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Glad to see my husband fought for your freedom so you could stand here and bash him. Too bad you didn't serve on the front lines with him, maybe you'd have a bit more respect for vets. Maybe you need to sign up and experience combat, then you will see why you should thank one and be respectful. There are lots of dangerous jobs yes, but just because yours isn't looked upon as respectfully, don't mean you have to be disrespectful to those who fought for you, so you have the freedom to post on internet chat boards and bash the ones who gave you that freedom.
Hate to break it to you, but your husband didnt fight for anyones "freedom", if we pull all our troops out of every foreign country tomorrow, I"m not going to lose my "freedom".
To answer the OP, this veteran worship is powered by the military industrial complex, a loose conglomeration of thousands of military contractors and the Dept. of Defense. This partnership acts like a fourth branch of government, although there are no system of checks and balances to limit its influence and curtail its voracious appetite for taxpayer dollars.
We were warned by the former Supreme Commander in Europe, and we were warned after WWI by a two time Congressional Medal of Honor recipient, and these two uniquely qualified and extraordinarily prescient voices have either been forgotten or ignored as we start wars without end, a perfect scenario to suck up these tax dollars unabated.
The veteran worship is a more subtle form of psychological warfare practiced on the masses. If you have everyone believing that veteran are above reproach, that we should only praise them for their sacrifices rather than be critical of the missions they are sent on and the wars we start, you are training people to be obedient and unquestioning. Stepping out of line and openly challenging this artificial paradigm risks alienation and condemnation. (And if there is any doubt about this, backtrack over the past two pages and read the anger and hostility expressed towards a rather innocuous question)
It works best on politicians, but it also works very well on those who put them in office by voting for them.
I am a veteran and am married to an officer who still serves.
I understand the arguments that have been made to a certain extent.
However, I really believe that anyone who puts service before himself or herself, should be recognized. Any kind of service. I don't care whether it is military, police, fire, working for a non-profit that betters your community, or even giving up weekends and holidays with your family to work in a hospital.
The fact that all of those people are paid should not detract from the sacrifice they make, IMO.
I am just a huge believer in service. If there is one thing I want my son to take from me after I am dead, it is an appreciation for those who serve and help others, and a desire to be one of those people.
I think it is a spin off from the military devotion mind-set we have in this country. Our fixation with the military seeps into our culture in ways that we don't even notice any more. Desert camo, Hummers, service bumper stickers, license plates or decals are a few examples. Then there is always the news headline "Viet Nam Vet goes on rampage" or "Ex-Marine robs liqour store" when military service has nothing to do with the event...some sort of added media disgrace heaped on the culprit. There are families where kids have been steered toward the military for generations. We have a military class developing in the US like those in some third-world countries...not a good thing for our republic.
It's not always recognized that the basic nature of warfare changed drastically between 1945 and 1990; Korea was a "police action" fought in the same manner as World War II (which, in turn, replaced the trench warfare and massed charges of World War I with "fire teams"). Warfare today is more likely to be shorter in duration and the outcome settled by technological prowess, not to mention "economic warfare", terrorism, etc.
But the men drafted for the two World Wars, Korea, Vietnam, and the early days of the Cold War had a very different outlook, precisely because they came of age in an era when the emerging nation/state. particularly in Europe, had far greater. and potentially abusive, power over the individual. When I entered college in the late Sixties, it was common to refer to a young man's "military obligation" -- as though we owed a portion of our lives, and the assorted risks, to Big Brother simply because we were born on his turf.
That has seldom been the case when measured by a wider period of time, and while we can never repay our debt to the now-diminishing group who defeated Fascism and Marxism, we don't need to adopt a process that Sen. Robert Taft described as "essentially totalitarian" to protect our republic.
A nation drawn into the global arena will always require a warrior caste; and the tradition of service still carried on in many American families can supply volunteers sufficient to meet the challenge of the changed, and continuously changing nature of military action. There is nothing "new" or "growing" with regard to this tradition; it deserves our deep respect, but need not be forcibly woven into the fabric of American live via coercion.
