Punkfolkrocker writes:

   "The likes of GUEST,AC... anti war protesters and
   rabid lefties... PC gone mad. They are ...a complete
   liability for whatever cause they are 'fighting for,
   and self defeating for whatever their objective may be.
   It really is unconforatable (sic) to know we are 'fighting'
   on the same side."

Somebody throw a bucket of water on this guy before he spontaneously combusts or bursts a blood vessel. I suppose even complete arseholes are entitled to their point of view but I'm intrigued to know what possible struggle we could be fighting on the same side in (don't bother to reply to that PFR... it's a rhetorical question).

I expressed my anger and outrage (at Joss Stone's musically dreadful and politically reprehensible effort) in language which was proportionate and reasoned even if it was blunt. This idiot seems to think that simple abuse and piss taking is a better course of action.

If people liked Stone's ludicrous mistreatment of Bogle's 'Green Fields of France' then I don't denounce or condemn them for that (poor musical taste isn't a crime and there are far worse sins) but the act of editing out the entire point and climax of the song was a political one and we should examine (and condemn) the motivations for that.

Everything happens in a context and the context of this incident is the Tory campaign that has been going on all year (launched by Michael Gove and Max Hastings) to rewrite history and portray WWI as a noble crusade against oppression and German military domination and for freedom and liberty. It was no such thing. The 850,000 British and Commonwealth troops who died (and the hundreds of thousands more injured and maimed) were not fighting for their own interests but for the selfish interests of their rulers: competing for markets and colonies. Eric Bogle's lyrics make the point that their sacrifice was in vain and this is what Stone and her collaborators have edited out of the song. This has been done for a political purpose, not just an artistic one, and that is what we should focus on.