Giving soldiers respect - NOT!
Obama has fallen into and is perpetuating the myth/lie that soldiers did not get the respect due to them when returning from destroying Viet Nam.
He’s piggy-backing on the popular urban legend that pro-military whiners love to trot out: soldiers were spit on by protestors – although there has never been a documented case, like the Halloween razor blades in the apples legend.
He is wrong. Whether they were spit on or not, soldiers were given the respect due from a nation whose directions were not being followed by soldiers or Congress and the Administration: soldiers decided to fight in an unpopular war despite knowing the majority of civilians stood firmly against it.
By focusing on how soldiers were treated by an unsupporting public, takes the focus away from the REAL problem. Soldiers were overwhelmed with their own searing pain, deep guilt, shock at the things they had done, been trained to do, with their riled up buddies – anti-human things, destroying their own humanity as they destroyed the lives and lands of others.
I guess it’s like sleep-walking – they must be in some sort of a trance to scamper so over their own humanity and inner knowledge of right and wrong while they are thundering wild with the herd.
Then when they have to be alone, the knowledge of the demons they became arise to give them what we now call PTSD (post traumatic stress) and what I call the attempt to rescue and heal their humanity, their souls.
More soldiers who ‘served’ in Viet Nam have committed suicide than soldiers who were actually killed in that country.
Some will argue they are killing themselves because they do not get the services here to deal with their demons, which is true. But the ONLY service that can really deal with those demons is the one that refuses to allow men to become killing machines in the first place.
I hate that term “served”. It is all part of the mighty powerful propaganda fed to our youth and our society, that they are “serving” us. Along with the propaganda that they are fighting for our freedom.
They are serving alright: serving the interests of corporations that want and need other people’s resources to make a fortune while determining our life styles in this country.
And fighting for the freedom of those corporations to exploit anything they want from other people’s countries.
Furthermore, Obama calls for us to respect soldiers when we do not respect the war they are fighting nor his orders to escalate and perpetuate that war.
It’s like calling for us to respect fathers even though they are raping and battering their kids; or husbands even though they are raping and battering their wives; or clergy and the pope even though they instrumental in oppressing women and poor people around the world.
For me, a title does not give one respect: his actions determine the respect that I give him. When he acts as a killing machine, he will NEVER get my respect: my deep sorrow, my compassion for the horrific mistakes he has made, my hand if he wants to reach toward healing but most of all my whole being’s knowledge to prevent him from becoming a soldier in the first place.
Now-a-days, criticizing and holding individuals and institutions accountable for their actions is much more widespread and acceptable then when I was growing up.
Back in the day, to speak bad against fathers, husbands, the pope was unheard of, ridiculed, a mortal sin even.
Today our patriarchal demi-gods are the military.
As a womon, I have no need or desire for a man to protect me. Yet the idea of husbands and fathers is systematically sold, shoved down womyn’s and children’s throats as necessary for not only protection but even for completion of a womon’s and child’s life.
We now know with great certainty that this is not true. Womyn and children do not need men to protect them from other men: we need men to stop behaving violently, towards everyone.
The military is to the country as men used to be to womyn: we think we HAVE to have a military to protect our country from the ‘enemy’ when far closer to the truth is that other countries have to protect their lives, lands, and resources from our military.
To stand up against the military is as much of a heresy as standing up against husbandry, fatherhood, and the pope used to be.
But surely it doesn’t take a genius to see what our mighty empire, loaded with the most funded & highly trained killing force inured to their own humanity, the most horrific nuclear and modern weapons – so many weapons we are able to supply over half the world with lesser weapons, still as anti-human and lethal as ever – that we knowingly and willingly use to conquer other human beings and their resources.
It doesn’t take amplification to hear the children crying, all over the world: crying in bewilderment for what can they fathom of war? Crying as their mother’s breast leak red, as their father’s eyes are wide, empty stares, as the pain in their own little bellies, their own bodies is so crushing.
