Poppy smilie

I found a Poppy smilie ... would this be a good addition to the MLU smilies/emoticons?

Karmen.

[servicepub (RIP)]

Definitely!!!!

Thank you Geoff, for adding this to the smilies. Perfectly fitting for MLU

Karmen

[Darrell Zinck]

Well done, Karmen!!!

I like it. Thanks too, Geoff.



regards
Darrell

[Geoff Winnington-Ball (RIP)]

As long as we have men & women under arms and under fire, I wear my poppy. Should MLU be anything different?

Originally posted by Darrell Zinck


Well done, Karmen!!!

regards
Darrell

Googling for images comes up with some really good stuff sometimes. I'm really glad I found it, and it's quite a nice one at that.

Karmen

[Bob Potter]

Not a rant or a complaint, just a question. They took the shilling, they take the risk of being deployed, shot at, or put in otherwise less than tidy circumstances. They are willing to stand between us and the "them" of the moment. We recognize them for what they do and are willing to do.

A fair number of MLU'ers were in; some I'd wager under less than tidy circumstances. I was in between 1975 and 1977, did not get shot at, and was generally bored to tears (except the night one of my less than stellar types came at me with a broken beer bottle). I was in because I was brought up that way, because every generation of my family back to 1638 (and probably back farther in the Warwickshire militia and fyrds) saw service as their responsibility. My father got shot at in Italy, but he also kept a surfboard on Waikiki Beach in the 1930's while on duty in Hawaii.
My Ontario great-great-grandfather crossed from Bridgewater to Buffalo to enlist in the Union Army in 1861. In 1865, he returned home to his "regular" job as the caretaker of the Drummond Hill cemetery at Lundy's Lane.

Bless 'em all.

Thanks again to Jon Skagfeld for sending me two of your Canadian poppies awhile back.

Bob

Originally posted by Bob Potter
Bless 'em all. Bob

My Dad served. He was rejected for overseas duty, stayed home, made Sargeant, trained men at Shilo during WW2. He also had to go to Halifax (?) sometimes to pick up and escort German POWS from point A to point B. My Poppy covers him and his service, and everyone who has ever served or serves, as far as I'm concerned. It's extra symbolic for me for those who scarificed their all, lost their lives, but for me, it remembers everybodies service to me. I've just always felt like that about it.

I remember in grade school especially we all recited In Flanders Fields and did the two minutes of silence, standing, girls in their tunics and white blouses, with our heads bowed to remember the Fallen Soldiers. We all wore poppies, made poppies ...

Karmen

[Vic Eaton]

Hello all
there has been talk over here about the poppy should now be white for peace personaly i think it stupid and misses the point,any comments on this white poppy .
vic uk.

Originally posted by victor eaton
Hello all
there has been talk over here about the poppy should now be white for peace personaly i think it stupid and misses the point,any comments on this white poppy .
vic uk.

Hi Victor,

Here is an article below that talks about this problem ... Karmen

Legion takes on activists in War of the Poppies
Veterans object to peace group selling white version of famous red emblem
KATHERINE HARDING AND DAWN WALTON

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

EDMONTON AND CALGARY — The Royal Canadian Legion is threatening to bring out its big guns — the lawyers — in a war with peace activists over poppies.

Veterans say the activists are unlawfully selling white poppies in a fundraising drive that violates trademark rights to the scarlet poppy, which they say belongs to the Legion.

Already, an Edmonton store owned by Michael Kalmanovitch that has been selling the so-called “poppies for peace” has been shipped proof by the Legion's intellectual property lawyer that the veterans association owns the image, regardless of the flower's colour, and has been asked to stop.

“If he [Kalmanovitch] doesn't, then we will proceed with further legal action,” explained Steven Clark, the Ottawa-based remembrance co-ordinator who oversees the poppy trademark for the Legion.

---------------

The red poppy has been Canada's symbol of remembrance since 1921 and stems from Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae's famous poem, In Flanders Fields, which speaks to the fear that the war dead will be forgotten. Canadians, and others in countries around the world, wear poppies over their hearts leading up to Remembrance Day on Nov. 11 as a pledge that the deaths of military personnel, in Canada's case 117,000 of them, have not been in vain.

The tradition of the white poppy, which was the brainchild of the Women's Co-Operative Guild in Britain, dates back to 1993 as a tribute to peace. It has been exported to Canada over the years, but for the first time, the Legion's head office says it has been informed about the practice and it's not about to roll over.

Mr. Kalmanovitch, who has owned Earth's General Store in Edmonton since it opened in 1991 and has been selling white poppies for the past three years, said he has been contacted by a Legion official. However, he won't consider ceasing white poppy sales until he's officially been notified by the Peace Pledge Union, a British organization that took over from the Women's Co-Operative Guild to distribute the white poppies worldwide.

Mr. Kalmanovitch's shop, which offers environmentally and socially friendly products, has been selling the poppies for $2 apiece, with the proceeds used to fund the store's “activism” efforts around the city. Most customers, he added, are supportive of the white poppy drive. The shop sold the last of its 200 poppies yesterday and has ordered more.

“It has started a lot of healthy debate,” he said.

Marya Nyland, who belongs to an international peace organization, Women in Black, which has been distributing the white poppies across Canada for the last 11 years, said it's ridiculous that the Legion is considering a lawsuit, especially since the white poppy has been around almost as long as the red poppy.

“Peace is free. You never buy peace,” said Ms. Nyland, who lives in Victoria, explaining why the group gives the poppies away for free across the country.

