The announcer's first announcement was that last Thursday was Veteran's (really Armistice, but I'm sure that's a piece of trivia he didn't know) Day. He asked all the veterans to raise their hands so that we may honor their sacrifice, since they fought so that we could be here tonight.
Really? We had a Vietnam vet at our table, long an anti-war activist, and editor of the local Peace newsletter. What a surprise it was to him to find out the REAL reason the US invaded, bombed, napalmed, and Agent Oranged that small country, killing 3,000,000, poisoning millions more, (including babies still born with horrible birth defects ), torturing and herding into concentration camps civilians, did I leave anything out?
Those damn "gooks" were trying to prevent us from playing trivia!
And no doubt the terrorists have the same goal!
The lionization of veterans is more meaningless ritual, like voting, but the purpose of the mandatory genuflection is the legitimization of war and military participation. Even anti-war people feel pressure to bow and "support our troops".
Bullshit.
They don't support the Viet Vets Against War, and they don't support the Iraq Vets Against War. Look at what happens when our heroes speak out or demonstrate against war.
All of a sudden, they're no longer heroes.
I'm pretty picky too. I only support veterans that have repented and now are against war. Like Smedley Butler and the Iraq veterans against war.
The smug, self-righteous veterans who feel no sorrow or shame for what they've done most certainly do not deserve any honor or respect.
7 comments:
The real goal is to make following orders (serving) noble - more noble than thinking for yourself. Being an authority is getting a bad name - history teachers tell lies, clergy are pedophiles, wars are rackets, etc.
To most Americans, war is like Trivial Pursuit, just a part of life. The glorification of war and the glorious role of America in it is ingrained into them from birth.
While America exists there will never be peace.
Americans used to be strongly anti-interventionist. Lots of immigrants came here to escape forced conscription in their own countries.
It was really hard to get them to support joining WW1 and WW2, for example. It took concerted and skillful propaganda, along with attacks on the Lusitania and Pearl Harbor.
But decades of propaganda, coupled with immigration policies that favor fascist sympathizers, plus the effect of decades of military brats, spawned by the millions and let loose into civilian society, makes the current US population hateful and warlike.
Although it still took 9-11 to get the enthusiastic flag-waving blood hunger of most Americans.
Lots of the warmongers are angry that Martin Luther King day exists. I tell them to think of it as a Peace Celebration Day, but it just makes things worse. Maybe we could rename it like Armistice (Peace) got renamed War.
And Martin Luther King has really been cleaned up for mass consumption.
You always hear that he had a dream, but not that his dream was not just the end of racism, but the end of war and imperialism.
Have you ever read his Riverside speech? I posted it a while back-
http://wagelaborer.blogspot.com/2008/01/martin-luther-king-against-vietnam.html
Why oh why aren't there millions more Yanks like you ??
The world would be a so much better place.
Another thing that pisses me off is that everyone has rank now. When did they switch from being policemen to being officers? I bet they would say it was because some were women and they were being PC. What is wrong with just police - are they public servants or public commanders? You don't hear nurses called nursemen or nurse officers or store clerks being called store officers - don't know why the "men" was needed in the first place. Here the auctioneers are all called Colonel Something-Or-Other. A new guy started out and I was going to tell him to give himself the title of General, but he is kind of a thief like the others so I stayed witless.
Post a Comment