On being a Mennonite and Skeptic on Remembrance Day

While I was growing up, solidly ensconced within the modern Mennonite world, nobody I knew ever wore poppies in early November. In high school we wore buttons in lieu of poppies that said "To remember is to work for peace." I got a few nasty looks in the mall while wearing that, but nobody ever confronted me. Certainly different than the stories of early Anabaptists I had grown up with, from the Martyrs Mirror, like Michael and Margarethe Sattler who were tortured to death for their refusal to follow the religious party line in the 1500s, or the stories about how my ancestors had to move to Canada to escape religious persecution part of that being forced to do military service against their beliefs of pacifism.

Let's face it - teenagers can be pretty opinionated and all fired up about things without the understanding that experience brings, and I was no different. In a Mennonite school with Mennonite friends and Mennonite family there were no social consequences of any sort to speak out against militarism on Remembrance Day. But as I moved out of my heavily Mennonite circles and gained non-Mennonite friends in the wider world, Remembrance Day became a difficult thing for me. I had friends who were pro-military, even friends who had gone to Royal Military College or had served in the armed forces. It was just easier to avoid all discussion of topics relating to this and my strongly-felt pacifism around Remembrance Day rather than potentially offend friends or coworkers through either my not explaining my beliefs very well or through them misunderstanding it.

Remembrance Day may, once upon a time, have been a time for thinking of those who died in wars, but in many ways it has become co-opted and turned into "Glorification of the Military" Day with not wearing a poppy, not participating in the day's observations having become synonymous with being anti-military. There are heated accusations made that not wearing a poppy is equivalent to spitting on the graves of the veterans and that disagreeing with the popular sentiment on this subject makes one unpatriotic and the next thing to a criminal.

As I get more and more involved in the skeptical movement I find that that values of pacifism which I hold dear are rarely talked about. If the "Great Tone Debate" currently cycling through the skeptic community is all about whether or not religion is on or off the table for what as skeptics we can question, then these question about patriotism, militarism and pacifism which come up around Remembrance Day are even further pushed out of sight.

Were I to be as derisive and mocking of the militarism and anti-pacifist sentiment that I see around Remembrance Day as many outspoken atheist skeptics are towards religion, would they be supportive of this disrespect of veterans and the military? Or would they call me out for being a jerk as they themselves get called out by the "Don't Be A Dick" crowd? I cannot see the P.Z. Myers and Christopher Hitchens of the world being supportive of using their same attitude in the debate on Remembrance Day issues as they do towards religion.

The "Great Tone Debate" debate on religion doesn't really bother me. I am religious, though not strongly, but I don't think that the topic should be off the table for skeptics. Nor do I feel that the derision of the more strident atheist skeptics is called for - you can still disagree with religious beliefs and say they are wrong without being a jerk to those who hold those beliefs. (Though, honestly, sometimes I think that some of the religious right are just begging to be called idiots.)

But I have much strong feelings and opinions about Remembrance Day. As oppressed as the outspoken "New Atheists" (for lack of a better term) feel about not being allowed to speak out against religion, I feel just as oppressed in my ability to speak out against the militarism equals patriotism that surrounds Remembrance Day and indeed permeates North American culture. To me, the two situations are directly analogous and comparable.

This is why I support the rights of Myers, Dawkins, Hitchens, etc... to say what they want about religion, even if I don't necessarily agree with them or their tactics; and it saddens me that I do not feel similar support from the skeptic community for expressing my own views on the topics surrounding Remembrance Day.