Flyer News is getting interesting.

Remember that "Support Our Troops" article I wrote?

It didn't go over so well.

Witness:

http://www.flyernews.com/article.php?section=Opinions&volume=53&issue=38&artnum=05

and

http://www.flyernews.com/article.php?section=Opinions&volume=53&issue=38&artnum=06

My response will be coming soon. It will rock.

Here's a preview. I should warn you, it's currently over the 600-word limit recommended by Flyer News. So I might have to find some things to cut out by Sunday, when I submit it. We'll see. Enjoy.

Also: this article may not make sense without reading the two letters above.



I guess it’s good to know people are reading Flyer News.

First, let me acknowledge the dumb stuff in my previous article about “Support Our Troops” bumper magnets.

I shouldn’t have said “there is nothing you can do to support our troops.” That is a false exaggeration. As Melinda Warthman demonstrated in her letter to the editor, there are many things you can do, if you wish, to support American troops. This contrasts perfectly with the “bland statement” of “vague patriotic beliefs” that I think bumper magnets exemplify.

I was happy to read Warthman’s letter because it demonstrated that people do take action on issues like this. Whether it is supporting the military or any other issue, it is good to know some people take action for a cause if they believe in it.

I also regret not being very clear in certain areas, which probably led to Erik Elam’s letter.

I think he misunderstood the point of the article. My goal was to question one particular expression of patriotism. He seemed to believe the purpose was to disparage the military, which it was not. But, in order not to disappoint Elam, I can give him the article he was expecting.

He asked if I would step forward if the military were not in place. Answer: no.

There are plenty of things that I think I would die for. None of them is a nation, but things like equality, mercy and peace are so important to me that I would die for them.

But I can’t think of a single thing that I would kill for. I happen to think ending lives is wrong, and it’s not something that I take lightly.

I cannot grasp the logic that certain lives, American lives, are worth protecting, while other lives, foreign ones, are not. They are worth destroying, apparently.

And this is true of past wars along with current ones: I would not have killed foreign men and boys in World War II, Elam’s example, nor in any war since. Let me explain.

Elam was correct in recognizing that I am a Marxist, and as such, I know troops are not to be ridiculed. After all, they are too often men and women – barely beyond childhood – from lower social classes without many options. In every nation, they are used as tools to protect the interests of the upper classes, which includes most students at UD. So the ridicule and shame, the “looking down on” that Elam refers to, should be placed on us, not them.

This is why I compared the military to social welfare and public education: all three are ways for the ruling class to deal with the youth of the underclass. In a response to my article via e-mail, sophomore Michael Langlais unwittingly supported this: “I feel the military straightens out many youths that ‘social welfare’ and ‘public education’ leave behind.” The difference, of course, is that social welfare and public education don’t involve any killing at all. That’s why I think they are good alternatives to the military.

That’s also why I don’t hate the troops, and why I will not spit on them as people did during and after the Vietnam War. I know they are just doing what they’re told. Now, if I could spit on the decision-makers, the capitalists who direct them, I’m not sure I wouldn’t.

Through John Stuart Mill’s quotation, Elam criticized me for a “decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling.” I have thought deeply about this issue on moral grounds, and my verdict is that I will not kill people, and I will not suggest that killing can ever lead to peace. If peace is your goal, peace must be your instrument.

As for patriotic feeling: I never claimed to have it. As I said, I would not die or kill for this country, or any other in history. My state of patriotic feeling is about as decayed and degraded as possible.

Criticize me for that, if you wish. But I know I will never kill for this country, or for anything else. At least I cannot be criticized for that.


Let me know what you think.