Memorial Day
Usually on Memorial Day I write an overwrought, maudlin piece expressing support for the struggles of our soldiers home from combat. It is an important issue for me, and one can never do enough to make people understand the implications of a world where you can be under fire one day, in a restaurant in Germany the next and home sleeping in your own bed the day after that. The human brain wasn't designed for the demands of modern combat, didn't develop any mechanism for dealing with a full year of 24-hour-a-day stress and fear, and simply can't adjust to such radically changed circumstances without extreme difficulty.But this year, I'm feeling substantially less charitable. It's hard to honor our "heroes" who, when engaged with a small group of lightly armed irregulars, call in massive air support and kill dozens of civilians. It's hard to ask people to salute those who risk so much for freedom when we chose to start the war in the first place. It's hard to demand people "honor their sacrifices" when they have laid waste to so much of the world, destroying so many lives in the name of a nebulous and arbitrary agenda. And should we look forward to a future Memorial Day when we unveil a glorious marble monument to our courageous drones?
It seems the world is in a dark, somewhat hopeless place today, and at least some of that can be laid at the feet of the American love of war, our virtual fetishization with all things military. Perhaps it's time for a holiday that celebrates men of peace, builds monuments for wars avoided and calls the roll of those, combatant and innocent alike, not killed in vain. Maybe on a Memorial Day sometime in the future, when a child looks upon a statue of a soldier and asks what it is, his mom might be able to tell him "men used to travel around the world killing and destroying because their leaders told them to". A time when we can look back on the brutality and barbarity of war as a solution to political and economic disagreements as something from an earlier, less enlightened era. When a country's great leaders will be recognized for the health, well being and education of their people and a country's great scientific advancements for curing disease and improving the lives of human beings.
In the meantime, today? A car race, a ball game, a steak and a beer. A warm spring day in the park. Not so much reflection - I've had all the war I can stomach for now, and I fear more is yet to come. The soldiers are still coming home from combat, still watching a surreal world through wary eyes, still struggling to adjust to a world without bombs, without weapons, without deadly enemies around every turn. They'll still need our support and understanding, and we'll still need to welcome them back. But today it occurred to me that much of the honor is gone, and if it ever really existed at all, the time for celebrating war is at an end...
posted by mikey @ 4:00 PM
6 Comments:
Don't lose sight of the "interests" that seem to be behind most wars these days (however strong or weak the ostensible reasons offered by those in command). I think that Americans' "love of war" is provoked and abetted by those who profit from war - often from both sides (I always think of Malvina Reynolds' song "the Bankers and the Diplomats are Going in the Army"). Being peaceable doesn't mean being weak, but it may mean some in the war machine make less money.
Yeah, I've been thinking about those drones. Their introduction is yet another step in our further "psychic isolation" as a nation from the rest of the world. We've always been a war lovin' bunch, as you note, but it seems to me that things have taking a more ominous turn since WWII. First there was our massive Cold War arming, then the introduction of the volunteer armed services ('War? What me worry? Someone else's burden...'), and now a bunch of Xbox warriors in Nevada taking out a handful of eeevildoers via joystick - or whatever the kids are using these days - and killing a whole bunch more noncombatants* in the process (*kids, women, old folks, and other such insignificants).
It gets easier and easier when death and destruction half way around the world looks as gosh darn fun as a computer game here at home - or like a fireworks display, once the photo editors at corporate media outlets remove all the unpleasant stuff sent home by the ever dwindling number of foreign reporters.
Despite that, best of Memorial Days to you, sir. I've been kinda-sorta following your comments for awhile (mostly at S,N!), and I am something of a fan of the joint effort put out by you and your personal demons. Lock your companions in the attic of your mind, and enjoy the day!
Still, a day off is not to be sniffed at. Easter celebrates the launch of a million molestations, but hey, there are chocolate eggs.
don't sweat it Mr. mikey.
in addition to slogging through the shit and surviving, you're a pretty good fuckin writer and I enjoy reading it when you're writing the hard stuff.
It always seems to me that there are two issues here; one; the young folks that are being sent with whatever justification, and acquit themselves as best they can in appalling conditions, if not individual bravery and when necessary, dying.
Versus the justifications and the reasons that those people are sent, usually by old white guys who have never been within earshot of weapons fired in hostility.
I probably did not describe those two different things very well, but it seems to me that here's the thing; one of those is worthy of honor in all conditions, and the other, not so much.
whether we, as humans, deserve honor is another issue entirely and we will need to address that subsequently.
However, Bubba can make the grannies dance, and whimsy lightens my heart.
Yeah.
Goddam right.
Smart people and dancing Grannies, and I take a look, heave a great big sigh, wipe the tears off my cheeks and put "that bullet" back in the box.
Thanks...
...being peaceable isn't a flaw, and having served isn't, either. Leave the bullet in the box and keep telling it like it is to those who are tempted, inclined, or coerced into solving the world's problems with war.
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