Fuck the pompous BS on memorial day

[rumguy]

"I was always embarrassed by the words sacred, glorious, and sacrifice and the expression in vain. We had heard them, sometimes standing in the rain almost out of earshot, so that only the shouted words came through, and had read them, on proclamations that were slapped up by billposters over other proclamations, now for a long time, and I had seen nothing sacred, and the things that were glorious had no glory and the sacrifices were like the stockyards at Chicago if nothing was done with the meat except to bury it. There were many words that you could not stand to hear and finally only the names of places had dignity. Certain numbers were the same way and certain dates and these with the names of the places were all you could say and have them mean anything. Abstract words such as glory, honor, courage, or hallow were obscene beside the concrete names of villages, the numbers of roads, the names of rivers, the numbers of regiments and the dates."

Hemingway - A Farewell to Arms

[mopaul]

1. brutal........thanks for that......

READY TO KILL
TEN minutes now I have been looking at this.
I have gone by here before and wondered about it.
This is a bronze memorial of a famous general
Riding horseback with a flag and a sword and a revolver
on him.
I want to smash the whole thing into a pile of junk to be
hauled away to the scrap yard.
I put it straight to you,
After the farmer, the miner, the shop man, the factory
hand, the fireman and the teamster,
Have all been remembered with bronze memorials,
Shaping them on the job of getting all of us
Something to eat and something to wear,
When they stack a few silhouettes
Against the sky
Here in the park,
And show the real huskies that are doing the work of
the world, and feeding people instead of butchering them,
Then maybe I will stand here
And look easy at this general of the army holding a flag
in the air,
And riding like hell on horseback
Ready to kill anybody that gets in his way,
Ready to run the red blood and slush the bowels of men
all over the sweet new grass of the prairie.


Chicago Poems - table of contents

[salin]

2. Fine for you

but I like to remember to give thanks that my father survived the pacific arena in world war II (and one result of that is my existence), and to recognize those with whom he flew who did not return.

I don't see the need to disparage you for chosing not to do the same, but I don't understand the need to disparage me for doing so.

[rumguy]

5. I'm not disparaging you

you obviously need to go back and read the Hem quote again - cuz you totally missed the fuckin' point

[salin]

13. the tone of your thread and title

are disparaging. Didn't miss the point. Nor did I miss the 'dis. And it wasn't from Hemmingway.

[Bombtrack]

3. Is that eminem?

[rumguy]

4. yes

[Gildor Inglorion]

6. What's he doing, and who are the people with him?

I know very little about this person, so the significance escapes me, but I'd like to learn. Here's a poem I like by Robert Service that fits in the mood of your topic:

DON'T CHEER
Don't cheer, damn you! Don't cheer!
Silence! Your bitterest tear
Is fulsomely sweet to-day. . . .
Down on your knees and pray.

See, they sing as they go,
Marching row upon row.
Who will be spared to return,
Sombre and starkly stern?
Chaps whom we knew - s0 strange,
Distant and dark with change;
Silent as those they slew,
Something in them dead too.
Who will return this way,
To sing as they sing to-day.

Send to the glut of the guns
Bravest and best of you sons.
Hurl a million to slaughter,
Blood flowing like Thames water;
Pile up pyramid high
Your dead to the anguished sky;
A monument down all time
Of hate and horror and crime.
Weep, rage, pity, curse, fear -
Anything, but . . . don't cheer.

Sow to the ploughing guns
Seed of your splendid sons.
Let your heroic slain
Richly manure the plain.
What will the harvest be?
Unborn of Unborn will see. . . .

Dark is the sky and drear. . . .
For the pity of God don't cheer.
Dark and dread is their way.
Who sing as they march to-day. . . .
Humble your hearts and pray.

[Name removed]

7. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[rumguy]

8. no - my dad and grandfather are veterans

I think you missed the point.

[Gildor Inglorion]

10. Hi, Old Guy...welcome to DU!

I'm a veteran, and I admire the guy's attitude.

[datasuspect]

12. even if the original poster was angry . . .

not saying this person is or isn't, but what's wrong with that?

are you trying to pathologize the original poster rather than discuss the substance of their post?

[msmcghee]

9. Waging war can be either a . . .

tragic insult to all humanity . . or the most honorable vocation a person may undertake in their lifetime - and we have little control over how that will turn out. It is the same in the schoolyard. There are bullies and there are those who will be forced to defend themselves when attacked. They both fight but they are not the same. One is honorable and the other is despicable - and sometimes it's not so easy to sort them out.

