Taylor Talks: Remembering Why They Gave Their Lives……

Romford Councillor David Taylor shares his monthly column.

This coming weekend, November 9^th, the country will pause to remember those who gave their lives fighting under the British flag. This truly patriotic moment is an important one for country, uniting us all in a moment of quiet reflection. 

For my generation and younger, the horrors of war are more something we read of in a book than something we experience. History classes at school were full of wars, from the 100 year war through to WW2 and the cold war. 

I grew up with war on the telly, following the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, our 24hr news channels would show footage that looked like the computer games we were playing. There wasn’t that same connection and horror that previous generations experienced, my life has never been directly threatened by war. 

That makes it even more important that we keep this memory alive and take a moment to reflect on what happened  and what people gave their lives for. For each of us, we will take away something different from this moment of reflect. 

Some will come away with a stirring sense of patriotism and a pride in Britishness, others will come away in grief at the continuing failure of humanity to live in peace with one another. 

For me, the more I read the stories of those who fought and the horrors of war, I realise that our nation has often been at the front of facing down oppressors, and that it is very British to stand up for the vulnerable. 

We have a history of oppression ourselves, and a history of making quite a mess of things. But we also have a history of doing good. I recently visited Hull and visited the home of William Wilberforce, a British Christian politician who convinced this country to use our wealth and power to outlaw and fight against slavery.

I long for Britain to rediscover this drive to be a beacon of hope. 

The horrors of WW2 are, in particular, increasingly relevant. Britain entered the war not because we were attacked, but because our allies were. We had made a pledge to protect Poland and when the Nazis marched in we stood up. Our entry into WW2 wasn’t about Britishness in the sense of protecting our nation so much as it was about protecting the more vulnerable from oppressors. 

I’ve been slowly making my way through the biography of Otto Frank, Anne Frank’s father, and it documents how Holland rapidly descended into fascism and racism following Nazi occupation. The oppression didn’t come solely at gunpoint, but also through rhetoric and legislation. Bit by bit rights were removed. 

Just days after occupation the Dutch banned religious slaughter, justified by the Nazis as “animal welfare”. Six months later and there was a cap on the number of Jews who could serve in certain positions, a quota system, to ensure the proper representation of the ‘native’ population. Jews only made up 6% of the population and so only 6% of university students, doctors, and other professions should be Jewish, to “prevent minorities being over-represented”. The Nazis continued to spread their rhetoric that Jews needed to be restricted as they posed a ‘security threat’ were ‘running dodgy businesses’ and that the natives needed protection from corruption. 

Things there turned nasty rapidly and much of this was done without much pushback from the local population. Whilst a strong underground would fight back, many simply either put their heads down and got on with life or even supported these rules designed to ‘protect the native population from dangerous migrants’. 

Eventually ‘voluntary emigration’ was encouraged.

Even after the Nazi occupation, Jews in Holland reported facing discrimination and suspicion, as a hangover from the rhetoric. 

It wasn’t just the Jews that the Nazis discriminated against. It was the black population, the LGBT population, the neuro-diverse and the disabled. 

We, Britain, didn’t think that this was acceptable and we took a stand against that discrimination. Our flag stood for freedom from oppression and the protection of minority groups. 

Whatever our faults as a nation, when confronted with fascism, we stood for freedom, for human dignity, and for the defence of those who could not defend themselves. 

The horrors of WW2 are unimaginable for many Brits, those my age lack the same personal link that others do. Our grandparents were hardly kids at the time, if even born, and so these horrors seem distant and unrepeatable. 

When we become detached from the past we become destined to repeat it, and what struck me from reading Otto Frank’s diary was the speed at which discriminatory legislation was put into place and accepted. It barely took 18 months for the Dutch to go from banning religious slaughter to ‘voluntary emigration’. 

And we, Britain, we stood against that.

When Britain declared war, Churchill said, “…it is a war, viewed in its inception, for the maintenance of the principles of freedom and justice.” In May 1940 he told parliament “We are fighting to save the whole world from the pestilence of Nazi tyranny and in defence of all that is most sacred to man.”. 

When our boys marched under our flag, and laid down their lives, they did so to fight oppression, discrimination, racism… fascism. We made it clear to the world that Britain was ready to put it all on the line to defend the vulnerable. 

This year, when we stand in silence before the memorials of those who gave their lives, I encourage you to think of the why.

The man and women who fought beneath our flag did so to oppose tyranny, racism, and cruelty disguised as patriotism. The truest way to honour them is to make sure those poisons never take root here again.  

Patriotism, Britishness itself, should mean courage, compassion, and the defence of freedom for all. When the bugle fades and the silence falls, let it not just be a silence of memory, but of promise. A promise that we will not forget what they fought for, nor fail to stand for it ourselves.

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