This week a few of us in the Crikey office shared our feelings about Anzac Day — the best and worst of a day that’s become incredibly fraught in Australian politics and discourse. We asked for your thoughts in return, and you delivered.

Below is a selection of the considered personal reflections we received.

Re: “Crikey roundtable: how should we feel about Anzac Day?”

Kate Olivieri writes: Anzac Day is my personal peace protest. I didn’t realise until I was in my twenties that it wasn’t considered a lefty thing to attend Anzac Day services. I was keen to attend the dawn service in Dili — I like to go wherever I’m living, I’ve been to services in Broadwater, Lismore, Armidale, Bulimba, and Canberra as well — and a bunch of other volunteers said sheepishly they’d never been. A former boss, whom I really respect, said she’d never met anyone with my view.

It’s not only that I have family members who have served, although that is why my parents took me when I was a kid, and partly why we still go. It’s the fact that it makes it real and I see what people felt they had to do. It’s the fact that my grandparents met working in intelligence and records suggest they never met, except one marriage and nine children and 20 odd grandchildren later, say otherwise. The Official Secrets Act still took its toll. It’s my uncle who was a Vietnam vet, the most jolly and fun person, who died of esophageal cancer, as so many do. It’s my friend, now retired, my age, who’s been spat on in Anzac Day marches.

Why is the personal meaning so discounted? In criticisms I see that connections to racism and sexism are put forward as reasons that the day is bad. But a day to be reflective and mark service people’s contribution is not inherently wrong — it’s our broader society that means this is part of the problem. We need to bring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people’s voices in, let everyone tell their stories, be more open and honest about all of our conflicts, the frontier wars.

Ben Birchall commented in Tuesday’s Crikey on the deep power of non-religious connection at dawn. I find that services inevitably are religious, but this is the one in the year as an agnostic that means something to me.

My Anzac Day is for the women, the men, the young ones who think they’re getting an adventure, the Vietnam vets who didn’t know, the grunts, the mechanics, the admin workers. The families left behind. The returned who can’t take it any more, who can’t find work, who end it all. The intelligence workers whose stories can never be told. For the people who do what they think is right.

Piss on it if you like, say it glorifies war. I know what I’ll be thinking of when I’m crying again at 5am on Anzac Day next year, thinking of all the young men, all the young women, all around the world, in all the wars ongoing. It won’t be glory.

It’ll be my peace protest.

Noel Gilbert writes: For me the meaning of Anzac Day has morphed into an exercise of public unity from a simple act of patriotism. From the age of ten I have attended Anzac services first as a member of the Cubs and Scouts, and later in support of others needing assistance.

In the post-Vietnam War recriminations that permeated public consciousness, the treatment of our servicemen and women by press and the RSL led to a deep resentment for the blatant hypocrisy displayed by the so-called custodians of Anzac traditions. The following 30 years I confined my participation in Anzac ceremonies to the occasional support of a willing family member. The next decade saw my involvement in a volunteer organisation request my help and participation once again.

Yesterday’s ceremonies for me display and engender a sense of community. Our small town has its own unique ceremony with school children, guest organisations and the services people and volunteers far outnumbering the service personnel both past and present who march and contribute to our sense of community. For me, now, the spirit of Anzac is embodied in three generations of my family joining with our community to show respect for those whose sacrifices should be remembered.

Roger Kelly writes: The eleventh hour. I can’t recall when I last attended a Remembrance Day service. I have always been conscious of the 11th hour on the 11th day in November but it was something I did on my own and I have always assumed that most other people did the same.

Last year I felt that it wasn’t good enough to do this on my own. I realised that contained in the spirit of the event, is that it needs to experienced with others and be seen happening by others, for a bunch of very healthy reasons.

In a time when it often seems that we are scratching for opportunities of ethical common ground, this is a universal “touch base” moment that becomes all the more valuable ipso facto. So I got off my arse and went.

I parked the car near the lake, behind the tennis club and walked the path towards the memorial. It was a brilliant day and the lake was looking as just good as it gets. The bowls club was swarming with white hats and the tennis club was neatly at rest… A group of 20 or so children from three different schools joined me crossing the lawn. Some folk were stirring from the shade of the trees to join the circle. There were three senior police attending in full uniform.

I recognised that feeling of belonging and “village” that keeps me in Benalla. 

The microphone started and we fell quiet. A prayer, then “there will be a short wait for the fire siren to signal the start of the minute’s silence”. The siren sounded out of sight — once — for us and with us. Why did it sound like an air-raid warning? Respectful but relaxed, we all briefly shared the same thoughts. It flashed through my mind (as most things do nowadays) that as a teenager, I might have once, in my igno-arrogance, found this boring. These young faces didn’t show it.

The siren sounded all-clear. In Flanders Field was read over the microphone, taking ownership of the moment. There was a formal wreath-laying followed by an invitation to others who had bought flowers. I saw a woman with a young girl walk to the monument. They laid flowers together and as they straightened the woman pointed to a spot on the list of names of the fallen, showing the girl. She was smiling. I was moved. My friend next to me said that was his mother and daughter. I asked who they were pointing out and he explained about an uncle who was killed in Fromelles.

The whole thing might have been 15 or 20 minutes out of my day only. Even as I walked away I knew that all that had taken place today will stay with me forever. I am so pleased that I went — I can’t explain it. It was one of those unexpected moments in life I guess.

On the lake path, half way back to the car and right on cue, two Kookaburras swooped past into a tree and sang out loud as soon as they landed.

What can I say… I won’t forget.

 

Send your comments, corrections, clarifications and cock-ups to boss@crikey.com.au. We reserve the right to edit comments for length. Please include your full name.