Quote:
| Originally Posted by [b Quote[/b] (aclivity @ Nov. 11 2003,17:46)]
For not one foot of this dank wet sod but drank
Its surfeit of the blood of gallant men,
Who for their faith, their hope - for life and Liberty.
Here made the sacrifice - here gave their lives,
And gave right willingly - for you and me.
|
Picture the scene: a mother and her 14 year old son talking in the livingroom of their home; and bear in mind the beautifully recalled, rendered and described snippet from Andy's posted inscription above:
Son: "Mum, why did
all those men die in the wars?"
Mother: (smiling gently, gazing down at her progeny with a look only a mother can give, whilst cradling the little cherub to her bossom and running her fingers through his hair) "Well darling, just a few of the reasons they all died were so shite like you could quibble and argue unnecessarily about who wears the best (most expensive) trainers; so you could idolise and consider as 'important' inarticulate wasters and poltroons with pure flakes for wives, like David Beckham and his ilk; so that you could play solitary 'Gameboy' and not mix or be sociable, or
run the risk of enhancing your communications skills; so that you could wear your baseball caps backwards like twats and cover them with hoods so no one can see your face or hear the grunts which pass for expression; so that you could wear jeans which might fit a man fifteen times your size (please don't drag your crotch on the floor, dear, it's most unbecoming); so school could be 'wagged' and homework and the desire to do well and have a sense of achievement be tossed-off like they had no worth; so you could be so endemically uncreative and empty-headed as to bitch and whine endlessly about there being "nothing to do round here..." as a cover-all excuse to be louts whilst you smash windows, hang around in intimidating packs, like hounds, and generally never develop a sense of respect, committment, responsibility or the desire to do anything selflessly; so you could say "innit", as a suffix to any statement or sentence instead of the required and properly constructed question; so you could look down on and deride anyone with education and a desire to succeed off their own bats or the virtue to get ahead on their own merit; so you could redefine both lethargy and indifference and raise them to an art-form; so you could remain ignorant of the fact that 'Ali G' is a satire and neither a role-model nor someone to whom you might aspire to be; so you could remain the snearing, objectionable and ill-disciplined whelp that your father and I raised you to be......
That's why all those men died in the two wars.........."
Sorry about the above rant from the hip - had to get it off my chest: I've just been speaking to an old acquaintance (one of the 'Old and Bold') who went through the Second War and who attended a Remembrance Day Service this morning in Cambridge.
Imagine, if you will/can, the scenes of deep sorrow amongst the aged, veteran assemblage (who'd turned up to pay thanks for the lives' of loved ones and friends lost in battle), as they looked on to find that 'scrotes' (as yet not caught and un-named) have drawn obscene pictures in black magic marker all over the names on the local War Memorial....
Never mind, eh, some do-gooding-PC-wallah Social Worker will, once they're caught, probably pronounce the little darlings to be merely 'just high-spirited', 'misunderstood' or that their actions were merely 'an unrequited call for help...'; before recommending that they all be given a jolly good holiday, more likely than not, to a safari park in Botswana......of course at the tax-payers' expense! Why would it not be?
So, signally rewarded for their heady wiles of youth and never having had the 'do you know what you've done is wrong and why so?' address, they just grow into older scrotes who then beget more of the same....and so the cycle continues.
I now understand, with greater clarity,
why it is so important to remember the selfless fallen: they act as a poignant counter-point to the pointless acts of the selfish.
Those who gave their tomorrows for our todays might well now be asking themselves: was our sacrifice really worth it? Did we die for this shower?
Given their character and fiber, I'm bound to say yes: they would think it was worth it; no doubt they'd do it again so we could turn out the same also. One of the comforts we can take from their sacrifice is that the possble alternative outcomes on offer at the time mean that louts and the selfish (whilst not wholly paling into insignificance) are just that bit more bearable, if still at times enragingly unpalatable.