- Banned
- #1
This speaks to all of us but points out some glaring truths, the least of which I've pointed out in other threads about education being a tool for teaching conformity/compliance. Of course it's not a curriculum course, but, it instills that authority is not to be questioned lest consequences be doled out- this problem is deeply ingrained in our world/society of monkey see monkey do- and sadly, the head monkeys call the shots (literally) to dole out consequences.
I'll ask, politely, to read the article, then discussing any discrepancies seen. Attacking the messenger isn't informative.
I'm in the process of reading the book, The Irishman, made into a movie. The latest chapter is the early story of Frank Shreehan, a good Catholic boy from Philadelphia, a friend of Jimmy Hoffa, describing his time in the Military in WW2, who spent 411 days in direct combat explaining how he came to view killing as no big deal when your life was on the line. Hard to disagree with his reasoning, but, it's so much more than that. He describes his life after returning home and how hard it was to adjust. It affects everyone differently, and at this telling he was somewhere around 90 years old.
Anyway, it got me to thinking (not that I don't usually) about the personal cost of war and then today I read this and I started another thread today about a veteran who was alone- there are some good, decent people in this Country, it's a shame they aren't politically represented.
Casualties of War
Excerpt:
Americans are fed a steady diet of pro-war propaganda that keeps them content to wave flags with patriotic fervor and less inclined to look too closely at the mounting body counts, the ruined lives, the ravaged countries, the blowback arising from ill-advised targeted-drone killings and bombing campaigns in foreign lands, or the transformation of our own homeland into a warzone.
Nowhere is this double-edged irony more apparent than during military holidays, when we get treated to a generous serving of praise and grandstanding by politicians, corporations and others with similarly self-serving motives eager to go on record as being pro-military.
Yet war is a grisly business, a horror of epic proportions.
I'll ask, politely, to read the article, then discussing any discrepancies seen. Attacking the messenger isn't informative.
I'm in the process of reading the book, The Irishman, made into a movie. The latest chapter is the early story of Frank Shreehan, a good Catholic boy from Philadelphia, a friend of Jimmy Hoffa, describing his time in the Military in WW2, who spent 411 days in direct combat explaining how he came to view killing as no big deal when your life was on the line. Hard to disagree with his reasoning, but, it's so much more than that. He describes his life after returning home and how hard it was to adjust. It affects everyone differently, and at this telling he was somewhere around 90 years old.
Anyway, it got me to thinking (not that I don't usually) about the personal cost of war and then today I read this and I started another thread today about a veteran who was alone- there are some good, decent people in this Country, it's a shame they aren't politically represented.
Casualties of War
Excerpt:
Americans are fed a steady diet of pro-war propaganda that keeps them content to wave flags with patriotic fervor and less inclined to look too closely at the mounting body counts, the ruined lives, the ravaged countries, the blowback arising from ill-advised targeted-drone killings and bombing campaigns in foreign lands, or the transformation of our own homeland into a warzone.
Nowhere is this double-edged irony more apparent than during military holidays, when we get treated to a generous serving of praise and grandstanding by politicians, corporations and others with similarly self-serving motives eager to go on record as being pro-military.
Yet war is a grisly business, a horror of epic proportions.
