So we went to my fiance's sister's High School graduation ceremony on Friday night. Christ it was long. And not the diploma part--they actually did that pretty quick considering there were 500+ kids graduating. Just so many speeches and shit thiat is so insignifigant when you consider that its high school.

Anyway, the main thing that got me thinking was that the speech by the class president and then later by the school's principal both made a lot of indirect and direct references to the war in Iraq, the war on terrorism, "defending our freedom", that sort of thing. There was even a part where if you had a relative in the war you stood up and there was applause/gratitude, etc.

The faculty and graduates all carried small American flags.


Then during the awards portion, this kid won the "Superintendant's Award" or whatever--basically he is voted the most outstanding student by all of the teachers at the school and the presenter (a dude from the school board) made a point to say that this kid was active in the High School Democrats, held very strong political beliefs that he expressed but also did so in a very respectful manner.

I dunno, I dont really have any family connection to the war and if I wasnt a news junkie, I doubt I would even be aware that it was going on, but for these kids--some of whom I would suspect will be over there pretty soon or have a friend or family member involved already, this shit is real.

This is indeed Life During Wartime.

Ah, fervent nationalism disguised as patriotism.

god bless america

patriotism isn't very christian.

i should have used my high school speech as class president for political fun.

instead i just talked for less than 30 seconds saying 'well i know you all want to get out of here as much as i do, so i'm going to keep this quick.'

my little bro is class pres also and is making a speech in a month...we'll see what he decides on.

he should call his speech "Bling During Wartime" and talk about how much jewelry he has.

I think you guys are missing the point.

what is the point?

that whether it affects you personally or not, there is some shit going on that is affecting a lot of people--especially young people.

I guess its easy to be cynical or make fun of the whole situation.

Yeah. And my school has all that PLUS extra on the Jesus factor.

Generally I dig both of you, but GET THE FUCK OVER YOURSELVES.

We all have different ways of expressing our feelings/support for the military in spite of how fucked we think the war is - both the justification for and the execution thereof.

This is heady shit that's not to be made light of. If someone wants to come correct with fact-based opinions on the country's mismanagement of foreign policy, terrorism and like that's cool and I'll probably agree or find merit with the lion's share of your argument.

But don't make lazy, half-assed, sub-Michael Moore digs any time someone brings up the war just because you've been trained like Pavolv's fucking dog to do so by the "Air America" set and your continuous-loop viewings of "Loose Change."

We need a standing o emoticon, stat!

Only this guy could cut a better promo than that.



Damn Chad, that belongs under the masthead at every newspaper in this country.

Truly fucking awesome.[/img]

Yail, I understand what you're saying. I am not directly linked to anyone over there anymore except for a HS and a college friend that are there now, but I rarely talk to those guys. I did have one of my good friends over there a year or so ago. He has since been back and he RARELY talks about it. He does the same thing my grandfather did about WWII. Just talks about some general war stuff but nothing specific. Until the other night that is.

He started talking to me about some stuff. We were talking about how sometimes you regret, post facto, the decisions you make. I told him that one night if I had just decided to go to the grocery store instead of going the back way home I would most likely not have gotten that 200 dollar speeding ticket. This started him talking. He told me that two of his friends that were in FAST company (a quick response team typically for anti-terrorist situations like going into embassies that have been hijacked and killing the bad folks and getting the good folks out) were out on a call. He said that there are about 5 -6 dudes in a truck at any given moment. Normally you choose where you sit and just decide to stay there and it becomes a habit. But, for whatever reason, one of the guys decided he wanted to switch with the other. The other was my friend's friend. This is the conversation that took place:

Patrick: Yeah, so they decided to swith places and my friend got shot.

Joe: Well...ummm...did your friend get...umm permanently damaged?

Patrick: Yeah. He died. He got shot in the face.

That short conversation hit me like a truck. I just never really hear about those stories from the people I know in the military that have served in a "Hot LZ".

I think that those that say that saying you support the troops but not the war are stupid and illogical are dead wrong. My respect for my friend and those that I know that have served increased a lot in that moment. It jus made me realize that I am not designed for the things that they have to and choose to do to "protect our freedom" regardless of the specifics of the war itself.

