Why are politicians so self-centred?
In a few days’ time, there will be commemorations of the Battle of the Somme, which started on July 1st 1916 and continued until November 18th 1916. During that period, more than a million men were wounded or killed, the highest loss of life during any period of history.
In a few days’ time, there will be commemorations of the Battle of the Somme, which started on July 1st 1916 and continued until November 18th 1916. During that period, more than a million men were wounded or killed, the highest loss of life during any period of history.
It is a sobering thought that only 100 years ago, the continent of Europe, indeed the whole world, was engulfed by horrendous and unimaginable human misery. Young men and women volunteered, then were conscripted, into an army that became fodder for machine guns or artillery. A bit of genealogical research shows that my grandfather, described as 5ft 1in, small but “suitable” was called up around that time. That he survived was good news for me, on one side. My paternal grandfather was in a reserved occupation as an aircraft builder, based in Southampton. He died in the Spanish flu epidemic in the winter of 1918/9, six months before my father was born. A few months difference and I wouldn’t be here.
My life, now numbering 63 years, has been significantly different from my father’s or my grandfathers’ generations. They were at war and were called up to fight. I and my children have never had to endure that, nor the suffering that accompanied the more distant fighting, although I do have a memory of walks to collect the still-rationed milk powder. I’d like to think, that if I had had to fight in the same way, that I’d have done so. Some things are well worth fighting for, such as personal liberty, something that is a higher aspiration.
The greater proportion of the past 100 years have been lived in peace, with people talking out problems for the main part through organisations such as the United Nations or the European Union. It seems as if “Jaw-jaw is better than war-war” has been largely successful. My last blog looked at some of my concerns after the recent referendum.
Sadly, there is no-one of the stature of a Churchill to knock a few heads together and to come up with some kind of plan that takes the discussion forward in a positive way. Treating other countries in the manner of a petulant teenager, stamping feet and having tantrums will not work. If you are a parent of older children, you’ll know that “I want doesn’t get…” in a very short week we have gone backwards very rapidly, financially and morally, because a few self-centred politicians and some rich backers felt they had the right to destroy the stability that has been part of the last 40 years, persuading sufficient people to believe in their promises of a “better tomorrow”.
The past week has been describe as a bereavement. It is almost eleven years to the day that my first wife died.
A few months previously, I had a valued member of my teaching staff succumb to cancer over a few short months. I had a very difficult time, supporting the staff of the school, but also the family. Geoff would call in each day after visiting for a cup of tea and a download. I was pleased to offer a listening ear. I was also very aware that I, in many ways had been lucky, in that grief was spread out over time and took many disguises. The raw emotion of such a rapid demise was unimaginable, even to me, who had gone through several recurrences.
In our case, we were told on our 20th wedding anniversary that she had breast cancer, which needed major surgery. At Easter we headed to France to visit friends who just wanted to look after us for a week. We had been friends for 20 years and they’d decamped to live in an old farmhouse. While we were there, we pursued a dream that had been alive for three years, to look to buy a small holiday cottage and settled on a two room house that had been empty for three years, since the elderly owner had died. We were able to buy a structure that had cold water and an outside loo, for the cost of a reasonable towing caravan. It became our bolt-hole and offered fresh air, calm and a chance to live a simple life for a few weeks each year. My hobbies developed into plumbing, electrics and coppicing. Between visits, plans were made for the next projects. It was a lifeline then, and after D died. It still offers the same respite from the world now.
But I do worry, not about my neighbours and many good friends, but about others who may seek to persuade us that we are not welcome, possibly with the rise of the Front Nationale, in the same way, sadly, that many have been made to feel welcome during the past week.
My life, now numbering 63 years, has been significantly different from my father’s or my grandfathers’ generations. They were at war and were called up to fight. I and my children have never had to endure that, nor the suffering that accompanied the more distant fighting, although I do have a memory of walks to collect the still-rationed milk powder. I’d like to think, that if I had had to fight in the same way, that I’d have done so. Some things are well worth fighting for, such as personal liberty, something that is a higher aspiration.
The greater proportion of the past 100 years have been lived in peace, with people talking out problems for the main part through organisations such as the United Nations or the European Union. It seems as if “Jaw-jaw is better than war-war” has been largely successful. My last blog looked at some of my concerns after the recent referendum.
Sadly, there is no-one of the stature of a Churchill to knock a few heads together and to come up with some kind of plan that takes the discussion forward in a positive way. Treating other countries in the manner of a petulant teenager, stamping feet and having tantrums will not work. If you are a parent of older children, you’ll know that “I want doesn’t get…” in a very short week we have gone backwards very rapidly, financially and morally, because a few self-centred politicians and some rich backers felt they had the right to destroy the stability that has been part of the last 40 years, persuading sufficient people to believe in their promises of a “better tomorrow”.
The past week has been describe as a bereavement. It is almost eleven years to the day that my first wife died.
A few months previously, I had a valued member of my teaching staff succumb to cancer over a few short months. I had a very difficult time, supporting the staff of the school, but also the family. Geoff would call in each day after visiting for a cup of tea and a download. I was pleased to offer a listening ear. I was also very aware that I, in many ways had been lucky, in that grief was spread out over time and took many disguises. The raw emotion of such a rapid demise was unimaginable, even to me, who had gone through several recurrences.
