Poppy Day- the politics of remembering

Remembrance Day always conjures up strong emotions in me. I have no personal attachments to the celebrations, in so far as I don't have anyone in my family that I know to have fought in the "world wars" and the blind nationalist support for commemorating Canadian historical achievements that I espoused throughout my elementary and secondary schooling has long since waned. What's more, my work as a historian has sharpened my attentions to how people in the colonized parts of the world and their oppressed and racialized brethren experienced these "great" wars of the 20th century. It's clear to me (and many others) that governments (and Hollywood) exploit the collective emotional weight that this day bears, but by simply pointing this out, we do not erase the weight. 

I don't wear a poppy because I feel that it represents an exclusive remembering- one that excises from popular memory the lives and deaths of those not considered of the 'Great White North' (or civilization in general) and one that omits the histories of racial and class violence before, during and after the World Wars in the West. I do, however, remember on this day the sacrifices that were made during these wars, as well as the histories that were frantically written to capitalize on such loss.