Requiem

I'm fairly certain that I am the only American that's sick and tired of Veterans Day, and it's not so much the barely ambulatory WWII geezers, but more the whole notion of what having a military means to begin with. If I hear one more person say "Thank god that they do what they do, so the rest of us can do what we do", I'm just gonna puke. Our freedom is no more threatened from beyond our borders than it is within them, and I, for one, am angered that we still insist on glorifying our aggression in the name of freedom.

Now don't get me wrong. I have absolutely nothing against soldiers. It's the leaders I have a problem with. And clearly, it is in those leaders' best interest to perpetuate the freedom myth; a myth that certainly should have died after the second World War. No soldier since has done anything to preserve my freedom, but they certainly have killed and been killed in the name of something American. My take is the economic interests of high echelon american capitalists. So I guess that George W. and his cronies should bow down and kiss the asses of every soldier they send off, but sorry, it is not my job to do it. My job is simply to criticize those people willing to send our children off to die for nothing.

And it also seems to me, that if we are going to honor soldiers every November 11th, then we ought to honor every soldier, both ally and enemy, because they are certainly fighting for similar, heartfelt beliefs. It is foolish to assume that the German soldier fought just for the fuck of it. He believed in what he was doing in the same way the American GI does. So let's include the Japanese, the Koreans, the Vietnamese, the Somalians, the Bosnians, the Taliban and Al-Qaeda as well. I can see how this suggestion might seem ludicrous, but it is not. The fact of the matter is that all nations fight for what they believe to be true, which only illuminates the fact that we long ago lost sight of what the truth really is. As Americans, we have bought into the notion that we have some god given insight into the truth, but we have molded and shaped our own truth to justify our actions. If we really stood for truth, justice and the american way, then we would have sent troops into Darfur, but then again, there's no oil in the Sudan, no american economic interest, no dollar value on our children's lives. But we can thank Christ for the wars we are fighting, because now GM can boast of its highest quarterly profits in decades, on our dime.

God is not on our side anymore, and truth be told, neither are we. If God (pick whichever one you choose) was worth anything, then we would be drowning in the tears he shed for every child who dies in war. And if humanity was worth anything, then we would be drowning in the tears of every mother and father who has felt the same pain. Yet we insist that because they died for a 'cause' then it's ok. It's not ok. We should be past this as a species, but instead, we cling to those beliefs formed in the past that have no bearing on today's world. Somebody always has to be wrong in our equations, but, truth be told, we are all wrong. Thou shalt not kill. There is no religion on earth that doesn't bear this credo, so if you accept what God hath given as the truth, then we all live in defiance, or at least denial, of that truth, and we are all going to hell in a handbasket.

I saw a cartoon the other day, where Moses was carrying the first draft of the ten commandments, which simply read 'Don't do bad things'. Think how much farther along we would be, how much more evolved we would be, as a species, if we followed that simple rule.

So today, this November 11th, I watched Avatar for the first time (yeah I know I'm a few years late), and was awestruck and saddened at the same time. Awestruck by the technical and colorful creativity of the movie, and saddened that we are choosing to pass along the same, insidiously stupid notion to our children; that war, fought in name of right and truth, is the only way to settle our problems.

And today, I am going to shed a tear for every soldier that has died in battle, for every soldier injured or maimed, for every soldier that has chosen suicide, for every soldier's nightmares, and may we all drown in the salt of it, for it is we who have given our children the story, the fable, the madness and stupidity. And I will pray that the next generation of children heed the lesson of Lot, and never look back.