If you won't say "hero" what will you say?

[dandi]

Nuclear Unicorn

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If you won't say "hero" what will you say?
The American soldiers I've been privileged to know would turn away with embarrassment at being called a hero. They don't glorify war but they do accept it, even though they hate it. They grumble about eating MREs and being awake for days at a time and how much the heat sucked "over there" but you can't drag them away from their friends. They would rather be on patrol for 12 hours after being bruised and battered than consider allowing their buddies to face danger without them.

They don't pick where they go. They go. They also seem to keep a sense of humor about it all. Sometimes they hurt on the inside, more than any person should, but even then they don't want pity, they want to find their own strength. They don't talk about combat with civilians around -- I think htat's more to keep us from embarrassing ourselves with half-witted questions.

They will laugh and curse in the same breath at the memory of the people and places they've encountered on deployment. They will speak in equal measure of the hope and frustration of trying to make those places just a little better.

Perhaps "hero" as a blanket term seems overly-broad. If we call those who serve honorably in the military "hero" we fear that we make war a "heroic" endeavor. I understand that point but the fact of the matter remains: people in the military endure far more than those who don't ever will. A person who races into a burning building to save someone else is called a hero and rightly so. Yet, their danger is measured in minutes. Those who serve measure their time in years, if not decades and it is the thing they knowingly wake-up to day-after-day.

I don't know if "hero" is the best word but I cannot bring myself to call them anything less.

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/1002739558

Thank you, Nuclear Unicorn. That was well-said. Unfortunately, you're casting pearls before swine.

GeorgeGist
1. Rinse and repeat.

Your brainwashing is nearly complete.

Star Member TBF
7. One doesn't have to be trained to recognize right-wing nonsense. nt

CBGLuthier
2. Uggh Fascism 101 worship the military

I view them as a necessary evil not an inviolate good.

Kali
9. error:

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I didn't send anybody anywhere. I acknowledge the personal sacrifice some military members make, but this is also a voluntarily commitment and a paid position so lets not go too overboard on the pedestal placement, huh? Especially when the bottom line is corporate interest and/or imperialism and not self-defense by any stretch of the imagination (not that the average soldier is to blame for that).

Brickbat
12. What do we call anyone who gets up every day and does his/her job?

The error is when we call all of them heroes, every last one, and the military becomes this huge band of "heroes." That's just not how it is. There are heroes in the military, and civilian heroes, and people in the military who are cowards or lazy or mean or who are bored silly working support jobs or desk jobs, and people like that in the private sector. To look at The Soldier or The Sailor or The Marine and get all misty and feel like you need to talk about heroes is a mistake. To glorify The Military because of All They Do To Keep Us Safe is childish. To admire singular people for what they have done, however, is only human.

Egalitarian Thug
15. Long periods of extreme stress does tend to make us band together like nothing else,

but this assignation of some superior motive and result to willingly participating in the global horror show is disturbing.

War is not about glory, nor is it about friendship, these are side-effects and desperately grasping to find something good in the greatest evil we know. War is about killing other people, period, and the military only exists to make war. There is nothing noble or good in the endless slaughter of our fellows at the direction of the evil and the greedy.

Whatever your opinion is of our current conflicts, the fact is in this age of rapid deployment, air power and nuclear threats, a standing military is a necessity. We don't have the luxury of time in taking months or years to raise an army from scratch. The very existence of our armed forces acts as a deterrent. Those same men and women you spit on today for fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan may next week be standing between you and a bullet right here at home. Try getting a DUmbass to understand that, though. 


      
   

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

I was about to bring this over.

She's fighting a losing fight over there.

No worries though, as soon as Obama starts bragging about killing UBL or some fag dumps our sensitive intel to the world they'll find it in their shriveled black hearts to peep something pleasant.

[WinOne4TheGipper]

To me, if you're willing to face being shot at for your country, you are a hero.  To have a bunch of keyboard commandos, who've never done anything worthwhile in their lives, debating the merits of our men and women in uniform is the height of absurdity.

[wasp69]

Wow, that looks like a thread that the piss twizzling indago troll would love to participate in.

[67 Rover]

http://upload.democraticunderground.com/1002739558

Thank you, Nuclear Unicorn. That was well-said. Unfortunately, you're casting pearls before swine.


Whatever your opinion is of our current conflicts, the fact is in this age of rapid deployment, air power and nuclear threats, a standing military is a necessity. We don't have the luxury of time in taking months or years to raise an army from scratch. The very existence of our armed forces acts as a deterrent. Those same men and women you spit on today for fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan may next week be standing between you and a bullet right here at home. Try getting a DUmbass to understand that, though. 

Or maybe not.

[seahorse513]

Our military does not expect hero worship, but a simple thank-you in appreciation, so they know what they are fighting for and to protect will not be in vain....

[jukin]

I thought that the left's term was "baby killer."

We know where their true feeling have been and always will be.

[Gina]

I can't stand these people.

[Ballygrl]

TBF
7. One doesn't have to be trained to recognize right-wing nonsense. nt

Please please please, beg the Democrats to run a commercial saying how calling someone in our Military a hero is right wing nonsense.

[Danglars]

Does anyone else here think some of the more intelligent of these creatures know that, as a matter of objectively measurable fact, no other single, particular institution in the entire history of mankind has done more good for its country AND the whole world than the US military? No other institution has saved more human lives, either directly or as a result of repelling aggressors here and overseas. Do any of these fools know what kind of hellworld this would have been without, specifically, the US military?

Some few of them must know it. Most likely they hate knowing it, though; it's a very an inconvenient truth.

