Though I loathe the culture war centered around “putting the ‘Christ’ back into ‘Christmas'”, I’m definitely one who wants my children to know the reason behind every season, or in most cases…holiday.

This applies most especially to holidays as “abstract” as Veteran’s Day. Yesterday my older kid jumped with joy as she celebrated having THREE DAYS OF MORNING TELEVISION this weekend. Uncharacteristically, I held my tongue so as not to deflate her joy. I’ll save the posturing about Veteran’s Day for the actual day.

I’m feeling particularly attached to Veteran’s Day, this year, because of the 100th anniversary of the WWI armistice. I’ve always been masochistically fascinated by WWI. It never fails to send a sobering chill down my spine to reflect on the first war in which men were able to massacre acres of men without catching sight of each other. The wide-scale use of machine guns, tanks, airplanes and trench warfare that wasted a generation all because of agreements between insecure, rich white men trying to keep their place in the upper-class mastering the universe.

Talk about toxic masculinity.

WWI was the end of an era (for the Western, caucasian paradigm, of course) in which impersonal savagery replaced, well…personal savagery.

A pall of sadness always lingers over WWI media (books, poems, movies, stories.) And so much changed for men in that time – so many poets and authors emerged from the battles in France scarred for life…with new-found expressionism. Seems to me, WWI created a generation of self-reflection, as opposed to WWII which created the emotionally stoic “Greatest Generation”. It wasn’t just a triumph of good vs evil, allies vs. axis. it was the destruction of humanity.

Yesterday, in France, French President Emmanuel Macron declared at the ceremony marking the end of WWI, “Patriotism is the exact opposite of nationalism. Nationalism is a betrayal of patriotism. In saying ‘Our interests first, whatever happens to the others,’ you erase the most precious thing a nation can have, that which makes it live, that which causes it to be great and that which is most important: Its moral values.”

I couldn’t agree more.

Because nationalism (setting national gain over international citizenship) is what caused WWI and could easily cause another unthinkable world conflagration. This is what most scares me about Trump and what most scares me about my kids’ generation not having a grasp of history. I pray neither of my children ever has to endure a generational war (although let’s not forget that American forces are waging battles around the world, today).

So we have to teach our children the significance of world citizenship, collective good and personal sacrifice so that insecure, rich men don’t repeat history and take us down the path of self-destruction, again.

I don’t exactly know how to talk with my kids about such disturbing issues as massive loss of life in the name of freedom (and on behalf of European royals and leaders). But I’ll lecture my kids, tomorrow, and will embrace the eye rolls in the interest of world citizenship and patriotism. I’ll recite “In Flanders Fields” by John McCrae, even though it’ll mean nothing to my kids.

For now.

And I’ll keep doing so…to protect them.