tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post1701925774844852939..comments2023-10-22T02:31:42.812-07:00Comments on grit's day: All death in the Imperial War MuseumUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post-85374324744075010242010-02-03T15:12:50.180-08:002010-02-03T15:12:50.180-08:00hello people, and thank you for your comments. i h...hello people, and thank you for your comments. i have many mixed feelings about the war museum; this is the first time i've visited, and accept it is a tough job they have to do. afterwards, i found it impossible to ask my usual question, 'did you enjoy the museum', but it gave us a lot more starting points to talk on. <br /><br />i guess i hope in the end that the kids grow up looking for ways to calibrate the language of politicians and consider more fully the agendas they bring to an event.Grithttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14022216340604423686noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post-74977876712703462892010-02-03T07:52:26.940-08:002010-02-03T07:52:26.940-08:00My dad would never talk about it. either. He was ...My dad would never talk about it. either. He was just a boy when he was forced to fight by the Ruskies. 17...no age, is it? Mother said he witnessed true horrors. He was eventually shot and captured by the Nazis and oiked off to pow camp. <br /><br />Mother used to tell us about her experiences... how she and my gran were forced into slave labour on a German farm. They were beaten senseless if they didn't work hard enough, shot at and injured and then bombed by the allies! The bombings were the worst...Mum used to hide with the farm animals...there'd be body parts all over the place afterwards, of course. Then there was the constant fear of being snitched on by trivial informers and carted off, never to be seen again. This fear made everyone the enemy. That's how it feels nowadays, too. The constant snooping by so called officials into family life and encouraging people to report this that and the other! Gah!! They tried to wipe out the gypsies then and they're still trying to do it now...and still people here don't see the parallels. Mother says she prays that we never have to go through anything like WW2. She thinks the state today is becoming too controlling and is as bad as 'Hitler'. She's lived through both periods so she's entitled to have her view and not be poo pooed as being paranoid! She is part of history, too. Dad and the others paid dearly so we can enjoy our freedoms. We must keep and respect them. They cost an awful lot. <br /><br />Dad hated Labour and was a Maggie Man. His way of sticking two fingers up at the Ruskies & Co. lol<br /><br />Sorry for rambling.Minniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04770118579029775245noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post-65473202059843413712010-02-03T05:57:51.638-08:002010-02-03T05:57:51.638-08:00I was intrigued by a picture of Gordon Brown who w...I was intrigued by a picture of Gordon Brown who was helping up a soldier with artificial legs who had fallen over outside 10 Downing street, and wondered if he felt any sense of responsibility. Tony Blair certainly doesn't. Kids need to know about war don't they, as it appears it will continue to feature even though you'd have though humankind should have grown out of it...the Imperial War Museum seems to be getting better at removing the glorification of it these daysNota Benehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00969705852180234416noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post-63665541177107743942010-02-01T19:53:44.527-08:002010-02-01T19:53:44.527-08:00My Dad was out in Cairo and Aden during WW2 and ap...My Dad was out in Cairo and Aden during WW2 and apart from that we knew very little about his Army days. He refused to talk about it and always said war was not for glorifying. We have a few pictures of him and some of his mates in their Black Watch kilts looking more like schoolboys than men out in foreign parts to fight to the death with The Enemy. He never collected his service medals either.<br /><br />The politicians who decide War is the only option should lead from the front and actually get out there and fight, just like in the 'Olden Days'. Maybe then they wouldn't be so keen to unleash death and destruction on so many innocent people.sharonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03247276433803886670noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1686467686335484826.post-15366399957468757012010-02-01T17:14:30.716-08:002010-02-01T17:14:30.716-08:00I used to work in a shop that this old sailor chap...I used to work in a shop that this old sailor chap used to pop into and talk and talk and talk - about pencils, the nice people at Mind and his wife but mostly about the war, and lovely as he was, after a while someone at the back end of the shop would have to ring the front end of the shop so I could excuse myself to take the call and he'd eventually work his way out via various other startled 'listeners'. One day he mentioned about being thrown out of The Imperial War Museum for talking to the visitors there about how war is a terrible terrible thing - not something to gawp at, glorify or congratulate ourselves on. I never again viewed him as a slightly amusing old fruitcake who was best humoured for a couple of minutes before escaping - I realised that here was the real thing. A real person with a real history and a real opinion based on real experiences. Bless him for keeping on.MadameSmokinGunhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00369302102195138989noreply@blogger.com