In our case, we were told on our 20th wedding anniversary that she had breast cancer, which needed major surgery. At Easter we headed to France to visit friends who just wanted to look after us for a week. We had been friends for 20 years and they’d decamped to live in an old farmhouse. While we were there, we pursued a dream that had been alive for three years, to look to buy a small holiday cottage and settled on a two room house that had been empty for three years, since the elderly owner had died. We were able to buy a structure that had cold water and an outside loo, for the cost of a reasonable towing caravan. It became our bolt-hole and offered fresh air, calm and a chance to live a simple life for a few weeks each year. My hobbies developed into plumbing, electrics and coppicing. Between visits, plans were made for the next projects. It was a lifeline then, and after D died. It still offers the same respite from the world now.
But I do worry, not about my neighbours and many good friends, but about others who may seek to persuade us that we are not welcome, possibly with the rise of the Front Nationale, in the same way, sadly, that many have been made to feel welcome during the past week.
Johnson, Give and Farage have changed Europe, for the worst. They have played politics, for personal gain; in the process making at least half the country insecure about their futures.
Before Della got cancer, I used to sing at Folk Clubs, with Nick, the friend who moved to France. We often sang the song the Green Fields of France, which is a lament for the fallen at the Somme. For the past week, this tune has popped in and out of my mind, reminding me that we don’t ever learn from history.
I can only hope that sense will prevail.
Green Fields of France
Well how do you do, Private Willie McBride,
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside
And rest for a while 'neath the warm summer sun
I've been walking all day and I'm nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the great fallen of nineteen-sixteen.
Well, I hope you died well and I hope you died clean
Or Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene.
Chorus :
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife
lowly,
Did they sound the dead-march as they lowered you down.
Did the band play the Last Post and chorus,
Did the pipes play the 'Flowers of the Forest'.
And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined
And though you died back there in nineteen-sixteen
In some faithful heart are you ever nineteen?
Or are you a stranger without even a name
Enclosed forever behind a glass frame
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained
Fast fading to yellow in a leather bound frame.
Chorus
It’s all quiet now in the green fields of France
The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance
The trenches have vanished, under the plough,
There's no gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now.
But here in this graveyard it's still no-man's-land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man
To a whole generation that were butchered and damned.
Chorus
And I can't help but wonder, Private Willie Mcbride
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe when you answered the cause
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
The sorrow, the suffering, the glory, the pain
The killing and dying t’was all done in vain
For young Willie McBride it all happened again
And again, and again, and again, and again.
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife
lowly,
Did they sound the dead-march as they lowered you down.
Did the band play the Last Post and chorus,
Did the pipes play the 'Flowers of the Forest'.
If you would like to hear The Fureys sing a variation of this song
https://youtu.be/u0tFv8yu7ow
The Flowers of the Forest mentioned in the song is a lament played when burying the dead on the battle field.
https://youtu.be/g4xIozPcZLg
There might be some mileage in using both during an assembly later this week, but have the tissues handy!
Before Della got cancer, I used to sing at Folk Clubs, with Nick, the friend who moved to France. We often sang the song the Green Fields of France, which is a lament for the fallen at the Somme. For the past week, this tune has popped in and out of my mind, reminding me that we don’t ever learn from history.
I can only hope that sense will prevail.
Green Fields of France
Well how do you do, Private Willie McBride,
Do you mind if I sit here down by your graveside
And rest for a while 'neath the warm summer sun
I've been walking all day and I'm nearly done.
I see by your gravestone you were only nineteen
When you joined the great fallen of nineteen-sixteen.
Well, I hope you died well and I hope you died clean
Or Willie McBride, was it slow and obscene.
Chorus :
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife
lowly,
Did they sound the dead-march as they lowered you down.
Did the band play the Last Post and chorus,
Did the pipes play the 'Flowers of the Forest'.
And did you leave a wife or a sweetheart behind
In some faithful heart is your memory enshrined
And though you died back there in nineteen-sixteen
In some faithful heart are you ever nineteen?
Or are you a stranger without even a name
Enclosed forever behind a glass frame
In an old photograph, torn and tattered and stained
Fast fading to yellow in a leather bound frame.
Chorus
It’s all quiet now in the green fields of France
The warm wind blows gently and the red poppies dance
The trenches have vanished, under the plough,
There's no gas, no barbed wire, no guns firing now.
But here in this graveyard it's still no-man's-land
The countless white crosses in mute witness stand
To man's blind indifference to his fellow man
To a whole generation that were butchered and damned.
Chorus
And I can't help but wonder, Private Willie Mcbride
Do all those who lie here know why they died?
Did you really believe when you answered the cause
Did you really believe that this war would end wars?
The sorrow, the suffering, the glory, the pain
The killing and dying t’was all done in vain
For young Willie McBride it all happened again
And again, and again, and again, and again.
Did they beat the drum slowly, did they play the fife
lowly,
Did they sound the dead-march as they lowered you down.
Did the band play the Last Post and chorus,
Did the pipes play the 'Flowers of the Forest'.
If you would like to hear The Fureys sing a variation of this song
https://youtu.be/u0tFv8yu7ow
The Flowers of the Forest mentioned in the song is a lament played when burying the dead on the battle field.
https://youtu.be/g4xIozPcZLg
There might be some mileage in using both during an assembly later this week, but have the tissues handy!
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