[obumazombie]

^Libs resent anything merit related in general.

[DefiantSix]

....Some few of them must know it. Most likely they hate knowing it, though; it's a very an inconvenient truth.

The few who will admit  that they "know" it are like 11BooBoo, TominTiburon and a few others who's recognition of the military and their unflinching ability to put their huevos on the block is inextricably intertwined with the online personas/psychoses they masquerade behind.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

^Libs resent anything merit related in general.

More correctly: they resent anything they don't control. When Obama personally killed UBL in singular combat they were all agog over military matters. Now that the polls show the military going 80+ percent to Romney they will be cursed for treasonous, baby-killing bastards.

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

This makes me want to puch my computer:

Arugula Latte (36,130 posts) Profile Journal Send DU Mail Ignore

47. If we stopped calling everyone who joins the military a hero, more people might stop & think before

they enlist.

The fact is, a good number of Americans who signed up for "duty" in the past 25+ years have been asked to slaughter innocent people for no good reason, unless you consider U.S. corporate gain a good reason.

But then there's this response:

Swamp Lover (143 posts) Profile Journal Send DU Mail Ignore

58. You assume that those who serve are stupid, or have not considered their decision.

It is the job of our military forces to go where political leaders assign them to go. It is our job as citizens to apply pressure to the decision making process to make sure that we go to war only for good reasons.

If, in fact, we have gone to war for the wrong reasons, then it is partly due to your failure to influence the political decisions. Your crass, stupid, comment makes it obvious why you have failed politically and have not influenced the process.

Our military serves us unselfishly and effectively. You, however, are a disappointment.

That was beautiful, man.

*wipes tear*

[NHSparky]

The salad primitive is just pissed cause he couldn't cut a 31 on the ASVAB.

Dear DUmmies, kiss my 99QT ass.

[BEG]

I bet every one who posted in this thread that said the men and women of the military aren't heros would be too chicken shit to say it to their face. I triple dog dare one of you assholes to get up during one of Obama's campaign stops and say this shit on national TV.

[obumazombie]

Quote from Arugula Latte (36,130 posts)...

"The fact is, a good number of Americans who signed up for "duty" in the past 25+ years have been asked to slaughter innocent people for no good reason."

If they are innocent that's already no good reason to slaughter them.
Then we get to "asked". I never remember being asked to do much when I was serving. Also, I had no trouble killing anyone shooting at me or mine, even without being asked.

[DefiantSix]

I bet every one who posted in this thread that said the men and women of the military aren't heros would be too chicken shit to say it to their face. I triple dog dare one of you assholes to get up during one of Obama's campaign stops and say this shit on national TV.

That actually sounds like fun!  I wonder which of Teh ReichsMessiah's campaign stops here in the People's Republic of Colorado I can get myself invited to....

(Of course I can always wind up in secret service custody the easy way: fly an "anti-Obama" banner through a TFR zone.  Will that count, BEG??)

[seahorse513]

When it comes to innocent bystanders, I know our troops don't stand there and start shooting. But what about the little Iranian(?)boy about 6 or 7 dressed in camouflage holding a semi-automatic gun(I have no knowledge of military weaponry, so i will not venture to guess what this kid was carrying), but what goes through this soldier'd head?? He sees a little boy playing soldier, who knows no better, and does what his elders tell to do., No chance at life...it is sad....

It was on the cover of TIME or NEWSWEEK several years ago....

[Airwolf]

I don't need to be called a hero but a simple thank you would be nice once in a ****in while. Makes me want to use a 5 iron and go tee of on all of DU after reading one of these threads.

[I_B_Perky]

I don't need to be called a hero but a simple thank you would be nice once in a ****in while. Makes me want to use a 5 iron and go tee of on all of DU after reading one of these threads.

Thank you Sir!    

The thing that pisses me off the most is that these idiots at the dump don't understand that people like you make it possible for people like them to spout their bullshit. I've always said that those cowards, those oh so brave idiots at the dump, the ones that speak truth to power, would wimp out if their pink little bod was on the line. I run across some libby's at work from time to time that spout that bullshit. I tell them to go to North Korea, Iran or Syria and spout their "truth to power" or to just SHUT THE HELL UP!!!!

[SSG Snuggle Bunny]

I don't need to be called a hero but a simple thank you would be nice once in a ****in while. Makes me want to use a 5 iron and go tee of on all of DU after reading one of these threads.

Think of all the groups whose collective asses we're supposed to kiss for no reason other than the accidents of their birth.

What virtue is there in being black? Certainly it's no sin but Janice Rogers Brown, Clarence Thomas, C L Bryant, Thomas Sowell, Frederick Douglass etc aren't great because they're black. They're great because they're ****ing geniuses and they deserve to be recognized as such.

Meanwhile, you have shitstains like Sharpton and Jackson who incessantly insist black is a a reason to be coddled. Those idiots never chose to be black. They didn't earn it. It's not the badge of some merit they've achieved and yet we're supposed to kiss their asses simply because they are black like we're supposed to kiss David Duke's ass because he happened to have been born white.

**** that shit.

Meanwhile, soldiers come from all wallks of life and all races and ethnicities into a society that recognizes only 1 virtue: everyone else but you. 1.5 million people working for their buddies, their families, their neighbors, their countrymen and even their political and religious opposites...everyone but themselves.

Only the willfully ignorant / malicious cannot see that.

[obumazombie]

It is malicious to assume you are better than someone because of the color of their skin. It's malicious to assume they need your help. When you do something for someone they can do for themselves, it robs them of their dignity. It's a soft bigotry as Bush said, but bigotry nonetheless.