Stunning photos of London's new WWI memorial

[Razgovory]

This is awesome but can you Brits get over it already? Everyone who fought in this war is already dead (in fact except for a handful of people, everyone who lived when this war started is already dead). Yes, people died. It was a war. We get it.

I think you're missing the political, cultural and economic shadows that war still casts.

Or perhaps it should be regarded as a watershed moment in British history?

It's not like Poland didn't have its share of traumatic events (in fact, some of them, especially WW2, make the British experience of WW1 seem rather feeble in comparison). And that was within the living memory. So I get the need to honor those who had to go through. But once everybody involved is dead, it does seem rather self-indulgent.

That's like the opposite of self-indulgent.   They aren't honoring themselves, they are honoring the dead.

[Sheilbh]

This.  Yeah, the Blitz was bad and you had Monty fucking shit up with his Montyness but compared to its continental counterparts, England came out relatively intact.  WW1 was a far different experience.  Kitchener destroyed entire communities.

Not just intact but immensely proud. Awful as the Blitz was it was for a good cause. It's the same with losing an Empire, if you've got to there's not much better way to do it than exhaustion fighting Nazis

I imagine it's similar for Commonwealth countries and from what I've read it actually mattered a great deal to British people at the time that Australia and Canada were with them. The WW1 experience was different I think for all of them - among the countries that don't mark 11/11 include New Zealand and Australia because Anzac Day is on the anniversary of Gallipoli.

[Jacob]

And of course it's not just about WW1 it's remembrance for all our fallen in all our wars, though there's going to be a pretty heavy WW1 focus in the next few years I think. The days of Tommies leading the parade (which I remember) are over. It's normally WW2 veterans now.

Yeah, in Canada while Remembrance Day was initially about WWI - and in many ways a mark of Canada becoming a nation - it is about all the wars and all the soldiers. There's some kitsch and some trite sentimentalism involved, sure, but mostly it seems to me to be a fairly solemn affair remembering the costs of war.

Here's a pretty good article in the National Post, from a WWII veteran:

It is the strangest thing, Frank Johnson tells me, a memory he can't shake because he can't make sense of it, can't understand why what happened to him on that long ago day in wartime Germany happened the way it did.

Here he was, you see, old Frankie Johnson — Johnny to his fighter pilot pals — shot to bits after being shot down over Germany on March 30, 1945. His back was busted, there was shrapnel in his right shin, a bullet in his left hip and he was bleeding from his forehead and covered in mud and blood and aircraft oil.

He was a "goddamn mess," he says, and he didn't really care whether he lived or died since he felt like he was already dying anyway. But a German farmer's wife, some middle-aged lady, she cared whether he lived or died and she took a shot-up enemy fighter pilot who was dumped on her doorstep by two German soldiers and cleaned his wounds.

Washed his entire body like she was washing her own "goddamn son," Mr. Johnson says, like it didn't matter one slice that old Johnny boy had spent the war taking out "German targets" and killing God knows how many Germans along the way with his Hawker Typhoon fighter plane.

The complete article can be found here: http://news.nationalpost.com/2013/11/08/why-the-hell-would-i-kill-this-kid-one-canadian-veteran-remembers-the-horrors-of-war/

[Duque de Bragança]

It seems to me that the Brits (and maybe the Belgians, as well as former CW countries, like Canada and Australia) are the only ones of the participants that still care so much about WWI, the French used to care a big deal too but they seem to not be that much into it anymore. I'd say that everybody else moved on to devote most of their historical grief to WWII to the point of eclipsing everything else.

I find it interesting that lots of countries still mark 11/11 - like the US for example do, I think Veterans' Day is around about now. It's odd.

But it'd be interesting to know about how other countries are marking the centenary, especially France, Germany and Russia.

Huge deal in France this year with 100th anniversary. On the other hand, people's attention was taken already by the 70th anniversary of the Normandy landing.
Since 2012 (one of Sarko's last measures), November 11th, a bank holiday, is also some kind of a Remembrance day.

[Syt]

November 11th, 11:11am is start of the carnival season in Germany and Austria. Also, ball season in Austria (ball as in posh dance event).

Not much remembering about WW1 going on, except for the occasional news editorial from what I can see.

[Martinus]

This.  Yeah, the Blitz was bad and you had Monty fucking shit up with his Montyness but compared to its continental counterparts, England came out relatively intact.  WW1 was a far different experience.  Kitchener destroyed entire communities.

I don't think anyone is disputing that. But if this is the reason for remembrance, then after 100 years it is probably a time to move on. If the point instead is to honour one's veterans of all wars, then it is fine but then stop making most of it singularly about WW1.  If the point is to make a post-modern statement about pointlessness of all wars - as mongers seems to think it is - then don't do it with the prime minister and top brass of the military that even now are keeping soldiers fighting wars of dubious sense or necessity across the globe.

Sheilbh is right with his point about infantilisation - I think it tries to create a myth of unity and belonging for a deeply atomised nation that Britain is, by idealising the WW1 experience. Unlike mongers I don't find it to be a good thing, because trying to change reality based on a myth is rarely a good thing.

[Jacob]

What's it to you how the Brits manage their national mythology?

[Syt]

Also, isn't the 11th Nationalist Riot Day Independence Day in Poland?

[Brazen]

Also, isn't the 11th Nationalist Riot Day Independence Day in Poland?

Yep.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30012830


Can't you Poles get over it already?

[Martinus]

This seems like an extremely silly retort.

Even if I were some huge enthusiast of patriotic flag waving and celebrating the Polish independence day (which I don't think I have ever given any indication of), "independence day" style celebrations are something slightly different than remembering a historical event (again, I would be pretty happy if there were't any, just as well, but these riots and competing celebrations are about modern politics, not about events that happened when noone involved was alive - so to be honest I think they are still more relevant).

I also thought that "you can't criticise my country, as your country is stoooooopeeeeed" stopped being considered a valid argument around the time one graduates from primary school, but apparently I was wrong.

[grumbler]

I also thought that "you can't criticise my country, as your country is stoooooopeeeeed" stopped being considered a valid argument around the time one graduates from primary school, but apparently I was wrong.

Well, the "why can't you be more like me" argument isn't considered a valid argument by anyone but you, so there's that.

[Fireblade]

Martinus is a fucking idiot, news at 11.

[Martinus]

Martinus is a fucking idiot, news at 11.

[Syt]

But more to the point: Remembrance Day in the UK is not (solely) about remembering the end of WW1, it's about remembering the fallen British/Commonwealth soldiers of wars in general.

[Brazen]

But more to the point: Remembrance Day in the UK is not (solely) about remembering the end of WW1, it's about remembering the fallen British/Commonwealth soldiers of wars in general.

Since last year's Armistice Day, another seven members of the British armed forces have died in service - including five who died in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan in April.