I visit the spot several times a year, on tbe cliffs near Pentire Head in north Cornwall, where those words were composed. There's a little plaque with those words overlooking one of the finest views you could wish to see.

Herewith lies my problem:

"If others choose not to wear a poppy, that's fine - it's one of the freedoms I mentioned above. But they'd better not get shitty with me because I do choose to wear one."

No-one is going to "get shitty" with you for wearing your poppy. I have no idea why you felt you had to express that so aggressively. The whole issue is with just a few poppy-wearers (as well as the gutter press and Theresa May) "getting shitty" with people who exercise the choice you say we have, or, in FIFA's case, being consistent in keeping a long-standing rule. It seems to me that the choice that people in the public eye have got to not to wear a poppy is coming with an awful lot of hawkish flak. Poppy fascism. I gave you examples, and there are plenty more. No-one that I know of ever craps on people who wear poppies.