Nov 11th is not a Holiday or Day off - Lest We Forget

I get really sick and tired of people passing off Remembrance Day as a day off or forgetting what it's for in the first place. I have always been and continue to be a passionate supporter of our veterans and our military and I consider our fallen heroes to be the greatest Canadians ever. I am increasingly disappointed by the behaviour of our citizens when November 11th comes. Is it really so difficult for us to spend even 1 hour out of every year (8760 hours) to remember their sacrifices? I remember being at a gas station once on my way to a ceremony and hearing a guy moan about not being able to buy a magazine before noon on Remembrance Day. How callous.

I can't really blame people for their ignorance since it isn't entirely their fault. Our society as a whole after more than 50 years of relative peace has grown soft and complacent. Our education system fails miserably at passing on our history to our youth. The left-wing peace activists and the politically correct malign and misinform an already clueless society into thinking that Remembrance Day is about glorifying war and that it is a perfect day to protest the War in Afghanistan or war in general. a whole generation of our youth is buying into this propaganda and further insulting our veterans with silly things like the 'white poppy'.

Can we not put politics aside for 1 day and pay our respects to those we have lost and their families? Can we not do a better job of informing our citizens that Remembrance day is precisely designed to remind people of the horrors of war, and not to glorify or celebrate it? Can we not do a better job of letting Canadians know that we have our own heroes to be proud of and how much of a sacrifice our own people made for peace? Can we not let people know that their is no need for an insulting, hurtful white peace poppy since the red poppy already stands for the very same thing?

Who are we remembering on Nov 11th?

Over 60,000 killed in WWI
More than 42,000 lost in WWII
Better than 500 dead in Korea
42 so far in Afghanistan
and numerous others on Peacekeeping missions across the globe.

Approximately 110,000 people, Canadians like you and me. Fathers, sons, brothers, daughters, sisters gone. Here is an excerpt of Maj McRae's famous poem 'In Flander's Fields' that I think sums up how tragic these losses were.

We are the Dead. Short days ago

We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,

Loved and were loved, and now we lie

In Flanders fields.

110,000 is a number that is difficult to comprehend but let me try and put it into perspective for you;

If you were to learn the name of one fallen soldier at every meal you eat for the rest of your life, no one that reads this will ever live long enough to learn them all.

Please take a few minutes tomorrow to forget the inconvenience, forget the politics, forget the white poppy and remember the sacrifices that were made so that you could live in such a great country.

LEST WE FORGET