„Junge Menschen müssen verstehen“: Grabwarnung, da nur ein Drittel der 18 bis 24-Jährigen die Bedeutung des VE Day kennen
https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/uk/third-of-18-24-year-olds-know-what-happened-ve-day/
Von tylerthe-theatre
„Junge Menschen müssen verstehen“: Grabwarnung, da nur ein Drittel der 18 bis 24-Jährigen die Bedeutung des VE Day kennen
https://www.lbc.co.uk/news/uk/third-of-18-24-year-olds-know-what-happened-ve-day/
Von tylerthe-theatre
33 Kommentare
I mean, is knowing the exact date of the German surrender as important as knowing the context?
I’m sure most 18-24yr olds know that roughly 100 years ago we, along with our allies, fought against the Axis and won, and they probably have a vague idea as to why we were at war.
Most people couldn’t name an important date during the Napoleonic wars or the civil war, but they probably know those things happened.
Why is an intense knowledge of specific WWII battles and leaders required? Or it just to validate people waving a Union Jack once a year?
Ironically a significant portion of those waving the flag will vote reform at the next opportunity.
> Luke Tryl, More in Common’s UK director, told LBC the polling indicates that VE Day is “in danger of losing its relevance for lots of people”.
It is not exactly surprising that as time goes on people hold the end of a war with less relevance. My Grandad could tell me first hand what it was like hiding in a bomb shelter when the luftwaffe were dropping bombs. The generation before me had Dads that were extremely traumatised by the war.
My dad can’t do the same for my kids obviously. So it leaves living memory and becomes history. My kids could barely even imagine what a war would be like, I can only imagine it through second hand stories. And I am very thankful for that.
> Perhaps the most eyebrow-raising result, though, came when we asked about the D-Day landings in June 1944.
> One in ten 18-24 year-olds, and one in twenty Brits overall, told us that Operation Overlord, which launched the Allies’ successful invasion of Nazi-occupied France, was led by Captain George Mainwairing – the fictional Home Guard commander in the seminal BBC comedy Dad’s Army
A minority of people not knowing the name of the individual who led the invasion and having a guess from the available options is not „eyebrow raising“, in my book
Makes me wonder what the other options were and the precise questioning of the VE day question, because it’s clearly a poll designed to just let them write this garbage article.
The only disturbing parts of WW2 revisionism that has become mainstream is that the US pretty much solely won the war in Europe, and the Nazi’s and their collaboraters were vastly better and more humane than the Soviets (or even worse the Soviets and Nazis were allies wtf). Both of which are insane positions to take, but that is how US media loves to present it.
I’m more surprised that any 18-24 year-olds have even heard of Captain George Mainwairing. What Gen Z is watching dads army in 2025?!
As do the vote the racists in lest we forget brigade
How does knowing the name of a D-Day commander help one to understand Hitler’s rise to power, the horrors of the holocaust, or the modern day political context of geopolitics?
Or am I misunderstanding what the important lessons from WW2 were
Literally no one knows anything about history, most people only know who King Henry VIII is, the “winners” of WW1&2 and they know about 1066 that’s about it.
I listened to some Year 10 children being interviewed on the radio this morning about VE Day. One lad knew that it had something to do with “some European countries fighting other European countries and winning” and a girl said that they had read a really good poem about the war in school but couldn’t remember what it was called or who wrote it! I felt very sorry for the interviewer!
Personally I think it’s more disturbing that people engage in holocaust denialism in the way that Rowling does without much backlash.
I am curious how well this is taught in school.
I mean when I did history a while ago we only seemed to go over things from the medieval era and backwards, nothing about WW2.
Yes, because they’re the demographic who have forgotten the lessons of World War Two and are out voting for Reform en masse /s
Yeah, okay grandad, just let me know next time you need help sending an email.
The thing we should be concerned about are the veiled attempts at clear ageism and prejudice against young people from the old. „BuT tHeY dOn’T kNoW wHo LeD oPpErAtIoN oVeRlOrD?!“
It’s baffling that more emphasis is put on „young people don’t know this and it’s a worry, we need to educate them“ than „young people have a declining standard of living compared to what we had and are unable to even buy a home between the age of 20-30, we should help them“.
It’s this kind of stuff that I just give up and say „oh fuck off“ because I’m out of energy even trying to argue with them.
What I find hilarious is that there’s a lot of old people who were part of the baby boom generation post-WW2 who have a lot of reverence for their parents generation who fought the war, but never fought a war themselves. And that same generation is practicing ageism and prejudice against my generation who lets face it; WW3 doesn’t seem very far away. I’m going to remember all these snarky remarks and „young people are so lazy, they don’t do or know anything“ next time I’m potentially sat in a freezing cold trench in the pissing rain getting a grenade dropped on my head by a drone while these old fogies are nice and warm jerking off over their WW2 history books. Even my grandad had a literal book on operation overlord and an autobiography of Bernard Montgomery.