The white poppies — about 12,000 are distributed every November in Canada — have always raised the ire of veterans, she said.

“I've had nasty calls from veterans. I've been harassed,” she said. “They feel that the red poppy should be it. Why shouldn't there be room for both?”

Ms. Nyland said most of her friends wear both poppies as a way to honour both the military and civilians who died in past wars.

“Remembering isn't enough,” she said.

But Harvey Shevalier, president of the Legion's Alberta-Northwest Territories Command which has 52,000 members, isn't swayed.

“It's offensive and it's disturbing that this white poppy would appear at this time of year,” he said. “To me, the white poppy is an insult to the veterans. The Women in Black organization, I think, are piggybacking on the sacred time of the year.”

Mr. Shevalier, who served in the army and worked with NATO and UN forces, said veterans aren't against peace, but Nov. 11 should not be used to make a political statement.

It also detracts from the Legion's primary fundraising drive, which raised about $15-million in 2004 (the most recent campaign it has calculated). The money is dedicated to the care of veterans and their dependants in need and funds programs such as meals on wheels, supplemental housing costs and medical equipment.

Instead, said the Legion's Mr. Clark, peace activists should focus their efforts on Sept. 21, which is the UN-sanctioned International Day of Peace. But even then, he added, white poppies would infringe on the Legion's trademark. He suggested they use a different symbol such as a dove.

“Nov. 11 is the day that we honour our veterans. We need to make sure that that does not get confused, combined or anything else with another campaign,” he said.

[Vic Eaton]

HELLO VETS
Imust say so far i have not seen a single white poppy over here We are taking two trucks to a small town called saffron walden in essex to help the royal british legion this saturday ill be very suprised if there is a sighting of a white poppy they dont seem to be able anything alone these days .
regards vic uk.

Originally posted by victor eaton
HELLO VETS
Imust say so far i have not seen a single white poppy over here We are taking two trucks to a small town called saffron walden in essex to help the royal british legion this saturday ill be very suprised if there is a sighting of a white poppy they dont seem to be able anything alone these days .
regards vic uk.

Hi Vic,

I'm mostly disturbed knowing that these people are promoting and trying to capitolize their Peace ideals via violating the symbolism and ceremonies of people paying their respects to our Fallen Soldiers. They're violatinmg our Fallen, period and they don't understand that at all.

I'm okay with promoting Peace, I'm not okay with violating the sacredness of what the Poppy and Remembrance Day are all about, and WHO they are for ... our Fallen. The Poppy and Remembrance Day, to me, is the funeral service strictly for the dead.

Go do your Peace promotion with another symbol of your own, independently, and don't violate our Fallen to promote it. It's out of line. Out of context.

Those are some of my own thoughts about this.

I've been invited to go to the local ceremonies to the Cenotaph tomorrow morning, with a neighbor, rather than alone. It will be so nice to go with someone I know personally who cares like I do.
I hope I don't see any white poppies to disturb the focus on our Fallen

Karmen

[Vic Eaton]

HI vets
Im pleased to say there were no white poppys around where we were today the town has a square it was market day so only military vehicles were alowed in i spent most of the time using my M5 generator making cups of tea it was a cold wind that was blowing but dry
regards vic uk.

[Bob Potter]

Peace is free, he asks again? So, on just what planet does the jack-ass who said this reside? Sounds like somebody needs to take a long walk through the cemeteries in Flanders, Tuscany, Hong Kong, or any of the far too many places far too many fighting men heard the Last Post.

I'd be really curious to see where this money from white poppies goes. Wonder if the international anti-gun tycoon George Soros (think that's right) is in the mix.

Yesterday our campus minister (I teach in an all-girls Catholic high school) started our day with a Veteran's Day homily. She got it right and I told her so afterwards. I am so brassed off at our media for conflating Memorial Day and Veterans Day, then following their "news" piece with a commercial for a Veterans Day sale at Sears, Penneys, or wherever. I guess y'all in the Snowy North get the same thing only for the Bay stores . . .

My grandmother always called it Armistice Day, so I learned about it early.

Ok, I'll go off somewhere quite to fume a little.

Bob

Well, obliviousness about things like this, Remembrance Day etc, sucks when it's inflicted and poured all over the focus of events and ceremonies, and grieving and remembering, Remembrance and Vets and their families. How disrespectful that is. A potential cure for obliviousness is to educate educate educate and hope the lightbulbs start coming on in some for future.

I'm totally glad to report that I didn't see a single white poppy at todays events ... I would have said something to the wearers about how out of line and context they are, especially at the events and ceremonies. They didn't invade "today" and "here" that I'm aware of.

Fuming is good and heartfelt ... its just so damned sad that's inflicted and triggered for us at this time that we are forced to focus any attention at all on this. Very intrusive and I resent it that I feel the fuming within.

I needed a little ventitaling about this too

Karmen

[Bob Potter]

The local newspaper does not do much any more that gets my attention, but this past Sunday I was reminded that the comic section always merits a look. One of my favorites is a Canadian import called, "For Better or Worse." The artist, Lynn Johnston I think, must be Canadian or live in Canada. I always appreciate her Remembrance Day cartoons because she gets the history, the emotion, and the perspective right. I think she draws her life. If so, her father was a WWII vet, and for reasons I cannot now recall, I think he was D-Day Dodger.

Anyway, I hope you Canadians appreciate this as much as I do.

Bob