Scared Witless

[gfish]

While out on a rescue mission to the Olympic peninsula I was listening to Wait, Wait Don't Tell Me (the NPR news quiz show). And they had a question referencing a fan club for someone in the Bush administration. Playing along I guessed Colin Powell, and then joked to myself that it better not be Ari Fleischer. To my stark horror the answer was, indeed, The Ari Fleischer Fan Club.

A fan club for Ari-fucking-Fleischer. Christ.

In Bremerton I drove through a good-sized 'support out troops' rally. One guy had a sign that read 'U.N. OUT / IT'S THEM OR US'. There were people dressed as Uncle Sam and far, far too many American flags waving around. Lots of little kids with signs about how they love their soldier daddies. I really do need to get a U.N. flag, even if I would have been far too afraid to show it under those circumstances. Those people were scary.

I can (abstractly) understand supporting the war. But their message was: We support our troops, many of whom are family members to us, so we vehemently reject proposals that they be allowed to return home to us instead of continuing to risk their lives on the other side of the planet. That's just... messed up. How can you begin to argue against something that irrational? I've rarely been so glad that I'm genetically immune to patriotism.

Comments

[allanc.livejournal.com]

The United States army is a volunteer army. Every person who is in the US army, therefore, wants to be there.

It's not messed up to want your family members to be able to do their job. Do children of, say, police officers go around protesting because their mommy or daddy hasn't been given a desk job when they want to be out on the streets doing good?

There is a lot of evidence that says that the people in Iraq are doing a good thing by ousting Hussein. And regardless of how I felt beforehand, pulling out now and just letting him come back in and claim another victory against the Great Satan would be just about the worst move the US could make.

--AC

[gfish.livejournal.com]

Maybe that's part of my problem. I've just never assumed anybody (or more than maybe 5%) joined the military because they want to fight for their country.The concept is so alien it is easy for me to dismiss it out of hand. Sure, I can see joining the military if, say, Canada was invading. But joining up in the hopes that a just war will come along that you can help with? I've always viewed recruitment as a dirty form economic extortion the government uses to get cannon-fodder, hence the perennial problems getting educated, skilled recruits.

Once you've joined you don't get a choice of which wars to take part in. Joining up before a war you support comes along betrays a highly dangerous faith in the ability of the government to pick just wars. The very act of signing up is explicitly one of renouncing your own moral judgment in favor of the government's. It means 'I trust the government to tell me who to kill.' (Just as terrifying, though less morally relevant, it means 'I trust the government to choose who will try to kill me.') That makes it very hard for me to take their reasoned dedication to an abstract moral cause seriously.