Inspired by reading dubious BBC "Have Your Say" websites

[vyvyanx]

When people say things like "People died so that you could vote", what historical event(s) do you think they are referring to?

(I ask because it struck me that I might have been barking up the wrong tree on this for a long time!)

Comments

[aldabra]

Suffragettes and WWII?

[mobbsy.livejournal.com]

I think of it on one hand as meaning the series of times when people have been killed while protesting for electoral reform and wider suffrage, for example the Peterloo Massacre (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peterloo_massacre), various Chartist (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chartism) riots and as aldabra says Suffragettes.

On the other, it's the times when democracies have gone to war to defend themselves against invasion by dictatorship. In Britain's case, World War 2 is the most obvious example.

[poetman.livejournal.com]

For us Americans it’s when we had to revolt against the evil British Empire. :p

One imagine that will stay in my head forever is that during the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989 they guy who stood by himself in front of a tank column. That is really showing bravery and sticking up for what you believe in.

[jholloway.livejournal.com]

I suspect that it's an appropriation of an American political commonplace, which is that the sacred blood of patriots etc. etc. was shed guaranteeing your liberties.

That said, people also died trying to prevent you from voting, and hopefully rather more of them.

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

The Universal Suffrage Movement, I suppose. As I understand it, the existence of representational government in the UK happened larrgely free of bloodshed (directly anyway), aside from the odd woman throwing herself under a horse.

[rochvelleth.livejournal.com]

I strongly suspect American War of Independence (and Civil War for minority groups) is usually what's being referred to in a general context... but in a specifically British context? Um, could it be a wild misunderstanding of the English Civil War? I fail to see how the suffrage movement fits the bill, though of course there have been some groups prepared to die for their voting beliefs. Or maybe they mean Jesus :)

[mikewd]

Almost certainly British people will be thinking of WW II, as that's still in living memory, and as mobbsy says, is seen as a democracy fighting against the threat of a dictatorship.

I doubt very much whether most people will be thinking of Suffragettes or other protests/riots when people got killed.