Remembrance Day

November 11 is Remembrance Day or Armistice Day in most of the world, ‘celebrated’ as the day when the Great War, what became the First World War, ended.  In the United States, it started that way and morphed into a day honoring veterans of all conflicts–that’s fine.  There’s nothing wrong with that.

But over the past 20 years, I’ve noticed that the U.S. has gone much further and gotten away from what Remembrance Day is about.  Today is a day to honor those who died, remember the millions killed in the meatgrinder of WW1 and those who died 20-25 years later in the next war meant to settle unsettled scores from the Great War.  WW1 destroyed a generation.  WW2 did likewise–though the clearest bad guys in at least a millenium (Nazi Germany) were utterly defeated.

Why have we gotten to the point that we glorify service, that men are risked in combat half a world away for no good reason?  We ‘celebrate’ this by trotting out an active serviceman before a sporting event to get an ovation; we celebrate this with wait-staff saying ‘thank you for your service’ with as much meaning as ‘have a nice day’; we celebrate this with commercials advertising low-interest loans to servicemen because banks/businesses are patriots/care.

Really?

REALLY?

The next time you watch an NFL game, a NASCAR race–count the number of gung-ho commercials about loving the military, count the references to the flag, the big show of playing the anthem.  Look at the money spent on the spectacle of “Look at me, I’m a patriot!  Look at me, I love the military!”

Want to support your soldiers?  Where’s the outcry about the lack of care for those with PTSD and mental issues after their service?  I know a couple of guys who can’t stay in towns on July 4 because of the terror fireworks cause them.  They go way out in the country or go to movies from dusk till midnight to avoid the sounds.   …they don’t matter, they aren’t in uniform anymore.  Suck it up, buttercup.

How about homeless veterans?  Roughly 500,000 are homeless in America–more than *20 PERCENT* of those are veterans…and yet, how many people do you know who look down on the homeless or won’t do anything to help their predicament–judging them as drug users, lazy, etc???   They aren’t in uniform–now they are useless.

Why are they not remembered?  Because they are ‘damaged’…there’s no glory in homelessness or fear of fireworks or the nervous habit of checking roads and doorways for explosives.

November 11 is THEIR day, to remember that sacrifice is not just death, but to be damaged by war, to be the Vietnam vet fighting cancer/Agent Orange for decades, the inability to trust anyone descended from an enemy nation even half-a-century later.

This is not about the commitment made by so many to serve their nations.  That’s to be commended, but you need to remember the real meaning of today–it’s not parades and candy.  It’s the Gold Stars displayed in windows, the collapsed parents when officers come to the door, the men who take paper and pencil for etchings at the Vietnam Wall of friends who did not return.

Remember those who paid the price for the privileges you enjoy.