I thought I might get this response until I started wearing one. I bought a bunch on line and then carried extras in my pocket to give away if anyone asked for one. The first two I gave away were to a woman in a convenience store. The woman behind the counter asked me where I got that. She had a British accent, I said I bought it on-line and asked her if she knew what it meant. She said she did, that both her and her husband were vets, and she’d really like to have a couple for them to wear. My wife is also a vet and I ran this article by her and she said she liked it a lot.

I think this is part of the problem with the whole poppy thing. People assume they know what they mean to everyone else—when they really are just assuming they know. I’ve been to several ‘peace demos’ (I know, really loaded language there) and seen old vets with chests full of medals taking part in them. Even in WWI and WWII there were ambiguities–and they were a lot more cut-and-dried than Afghanistan, Vietnam, Iraq, etc.