SARAH VINE: My message to the ignorant snowflakes who plan to desecrate Remembrance Day and glorify Hamas
Whenever the armies of the righteously woke encounter someone who dares to dispute their world view, one of their favourite retorts is to tell that person to ‘educate’ themselves.
Judging by recent events, I think it’s high time some of these people took their own advice.
Not just the scumbags who pushed and punched a 78-year-old veteran during a pro-Palestine protest at Edinburgh’s Waverley Station, or the morons who surrounded and intimidated three middle-aged poppy sellers at Charing Cross Station in London.
But all those planning to disrupt Armistice Day on Saturday by mounting pro-Palestinian marches against Israel — marches that will inevitably turn a solemn anniversary into a day of rage.
It’s clear that none of these idiots has the slightest clue what Remembrance Day means or stands for. Either that, or they understand precisely the importance it plays in Britain’s national culture and they are deliberately setting out to desecrate it. I’m not sure which is worse.
It’s clear that none of these idiots has the slightest clue what Remembrance Day means or stands for, writes Sarah Vine. Pictured: Protesters in Trafalgar Square, London
Protesters surrounded and intimidated three middle-aged poppy sellers at Charing Cross Station in London last weekend
Other activists pushed and punched a 78-year-old veteran, Jim Henderson (pictured), during a pro-Palestine protest at Edinburgh ‘s Waverley Station
There is a level of wilful ignorance among these protesters —many of whom belong to the same generation as my children — that simply beggars belief. Like the students marching through Washington DC last week, chanting ‘there is only one solution, intifada, revolution’.
Do they not know about Hitler’s ‘final solution’? Do they not know by using that word ‘solution’ in the context of Israel they are effectively calling for a new Jewish holocaust? Or are they fully aware, and choosing their words accordingly? Either way, it’s utterly chilling.
Of course, young people have always been politically gullible. Even when I was young, in the 1980s, people would jump on and off bandwagons as fast as they jumped in and out of each other’s beds — pretty damn fast.
But Gen Z seem to have taken the concept of youthful ignorance to a whole new level.
Not only do they seem to lack any real understanding of history, they also appear to have no desire for one, either.
They genuinely think they know it all. They think they have nothing to learn whatsoever from previous generations — indeed, they seem to view us with utter contempt (see Greta Thunberg et al).
They exist in their own narrow generational echo-chamber, believing what others like them say on social media, forming their view of the world from ten-second clips on TikTok, picking and liking what chimes with their narrative, never stopping to question where this information comes from, why it’s out there, who generates it or what their motives are.
They take what they like, and dismiss what they don’t as fake news or propaganda, seemingly oblivious to the fact that they are being played by far more cunning and ruthless propagandists than the ones they so enthusiastically decry.
There is a level of wilful ignorance among these protesters —many of whom belong to the same generation as my children — that simply beggars belief, writes Sarah Vine (pictured)
Most worryingly, they distrust governments and mainstream organisations, preferring to put their faith in groups at best, dubious, at worst, criminal.
In Hamas’s case, people who use women and children as human shields, who deliberately embed themselves among civilian populations, who hide like cowards behind the corpses of those they claim to protect.
People like Mousa Abu Marzouk, Khaled Mashal and Ismail Haniyeh, three of Hamas’s most senior ‘political’ leaders, who are worth billions of dollars between them and live lives of unimaginable luxury while those they claim to protect languish in squalor.
Educate yourself, you say? Let me educate you, my pampered little snowflakes.
These people are not your friends; they should not be your heroes. If they ever achieve power beyond their current boundaries, they will not let you live your life in freedom, they will not allow you to practise your religion freely, or dress the way you want, or express your sexuality or gender in whichever way pleases you.
They will oppress you in the way they oppressed the people of Gaza, the way their allies oppress the women of Iran or the Yazidi in Syria. Viciously, with no mercy nor quarter.
To them, you are nothing more than useful idiots who, in your naivety and ignorance, are doing their work for them.
My heart bleeds for the innocent civilians of the Gaza Strip. But appeasement of these vile terrorists is not the answer. Just as it was not in the late 1930s, when Germany was extending its murderous tendrils across Europe.
Which brings me back to the poppies. It’s clear far too many young people today think wearing a poppy equates to supporting war. It seems almost unbelievable to have to point this out, but that is not the case. No one in their right mind is in favour of war, and certainly not anyone who has ever had the misfortune to experience it.
No, the wearing of a poppy is a simple, poignant symbol of respect for those who fought — and still fight — for our freedoms. Those who carried the trauma of war with them throughout their lives, those who died before the parents of today’s entitled, ignorant young protesters were even born. Young men and women like them who never got the chance to live even half their lives — but gave theirs so that we might.
So yes. Heed your own advice. Educate yourselves. Stop scrolling. Read a history book. And, above all, keep your hands off our heroes this Remembrance weekend.
My daughter, back from university for reading week, is intrigued to discover that according to my esteemed colleague, Nadine Dorries, her father, Michael Gove, ‘binds all the dark arts people together’.
Even more intriguingly, he takes not one, but two notebooks into Cabinet meetings.
‘Even better than John ‘two Jags’ Prescott,’ she says: ‘Dad ‘two notebooks’ Gove.’
Serena shows us fashion’s problem
It’s only when you see someone like Serena Williams photographed next to a raft of A-list actresses and celebrities that you realise how impossible it is for normal-sized women to live up to fashion’s standards.
At the CFDA Fashion Awards, held at the American Museum of Natural History in New York on Monday, she posed alongside the likes of Demi Moore, Kim Kardashian and Anne Hathaway.
Serena Williams attends the 2023 CFDA Fashion Awards at American Museum of Natural History on November 6
Their small stature and birdlike frames made them seem tiny compared with Williams, who loomed over them by comparison.
And yet she is a beautiful, healthy, average-sized woman. Is it any surprise many of us hate our bodies so much?
Rishi’s rolling out the wrong ban…
I can’t say I welcome Rishi Sunak’s finger-waggy incremental ban on smoking, announced in yesterday’s King’s Speech, which aims to ensure today’s youngsters never get to experience the illicit joy of a quick fag round the back of the bike sheds.
But even if I did approve of this head-boy nonsense, it won’t work. The idea that no one under 16 currently uses tobacco products because they aren’t allowed to buy them is poppycock.
The more you ban something, the more people want it. And besides, smoking is not the biggest killer in Britain any more, that’s obesity. We should ban sausage rolls, not cigarettes.
Police in York were astonished when they responded to calls about a man close to drowning in the River Ouse — only to find bystanders were too busy filming him and taking selfies to help the poor fellow.
Perhaps it’s time to introduce a new type of criminal offence: manslaughter by vanity.
Pout of order
Louise Redknapp has, we are told, gone ‘Instagram official’ with her new partner, a former Army officer called Drew Michael. Delighted for them both, of course.
But Redknapp is 49. She has a 19-year-old son (from her marriage to footballer Jamie).
Isn’t it a bit embarrassing to be posing on Instagram pouting and doing peace signs like a child?
Louise Redknapp has, we are told, gone ‘Instagram official’ with her new partner, a former Army officer called Drew Michael (pictured together)
It seems most unlikely that King Charles would neglect to invite his youngest son to his 75th birthday family celebrations next week.
Yet that’s the claim made by a ‘spokesperson’ for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex in response to suggestions Harry had turned down an invitation. Who to believe? Given Harry’s previous interpretation of facts, I think I know . . .
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