It's Memorial Day.
When I was a child, we would have gotten together and taken flowers to all the cemeteries we could drive to with relatives of ours. I thought the day was to remember the past, where we came from. I thought we were remembering those that were no longer present. Those trips taught me a love genealogy and family stories, and an appreciation of home grown flowers and country graveyards with huge trees and varied tombstones.
I realize now that it is a day to memorialize the sacrifice of soldiers and their families. My own father was proud of his part in WWII. My Brother had the 21 gun salute of a Veteran at his funeral. Neither died in combat.
I have seen a hundred reminders today about the sacrifices of the brave for our freedom. I know that know one serves without seeing what they are doing as an act of patriotism, sacrifice, and bravery; a selfless attempt to keep the family back home safe and free to live the life they have.
For their acts I am in awe. Few of us get the opportunity to do more than the regular grind of go to work, pay the bills, take care of small responsibilities.
Do not misunderstand me.
I am unbelievably grateful that the draft has not existed since the end of the Vietnam War. I am even more grateful that my children did not join the armed forces. While the acts of the young men and women that sign up, giving over at least a part of their lives and possibly all of it, risking permanent physical, mental, emotional damage, risking exposure to things that can forever stop or change their progeny, is both selfless and brave.
The men and women in charge of making the decision to send them to war, to police actions, and to training is neither high-minded or selfless. I can't remember the last time we had a war that wasn't for the economic profit of the rich. The last tragic war effort was started with great patriotism by an act of terrorism, but the number of soldiers that died actually fighting the people that sent those planes into the Twin Towers is not high. Instead we aimed at anyone of that religion that might have control of the oil monies.
We are not the morality keepers of the world. We are not fighting for the freedom of the people in the countries we go into. We are not supportive of their political choices unless those choices continue to feed our economic needs.
I were raised to believe we were the good guys. But looking at history, we have seldom been the good guys. In WWI and WWII, I think we might have come closest. Although, I'm not sure that WWI was our business, at least we were invited in by allies that were being threatened in their freedoms. WWII was most likely made possible by our actions in WWI--a poor plan to control a country that lead to the empowerment of a worse threat. We allowed a monster to rise and that happened not because we were unaware, but because he was spouting many of the same things our own people in power were spouting.
We did not join that war because of what was being done to the Jews, Blacks, Gays, Gypsies,--we refused the entrance of those refugees, but rather because of what was happening to our allies--again. While we were a lot of people's salvation, that goal was not why we joined.
I wish it had been our goal. If the only thing that would make us send in troops to risk their lives was the bullying, torturing, enslaving, disenfranchising of people in another place, I would be very proud of our country.
As it is, I think we need to remove our blinders before telling our children to sign up to go to war. Our children are more important than cheap fuel and we will never know if one of those young men or women might have found a better answer than petroleum, or created a new medicine or sang a beautiful song that only they could have written because they paid the ultimate price for our...what?
For those who have lost someone to war, my condolences. If they lost their life saving someone else, my eternal thanks.
If we stop praising war for our freedom, when we have fought very few wars for our freedom, perhaps those in charge of these debacles will realize that sending our young to die or be scarred is not the first answer.
Knowing what is going on in the world is important. Knowing what group of nuts is working toward some craziness is important. Politics is not important. The economic advantage of the rich that own their own politician is not important.
If we would enjoy our freedom, we must allow that freedom to extend to everyone, not just our citizens, not just our powerful leaders, not just our rich.
My mother used to tell me regularly that my rights stopped at the end of the other person's nose. It was the wisest thing she ever told me.
But I can't force that knowledge on anyone else without interfering with their right to chose right from wrong.
I do think a return to a goal of equality would be good though. Right now, in our fine country, freedom is for sell to the highest bidder, and the rest of us get the opportunity to sacrifice everything for popular platitudes.
