A peril of blogging
Yesterday, while reading through the back and forth in the comments at Protein Wisdom, I ran across a comment that really caught me unready. "Rusty" was reading the Riot Act to a commenter upthread that was engaged in a bit of moral equivalency - namely that it was bad what happened to our soldiers, but we are just as bad in what we do at Gitmo, etc. 'Rusty" corrected that...
Here is the end of the comment, the part that hit home:
Here is the end of the comment, the part that hit home:
You have no idea who those boys were. You have no idea what their motivation was for joining the military. Every man and woman over there knows what the dangers are. They know what they risk everyday. Their deaths don’t belong to you. By claiming moral outrage at their sacrifice you trivialize the lives they lived, the honor that they bought themselves. You sacrifice nothing.
Their service to their country is over. They belong to their families now.
Their service to their country is over. They belong to their families now.
.
I could not read much more after that. That is a peril of blogging - you can run across some expressing something in a very arresting way, and you might not be ready for the impact it has on you.
posted by LTC John at 8:15 AM
6 Comments:
It moved me too, Major John.
I had just seen an interview with Kristian's family, and they were so proud of him. They spoke of what it had meant to him to be a marine, how they had feared his choice at first, but how it had made him a better man.
With that in my head, Rusty's words were especially moving.
Sage,
Look at the whole comment - he was telling some moral equivilizer (the guy basically equated what happened to these two soldiers to what we have done at Gitmo) that he should lay off the fake sympathy for the soldiers - that the soldiers and their families were above petty political point scoring.
It was actaully quite supportive. I think I will update the post to reflect that.
Heh. I did a better job of posting this at Milblogs - I should have done so here.
Right, Snizzle. And that is what Rusty was trying to say - leave off trying to manipulate the deaths of servicemen for political ends - they belong to their families now and should be kept from political usage..his target happened to be those on the Left that faintly condemned their killers and proceded to round on their political foes and claim it was their fault (ie. Andrew Sullivan).
Man, that line is haunting me. I have often had moments of "clarity", usually when something is going very wrong about how my family will feel, who will look after them, etc. We often remark that families serve in shadow. They support their loved ones in service to the nation. It is typically their sacrifice that goes unnoticed and as the potential survivors, their burden which can be the greatest. Once the fallen returns to their family, I think the nation should reach out to those who remain in recognition of their service through sacrifice.
Sorry, rambling. This stuff does have an effect on oneself.
CD,
Tell me about it - I am trying to get back over for another tour - and then to read something like this...
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