In a democracy we determine whether the man glorified in Hemingway's statue turns out to be a hero or a war criminal. It is up to us to carefully elect leaders who themselves are honorable and who understand the ugly forces in human nature that could draw nations to war for political, not defensive reasons.

But that requires a media that does not see their profit in war rather than peace and a citizenry who themselves understand these things, or at least try to understand them - and I'm afraid our nation is at a severe deficit in both those areas. And because of that, life on earth is now in very serious danger.

[welshTerrier2]

11. David Dellinger

In Dellinger's final book, "Vietnam Revisited", the dedication read as follows:

"To all veterans of the Vietnam War; those who fought in it and those who fought against it."

Here's my two cents on "celebrating Memorial Day":

Too much of what I hear and see in the formal ceremonies celebrates war ... honoring those who served is not the problem ... but too often, what should be the central theme of Memorial day, gets lost while we do so ...

To read the names of those who served and what sacrifices they made may be a noble thing to do ... but we should never do so at the expense of trying to justify an unjust war ... too often the underlying theme is that the sacrifice a veteran made was done to "protect the country" ... are our troops in Iraq "protecting the country" ??? were we being "protected" from the North Vietnamese who were about to land on our shores with their invading armies ???

The truth is that most wars this country fought were fought for other than the advertised reasons ... so, I think it's fine to honor those who served ... i think it's fine to talk about a heroic act they performed ... but ultimately, I agree that most Memorial Day ceremonies fail to highlight the failures of our government in keeping our country out of war ... and they fail to highlight the greedy profits sought by those who benefit from war ... and they fail to highlight the damage our country does to thousands, often hundreds of thousands, of innocent victims of war ... and they fail to highlight those who fought against the war ...

So, we can honor our fathers and our grandfathers and the sacrifices they made ... but Memorial Day should be about humility ... it should remind us that wars are at best failures of diplomacy ... we should not wave our flag with pride while recalling such memories ... we should hang our heads while we remember that our species is capable of such colossal violence ...

[msmcghee]

14. Good points, well stated. However, you said . .

The truth is that most wars this country fought were fought for other than the advertised reasons ...

The Revolutionary War, War of 1812, WWI, WWII and the War in Afghanistan all seem to have some honor associated with them.

Certainly WWII was defensive and saved the world from a true tyrant, although if we had entered earlier against Hitler we might have saved several million lives. The Jews may have seen their homeland created in Germany and central Europe and would not have migrated to Palestine - and that festering sore that has threatened world peace for fifty years may not have occurred. Arab nations, instead of fomenting religious hatred against westerners might have adopted democracy on their own by now. Sometimes failing to go to war can be worse than the alternative.

Also, false advertising is bad, especially when it concerns war, but is that worse than war for the wrong reasons?

[welshTerrier2]

15. false advertising to hide the real incentive for war

i am not knowledgeable enough to argue about the wars from WWII and earlier ... perhaps you have a point there ... even with the wars you cited, I often wonder whether the ultimate decision to go to war, even a necessary and justified war, is driven by commerical interests ... a bank could have its foreign assets seized ... an oil company could lose its investments in oil fields ... the military-industrial complex needs to "show off" so that defense funds are increased ... terrorists are everywhere ... fear fear fear ... we need more money for massive, expensive weapons systems so we can fight them ...

so our government, always in the pocket of such wealth and power, hides its real motivation for war behind what might actually be a good reason to go to war ... and yes, this might very well have been the case in WWII ... as i said, I'm no expert on this but I do believe that this is the way the levers of power are pulled ...

and on Afghanistan, I would disagree ... I believe the war in Afghanistan, like the war in Iraq, was very much about oil and commercial interests ... we had spent years wooing the Taliban to install an oil pipeline across Afghanistan ... and this would have put billions in the pockets of a little multi-national call Unical ... are there terrorists there? maybe ... but I doubt we would be there today if someone wasn't making a buck from it ...

[msmcghee]

16. I think you are right . .

. . that commercial interests will always be a huge component of any war decision.

I think that's why it's so important to elect leaders who have a strong enough moral compass, and are smart enough, to help us sort out the morality of the question.

Instead, it seems that a huge number of voters in our nation see these questions merely as an opportunity to help their favorite RW politicians play politics. The flags and decals on all the cars - it's so much like the fervor preceding the college basketball playoffs or something. "Paint your face red, white and blue. Kill those damned liberal traitors, bomb the hell out of those fuckin' 'raquis. They're all better off dead." Sad.


Democracy requires an educated, intelligent electorate. Maybe that's why the RW fundies love home-schooling so much. Not to say that there are not good sensible reasons to home-school your kids.

So many layers, so many windows to look through.