I know many will turn this into a "blah blah blah hate bush if it wasn't for him these people wouldn't die" thing, but that's not the point. It's less general and blame casting and more so getting a grasp that this is really happening. The way in which war is conducted these days it is easy for someone like myself to not think about it and avoid it whether conciously or subconciously. I think it is good to remain mindful of the things that are going on.

I can see what Yail and Meatbone are saying. I find for myself that it's easy to dismiss that it's real people going over there and having to deal with horrific things on a daily basis. Partly this is due to my opposition to the war itself and Australia's involvement in it, but also because we have such a small number of people over there - I think it's 500 max. I'd imagine that I would have a whole different experience of it if I were living in the US just because I would probably know someone who was serving/had served.

But it's something I've been thinking about a little in the last few days. Not sure how much of this has been on the news elsewhere in the world, but East Timor has pretty much descended into chaos in the past week so the government has sent over about 2000 troops at this stage - not a huge amount, but then out military is pretty tiny. It's been reminding me of the stories we would hear about soldiers who had been sent there after the independence ballot in 1999 and how so many of them had had a lot of trouble dealing with what they saw happening, with not a whole lot of post-service help from our military establishment either, it has to be said.

It is a bit of a weird time to be growing up. In a way it doesn't really seem comparable to what I know of Vietnam because it seems pretty easy to put Iraq/Afghanistan/East Timor to one side and get on with your life, particularly here since only one Australian soldier has died over there, but not in combat. But at the same time there is this knowlegde in the back of your mind that, hey, we are actually fighting several wars/peacekeeping operations/whatever you want to call them

first of all, if you haven't "been there" or "done that", you have room to talk. Nobody is forcing you to be americans. People are dying everyday to support your freedom, your liberties, your rights as americans. It's not a Bush thing or a 'Republican' thing...it's an american thing that affects all americans, regardless of political affiliation, regilous beliefs or whatever of cause you choose to hide behind.

Cool. I'm glad a couple people got my point.

There is hope for you humanoids after all.

I have never listened to "Air America" and I don't know what "Loose Change" is.

The point to me is that highschool graduations shouldn't be a place for anyone to push politics...it should be about a bunch of kids who have accomplished something awesome. Nobody should be bringing up patriotism or the war because it has nothing to do what is actually at hand there.



Now perhaps I am completely misunderstanding/misinterpreting this and people were not being political at all and just mentioning the war to be nice. In which case, whatever I guess.

I know that shit is real. I have friends from my high school that are over there. I think a lot about the fact that I could very easily be over there right now. I don't take geopolitics lightly, if anything I take them too seriously.

i don't support the troops as much as i just feel bad for them.

i guess the one way i support them is that i hope they achive the (supposed) goal of bringing peace to the area and that they come home unharmed and that people stop hating us.

i hope that they make it home, but i think that people are responsible for the consequences of their decisions, and i suspect that for a few of them the consequence of deciding to join the military in a time of failed leadership will be getting shot in the face. while i wish that their leadership would have some accountability, anyone joining the army should know that that is not the case, nor will it ever be. joining the military today is not the same as joining the military 50 or 30 years ago, and it's not going to contribute to creating a new meritocracy like the GI Bill did. at this point i view joining the army as admitting failure in life. all this crap about defending our freedom is rhetoric and not applicable; i don't see any correlation between iraq and our freedom at all. i don't like how anything in this country can be clad in the flag and then treated as unassailable, but 18 year old men are, in this society, men, and it would be morally presumptuous to tell them that they can't make their own decisions. i don't support the troops but i won't be throwing fruit at the ones who come home.

but how about people who joined the army right after 9/11 and are now fighting in Iraq and Osama is still out there making more movies.

i feel really bad for that dude (or dudette)

exactly.

that was much more eloquent and useful than "god bless america"

i tihnk your assumption that only failures join the military is wrong. maybe only the failures that YOU know join but I know lots of non-failures in the military. I know lots of people who joined the military because they believed in service to our country before the War in Iraq. So I support all the people who made a choice to serve all of us regardless of politics. They made it their job to protect us. Period. It has nothing to do with the flag, Bush, democrats, and/or high school speeches.

i don't agree that only failures join the military..there are also a lot of people who really think they are serving our nation and protecting our freedoms and feel the call of duty.

if this was world war II, I would probably go fight. I wish I could feel proud about this war effort like I would have were I alive in 1945.

if i was smarter i would probably agree with oldbuleee more.

that's probably going to read as sarcastic but it wasn't intended as such.