THIS time of year is always a difficult for the left. The weight of expectation to toe the line and join with the Establishment in paying tribute to British servicemen and women who have lost their lives in one of the many conflicts involving Britain since the first world war is extreme.

I have written about this issue in past years, and have regularly been invited to participate in debates on the subject on BBC Radio Scotland, as I was this past week.

It seems, increasingly, that when it comes to wearing the poppy there is a lack of tolerance for any dissent, particularly when it comes to people in the public eye.

The actress Heidi Miller came in for attack in the press and on social media most recently, for the “crime” of appearing on the Graham Norton Show without a red poppy pinned to her chest.

We don’t know whether Miller made a conscious decision not to wear the poppy or merely forgot — or whether it didn’t even cross her mind.

However we do know that some, such as Channel Four News presenter Jon Snow and professional footballer James McClean, have made a conscious decision not to wear a poppy.

Needless to say, both have come under attack for their stance, which, given that we are continually told that the troops died for our “freedoms” seems a contradictory state of affairs.

Surely the freedom not to wear a poppy, and the right not to be lambasted for it, is more in keeping with the sacrifice of the troops than the public witch-hunt that is the case at present?

McClean has a perfectly good reason for refusing to wear a poppy. He comes from Derry in Ireland, a town where people’s experience of British troops is definitely not one deserving of tribute.

This is the problem when you live in a country with a shameful history of colonialism and empire.

It makes it an impossible task to separate honouring the troops who died in its wars and conflicts from the morality of the wars and conflicts they died in, not to mention the suffering caused to millions across the world as a consequence of those wars.

The politicisation of the poppy and Remembrance Day has long been a shameful and transparent attempt to foment an unthinking consensus around Britain’s military history.

The marching bands, the pipes and drums, the martial music and solemn trumpets are designed not so much to lament the deaths of the countless number of young working-class men and women who’ve died in the nation’s wars but to extol the manner and cause in which they died.

The only honourable war this country has ever waged was the second world war against fascism. All the others have been driven by colonial and imperial plunder and advantage, fought not to secure our freedom but to crush the freedom of others.

On another level, no country that in 2015 allows its ex-servicemen and women, some physically and psychologically maimed, to rely on charity has the right to wallow in their plight once a year.

That said, we also have to acknowledge that thousands of families up and down the country have been touched by conflict and war, and therefore it is important that their pain is not made worse by openly disrespecting their loved ones who served and died.

Making sense of their loss requires that they are able to justify it, believe it was for something noble and worthy.

This is where I have a problem with the white poppy, which has become increasingly popular as the antithesis to the red poppy in recent years.

People who choose to wear it clearly do not do so with the objective of insulting anybody. However, this doesn’t alter the fact that it is widely viewed as a protest against the red poppy, which is recognised as the appropriate and universal symbol of remembrance in Britain.

Another problem with the white poppy is that it is worn as a symbol of peace and pacifism. I believe in neither. Justice not peace is the goal of conscious humanity, and justice is the product of struggle, up to and including war.

Ultimately, the only way to truly honour those who have died in the nation’s wars is to work to end the empire and colonial mindset that has held succeeding generations of politicians and governments in its grip.

Until that day arrives, I choose to wear neither a red or white poppy, while acknowledging that those who do are perfectly entitled to do so.

When it comes to the political class, however, we are talking a different scenario altogether.

With few exceptions, the parade of political leaders and Establishment flunkies who will be lined up in front of the Cenotaph in London this Remembrance Day, sporting their red poppies, would run a mile if they ever found themselves face to face with one of the troops they so hypocritically laud and lament.

There is no such thing as the national interest. The issue as ever is class.