However, I really believe that anyone who puts service before himself or herself, should be recognized. Any kind of service. I don't care whether it is military, police, fire, working for a non-profit that betters your community, or even giving up weekends and holidays with your family to work in a hospital.
It probably leads off-topic, but your post makes me wonder (not for the first time) why the difference in the way military service is seen (exalted) versus the way other forms of public service are seen (debased). The people who campaign against the waste, fraud, and abuse of all those bureaucrats in Washington get there and spend years telling these very people that everyone is part of the mission, that the only difference between the military and civil service is the uniform. But that sort of thing doesn't make the papers. In the media, there is still a divide between "heroes" on the one hand and "leeches" on the other. I'm not sure that makes much sense.
As I imagine Red3311 is a troll hiding behind anonymity, I won't bother to reply to the original post.
I do however appreciate those who took the time to respond in a well-thought-out and calm fashion. To those who hate the military for its war-like attitude, there is nothing that can ever be said to change their minds.
^ this is exactly the thesis of my original post. thanks for proving it for me. And thanks to everyone else for their responses.
What makes me a troll? the fact that I refuse to blindly follow what the masses are doing? Dont get me wrong I respect people who do tough jobs, but the media and corporations like USAA only have those praise like commercials and events to sell more products to military members. They could careless that you served, as long as you are giving them money (think NFL 'salute to service') There was another poster that said turning the army into this holier than thou attitude will make young people think it will give them respect and get more of them to enlist and I tend to agree with that response.
There is nothing "new" or "growing" with regard to this tradition; it deserves our deep respect, but need not be forcibly woven into the fabric of American live via coercion.
Why would such a family deserve any more respect than a long line of plumbers or accountants? And is it a good idea to be establishing a basis for expectation that one is due all this "deep respect" from others merely from being in the service in some capacity or other? Shouldn't there be a little more to it than that? Just on a personal note, some of the worst people I have ever known have been in the military. Is it somehow not okay for me to think poorly of them for it?
As for coercion, I would suggest that there is indeed a draft today, but that they simply aren't taking anybody given the current supply and demand situation. Let something come over horizon, and all these people lauding the benefits of an all-volunteer army will turn on a dime and enforce conscription. All the machinery for it is there. It simply isn't switched on at the present time.
And yes, the idea of a "military obligation" was everywhere fifty years ago, and it is still a part of life in at least a couple of dozen countries. The notion of course caused a lot of controversy once it was associated with what came to be seen as an unjustified quagmire, but there is the broader question of obligation to society in general. Is there one any more? We have people who don't want to obey the laws and don't want to pay their taxes either. To hear them tell it, this is all some sort of unwarranted imposition on them. So what then is actually left of this? Do we all just become takers, never putting anything back?
I think we owe our thanks to all those who lay their lives on the line daily whether they be military, police, fire fighters, etc. Since our military is currently voluntary, those entering choose to do so for many reasons. But, they and their families do make sacrifices and without them, past and present (whether they volunteered or in the past were drafted) we would not be enjoying the freedoms we have today; freedoms that we seem to be giving up one by one to a larger and larger government.
There are more than twice as many people in the country today than on the day I was born. And I'm not all that old. It doesn't at all surprise me that the government has gotten larger over the years as well. Meanwhile, I can't put my finger on where any freedoms have been given up, but the end of the draft -- a doorway to two years of often involuntary servitude -- certainly could be seen as having expanded them. Then there was the end of both DADT and DOMA. Let freedom ring!
Everywhere I look, I see ads thanking veterans for "my freedom". Just wondering where all this worship is coming form. That is their JOB, they signed up for the job and were not forced to do it and arew GETTING PAID. There are a million other dangerous jobs that make our day to day lives easier, better, safer as well but we dont worship those people. Why cant a company hire on merits not wether you served 10 years as a mechanic in a base somewhere in Germany?
This is what decades of ******* academia has wrought. It also serves as another reason why we should resurrect the draft.
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