It only takes a heart to hear the children crying – and a determination to work to change OUR COUNTRY, so we stop making the children cry.
He’s piggy-backing on the popular urban legend that pro-military whiners love to trot out: soldiers were spit on by protestors – although there has never been a documented case, like the Halloween razor blades in the apples legend.
He is wrong. Whether they were spit on or not, soldiers were given the respect due from a nation whose directions were not being followed by soldiers or Congress and the Administration: soldiers decided to fight in an unpopular war despite knowing the majority of civilians stood firmly against it.
By focusing on how soldiers were treated by an unsupporting public, takes the focus away from the REAL problem. Soldiers were overwhelmed with their own searing pain, deep guilt, shock at the things they had done, been trained to do, with their riled up buddies – anti-human things, destroying their own humanity as they destroyed the lives and lands of others.
I guess it’s like sleep-walking – they must be in some sort of a trance to scamper so over their own humanity and inner knowledge of right and wrong while they are thundering wild with the herd.
Then when they have to be alone, the knowledge of the demons they became arise to give them what we now call PTSD (post traumatic stress) and what I call the attempt to rescue and heal their humanity, their souls.
More soldiers who ‘served’ in Viet Nam have committed suicide than soldiers who were actually killed in that country.
Some will argue they are killing themselves because they do not get the services here to deal with their demons, which is true. But the ONLY service that can really deal with those demons is the one that refuses to allow men to become killing machines in the first place.
I hate that term “served”. It is all part of the mighty powerful propaganda fed to our youth and our society, that they are “serving” us. Along with the propaganda that they are fighting for our freedom.
They are serving alright: serving the interests of corporations that want and need other people’s resources to make a fortune while determining our life styles in this country.
And fighting for the freedom of those corporations to exploit anything they want from other people’s countries.
Furthermore, Obama calls for us to respect soldiers when we do not respect the war they are fighting nor his orders to escalate and perpetuate that war.
It’s like calling for us to respect fathers even though they are raping and battering their kids; or husbands even though they are raping and battering their wives; or clergy and the pope even though they instrumental in oppressing women and poor people around the world.
For me, a title does not give one respect: his actions determine the respect that I give him. When he acts as a killing machine, he will NEVER get my respect: my deep sorrow, my compassion for the horrific mistakes he has made, my hand if he wants to reach toward healing but most of all my whole being’s knowledge to prevent him from becoming a soldier in the first place.
Now-a-days, criticizing and holding individuals and institutions accountable for their actions is much more widespread and acceptable then when I was growing up.
Back in the day, to speak bad against fathers, husbands, the pope was unheard of, ridiculed, a mortal sin even.
Today our patriarchal demi-gods are the military.
As a womon, I have no need or desire for a man to protect me. Yet the idea of husbands and fathers is systematically sold, shoved down womyn’s and children’s throats as necessary for not only protection but even for completion of a womon’s and child’s life.
We now know with great certainty that this is not true. Womyn and children do not need men to protect them from other men: we need men to stop behaving violently, towards everyone.
The military is to the country as men used to be to womyn: we think we HAVE to have a military to protect our country from the ‘enemy’ when far closer to the truth is that other countries have to protect their lives, lands, and resources from our military.
To stand up against the military is as much of a heresy as standing up against husbandry, fatherhood, and the pope used to be.
But surely it doesn’t take a genius to see what our mighty empire, loaded with the most funded & highly trained killing force inured to their own humanity, the most horrific nuclear and modern weapons – so many weapons we are able to supply over half the world with lesser weapons, still as anti-human and lethal as ever – that we knowingly and willingly use to conquer other human beings and their resources.
It doesn’t take amplification to hear the children crying, all over the world: crying in bewilderment for what can they fathom of war? Crying as their mother’s breast leak red, as their father’s eyes are wide, empty stares, as the pain in their own little bellies, their own bodies is so crushing.
It only takes a heart to hear the children crying – and a determination to work to change OUR COUNTRY, so we stop making the children cry.
posted by Xan @ 5:05 PM
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