front of you.

I'm no historian - and I'm not a soldier, sailer or pilot.

But I think that 11am on the 11th of the 11th was a bloody good date to stop fighting. The surrender was signed at 5am and the official "put your guns down boys... it's over " was at 11am.

THATS what Remembrance Day is for.

it glorifies PEACE and the end to killing people. It does not glory war.

"It is only those who have neither fired a shot nor heard the shrieks and groans of the wounded who cry aloud for blood, more vengeance, more desolation. War is hell.”
"I must study politics and war that my sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy."

The shooting of guns, the silence, the solo brass blown that makes me cry... it's not glorifying war. If it was about glorifying war, we'd have a recreation, a battle scene played out in every village and town. And we don't.

If it glorified war, we'd all wear t shirts on Nov 11th and they'd say "we kicked their arse and my grandfather helped...with bits of his own body" ...but we don't.

We remember the dead who died. It wasn't fun. It was a sh1t storm. Both wars were hell.

Please no one complain about my vulgarity. Both world wars were sh1t. Utter bloody hell. And we continue to wage wars where we see fit....and people die.

Go drink tea, work hard, learn and study, hug your kids and feed the cart play your consoles and whatsapp your mates. Eat, drink, drive and go on holiday to sunny climes ...or skiing. But on the 11th of Nov, I think you should be respectful of every person who died in a war., AND war.... Whether you agreed with the war or not, cos the bloke/girl who died, didn't choose to strike up the war. They just did what they were told.

[Ttaskmaster]

I'm unsure if that was meant to be ironic or not.

Unsure if you're perhaps confusing 'forcing someone to understand' with 'using force to make someone understand'...

Of course we can't force anyone to visit these areas and get a feel for it

Actually, we can.
We can force students to travel all the way up to Derby and traipse round old coal mines, smithies, steel mills and works, to learn about the Industrial Revolution.... or around a muddy field, where we think the Romans might have once lived... or to a random field to look for insects... Why not to Europe on a Battlefields tour?

[kalniel]

Actually, we can.
We can force students to travel all the way up to Derby and traipse round old coal mines, smithies, steel mills and works, to learn about the Industrial Revolution....

Oh please, I'm from Derby and I wouldn't force it on anyone. Besides, coal is more like Yorkshire, steel was Sheffield. We did cotton mills.

[Ttaskmaster]

Oh please, I'm from Derby and I wouldn't force it on anyone.

It was bloody well forced on us!!!
3rd year history trip, mandatory for all students, comprising several trips up that way, all on a stinking, hot, slow coach....

[spacein_vader]

Unsure if you're perhaps confusing 'forcing someone to understand' with 'using force to make someone understand'...


Actually, we can.
We can force students to travel all the way up to Derby and traipse round old coal mines, smithies, steel mills and works, to learn about the Industrial Revolution.... or around a muddy field, where we think the Romans might have once lived... or to a random field to look for insects... Why not to Europe on a Battlefields tour?

Whenever my kids go on a school trip I have to sign a consent form. If I don't they don't go. So we don't force them to go to any of those places you mention.

[ik9000]

Oh please, I'm from Derby and I wouldn't force it on anyone. Besides, coal is more like Yorkshire, steel was Sheffield. We did cotton mills.

err, Derby had a bit of mining. Coal included, as well as lead, copper, tin etc. I can recall going on a school trip of an old copper mine in the peak district.

https://www.nmrs.org.uk/mines-map/co...bynotts/derby/

[Ttaskmaster]

Whenever my kids go on a school trip I have to sign a consent form. If I don't they don't go. So we don't force them to go to any of those places you mention.

Back in my day, no parent would decline to sign, especially as they didn't have to pay for mandatory trips... besides, there was no reason for kids not to go, and it got us out of their hair for additional hours.
Not going, meant more expense for fill-in teachers to look after the kids staying behind.

Thinking about it, it might have been Dudley, not Derby... which just reinforces my perspective of mandatory learning about actual important things, as well as the random, unrelated stuff we never paid attention to.