SMOL: School off base in banning military uniforms on Remembrance Day

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What happens when you mix Remembrance Day with your run-of-the-mill woke, anti-military decolonizing principal or educator?

Answer: Sackville Heights Elementary School in Nova Scotia.

In classic Orwellian fashion, this Halifax-area school’s November newsletter — while claiming that “these days remind us of the courage and resilience of all who have served” and “warmly” invited “any service members who would like to attend” their Remembrance Day service — insisted that “to maintain a welcoming environment for all, we kindly request that service members wear civilian clothing.”

I have no doubt that every self-respecting serving member of the Canadian military and veteran from coast to coast to coast in Canada and overseas shares my belief on this topic. Simply put, wherever and whenever the Canadian uniform is not welcome, so, too, is the one who wears the Canadian uniform.

Perhaps not surprisingly, a surge of public outcry has forced the administration of this school to withdraw their policy. But the school still made the choice to figuratively pull the ideological trigger and “take the shot.”

Taking such a brazen point-blank shot from their woke machine gun straight at the military and veteran community’s heart may be simple. But retraction or no retraction, the damage to the surrounding military and veteran community cannot be undone anywhere near as easily.

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Sadly, this public school’s veiled contempt for our serving military, and for veterans like me, is only the latest woke-inspired hit-and-run raid on Canada’s national institutions and legacy.

No doubt, for the foreseeable future serving military and veterans will likely have to deal with further misinformed ideological attacks on our dignity, pride and legacy by the privileged woke elites in education, academia and elsewhere. As I brought up in my Remembrance Day piece last year, the push to decolonize Canada’s national war memorial is only a matter of time. Concurrently, attempts like this to purge Canada and the Canadian military’s signs and symbols from Remembrance Day will likely become more frequent, especially if we let them go unanswered.

So what about the implication in the school’s stated notice that the sight of a Canadian woman or man in military uniform might make the school’s ambience unwelcoming to certain students and staff?

My short answer — to use a classic army retort — “too bad, so sad.” It is simply not the military’s problem that lawfully worn and earned Canadian uniforms, badges, medals and accoutrements run contrary to certain individuals’ haughty ideological sensitivities. Citizen or not, being in Canada implies that all individuals respect lawfully mandated Canadian authorities whether they be our political institutions or our courts, police, school authorities and yes, our military.

Certain elements of the Sackville Heights Elementary school community are not the first to find the Canadian military uniform “offensive.” No doubt the same can be said of invading U.S. soldiers during the War of 1812-15, or Boers in the South African War of 1899-1902, or Germans and their allies in the two world wars, and the Chinese People’s Liberation Army and North Koreans in the Korean conflict — right down to the Taliban in the recent war in Afghanistan. Again “too bad, so sad” to all who might not like the sight of a Canadian soldier, sailor or aviator in uniform — past or present.

The generous suite of rights we have will quickly become meaningless if we do not correspondingly honour and respect our government’s organizations and institutions, including the Canadian Armed Forces.

And if the presence of a professional, law-abiding, courteous and respectful woman or man in a Canadian military uniform on Remembrance Day is so perturbing and disconcerting a sight to see, then there are about 193 other national alternatives around the world that the reticent Canadian citizen, landed immigrant, or refugee can freely weigh as an alternative to Canada, its rich colonial past, and the Canadian Armed Forces.

But dare I say that almost all national alternatives to Canada sport some version of a uniform-clad militaries that they might find equally, if not more, offensive.

Lest We Forget.

— Robert Smol is a retired teacher who served in the Canadian Armed Forces reserves for more than 20 years. He is currently completing a PhD in military history. Reach him at: rmsmol@gmail.com