Me, along with my friends, all aged 20 – 25, are big WWI history nerds. I passed every history exam in secondary school with As. I still wouldn’t be able to tell you who ran Operation Overlord in WWII.
We know the significance of it. We understand what happened. We understand what VE day meant for democracy, and its‘ impact upon the world. We just wouldn’t be able to tell you who the captain of the fifth Northumberland fusiliers was during any given battle, because then you’re getting into specifics that isn’t covered at a secondary education level. Or, it isn’t retained as much as the big facts of the D-Day landing are, the stuff that is taught to us to help us pass history exams.
That’s like asking a 20 year old in 1966 (aka, a boomer) who led the the British side during the Battle of Schuinshoogte (80 years prior to 1966) during the First Boer War. They wouldn’t know.
It was Major General George Pomeroy Colley. If you’re interested.
I wonder if young people actually do understand their own lives and their likely trajectory better than they get credit for and old glories are just a reminder that the past matters more to some than their future.
Personally, I’d like to see less importance placed on key dates and more about the actual Nazis and their ideology and the whys of why it was, and remains so dangerous. So many both here and in the US can’t recognise an actual Nazi salute, or are happy to handwave one away when they see one, for example, and that includes a lot of the older generation who will be tut-tutting this.
This is very worrying. We should increase the number of Dad’s Army repeats until understanding improves.
Its almost as if people dont live there lives focusing on a wars that happend several generations before theirs.
“ whats happening over here in Gaza, to the people there? “
“ shout up about that, we need to learn about 80 year old stuff, so the slaughtering doesnt happen again!“
“ ohhh „
Let’s face it, most people barely remember the history that they were taught in school if they have no interest in it, and WW2 is much less of a cultural touchstone than it once was, so it doesn’t get into people’s heads through that general background either.
Make it a bank holiday and people would be more willing to learn about it, shrove tuesday goes reasonably ignored due to it being a normal day while everyone knows the importance of Christmas and Easter due to them having the day off.
Every war memorial says on it „Lest we forget“. But, we have forgotten. Brexit made that clear.
I think the hypocrisy of the far right’s emphasis on VE commemorating a war to defeat fascism confused them
1945 was 80 years ago. If you ask the average 56 year old today about the First World War they might be similarly hazy. But when they were 20 in 1998, the First World War was 80 years prior as well. Perhaps some of this is the passage of time and how generations inevitably wind up being more and more separated from these things. A 20 year old in 1998 however was only 53 years away from the end of the Second World War. So their parents and teachers and everyone lived through it. Their grandparents may have been in the First World War though. Today, grandparents are the children of the vets of the Second World War.
This is not to compare the impact or importance of either war or whether we should make more efforts to reinforce certain lessons. I just wouldn’t be too surprised if it turns out that generationally this is how long it typically takes before history becomes less common knowledge.
Tbh do the older generations. Most people seem to back appeasement with russia so are we really upset about 18-24 yo knowledge?
Ugh. Boomers insisting on young people „understanding the significance“ of VE Day while they read the paper that supported the Nazis and bite for the people sounding most like them too.
I saw an AI generated banner on the front of my local pub for VE day today so at least they’re doing their part.
I left school some fifteen years ago so take this with a pinch of salt. We were taught about the wars, but I can’t remember us ever being taught anything specifically about VE day. Especially not the people involved. It’s sad, and we should know our history, but at least in my old school it wasn’t taught either. We were taught obviously the Blitz, rationing, the Holocaust, Anne Frank, etc, but that was about it.
We need to know our history or we *are* going to repeat it.
The end of the war is not the important thing to take lessons from. The rise to power of Hitler and other dictator figures from other countries around that time, the tactics they used to gain popular support, and the ways in which they consolidated an absolute grip on power… those are the lessons we should remember.
The irony is when you attend an annual remembrance day parade and the overwhelming majority of people there are either in the Cubs, Scouts, Brownies, Sea Cadets, Army Cadets or Air Training Corps and their families.
There are nowhere near as many adults there who don’t have kids in the parade.
Or at least that’s what it’s like at the two remembrance day parades near me.
The rise of far-right rhetoric is more worrying to me.
A massive percentage of 18-24 year olds either weren’t born here or were born to parents who weren’t born here. Of course they don’t know (or don’t care) about the significance of VE Day. We’ve diluted our culture by massive amounts for a couple of GDP points.