Memorial day is a United States federal holiday commemorating the soldiers who died in service to the State. And I have a deep moral and philosophical problem with it.
It serves primarily to glorify the government that sent those men to murder and die at the whims of politicians and their cronies who could benefit from the blood spilled by others. It also minimizes the deaths suffered at the hands of US soldiers overseas, where equally-gullible foreign soldiers and innocent civilian bystanders alike were slaughtered wholesale.
I can link to explanations of how how none of the wars in US history have been defensive wars or otherwise fit any traditional just war theory. I can point out how the government casts aside the survivors of its senseless conflicts after they have been used up. I can cite Marine Major General Smedley Butler's book, War is a Racket, but even that is invariably ignored.
Of course, this "disrespect for the fallen soldiers who fought for my freedom to say such things" is immediately denounced by "loyal patriotic Americans" everywhere, but what does that really mean? If soldiers fought for my freedom, their sacrifice is honored rather than slandered by my expression of dissent. If, however, they fought in service to a corrupt leviathan state administered by psychopaths, then my dissent is the only way to honor their memory, and support for the liars who sent them to murder and die is truly dishonorable.
Naturally, I have been repeatedly told to "Love it or leave it" when I question the presumed virtues of The State and its enforcers. So today, rather than continuing along these lines, I will post music links.
Blessed Are The Landmines
Brave Saint Saturn
Arthur McBride
Planxty
What are you fighting for?
Phil Ochs
Hell Broke Luce
Tom Waits
The General
Dispatch
And the band played Waltzing Matilda
The Pogues
Masters of War
Bob Dylan
War (What Is It Good For?)
Edwin Starr
The Call Up
The Clash
War Pigs
Black Sabbath
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I actually woke up this morning feeling the same way. I honor those who are loyal and brave, those that gave all, and those that worked hard in military service. However I have a problem with the lies and deceptions that pulled at the integrity heart strings of so many of our military men a woman. Yes they absolutely deserve to be honored, have gone to places many of us would not, having given up friends and family to serve because they have the moral character and integrity to do so. I believe they deserve the highest respect of everyone in this country and the best medical care that can be provided, I believe that not one of them should be homeless, food less or job less and I believe that each and everyone of us, who live in this country should stand up and fight for their rights and hard as they fought for ours. I do however also see that these were wars fought for profits, for money, to create what those in government wish to see, which is absolute control of every single person on the planet, and for that I am sad that we this country participated in senseless wars that took the lives of so many. It is time to put an end to the government profiteering through war, ( the U.S having been at war with someone for more that 200 years) and work to create a means of lasting peace. How do we do that... well, think about this, if every being on the planet had everything they needed, and we switched to clean fuel, and gave the land back to our farmers to grow food, then as a country we could begin to barter our good for those good we would like from other countries..We would no longer need oil, or be importing foods from other countries..The United States has such a diverse work force there is NOTHING we can not grow, design, create or manufacture, so why have we given so many of our citizens up to wars??? Politics and greed...I think we can better honor those who went to war by giving them a home a country they can be proud of...
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I mute you.
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Larken Rose wrote something similar @larkenrose. I gave a reply there. I see some of what you are getting at completely. Yet I also think there is a false dichotomy in play that we either support them or we don't. I believe there are some other choices.
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I'm not sure. I don't deny that many, if not most, who joined the military had honorable intentions. But their intentions were based on deeply flawed reasoning and blind faith in the State. Their actions, regardless of intent, inflict great evil. And they were paid and equipped entirely with stolen property for the purpose of furthering the State. Only by pointing this out can we hope to reduce such senseless bloodshed in the future. Now, they are martyrs for the cause of evil, covered in a veneer of false virtue.
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This is true.
Yet because they are indoctrinated and blind that can also be a case where they had not really been equipped with the mental tools by which they could use freewill to realize they are doing wrong.
In fact, they likely have zero clue what they are doing is wrong.
I cannot despise them for this. I despise those who indoctrinate them, and manipulate them.
I am NOT happy about them, but I do not despise them.
I do not see masses of people willfully doing what they do if they have the mental tools that you and I have discovered over time.
I am certain there was a time where you did not see these things clearly as well. I know there was for me. I feel like things get clearer over time with regards to these things. It feels like scales being pulled back from my eyes, or my eyeglass prescription continually getting better.
So if this is true for me, why would I not believe it is the same for them?
If they were fully formed and new what it was they were doing and truly understood the implications then all the vitriol thrown at them I'd fully understand and agree with.
I consider most of them completely ignorant to the true rammifications of what they do.
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Hi, I've seen some of your publications I'm going to follow, follow me and let's collaborate together =)
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I'm a conservative, and I LOVE this country and what it stands for, and yes, it does stand for something good. It is very easy to be cynical. The government has been extremely wasteful and increasingly corrupt both in how it handles war and in how it mismanages social programs (often deliberately, to create a perceived need for itself).
The human race has always worked like this, and it's awful. But you know what, the government is not this country. I AM this country! My father, who came from Cuba and served in the military is this country. The Christian Quaker who hid slaves on the underground railroad, his family IS the heritage of this country.
We, the people, with blood and grit more so than words, stopped the Nazis, and prevented the spread of Communism across several continents. We were the ones willing to fight a war against our own brothers in order to vanquish slavery, the only such war ever fought, where it was not a slave uprising, but an uprising of conscience.
We do these things, not because they are easy, but because they are right. We do these things because that's who we are, and we do them often not because we believe in our government, but because we believe in a transcendent truth that G-d created all men equal, and that our Creator has given us certain rights which no government has a right to withhold. Often, as in the case of George Washington, we do these things against the legal decrees of government--and in spite of whether or not government approves.
This is my perspective--no more, no less.
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Government is not society, and does not represent the general populace by any rational measure. You are you. You are not the government or the geographic region or the mythical State. The government is a group of people who claim a territorial monopoly in violence and act entirely through aggression against the rights of everyone else in the region they claim.
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Though the government may have misused veterans, God knows the full truth and will recompense them in due time, the veterans that gave their lives in sacrificial service to the Constitution and the citizens of the USA still deserve to be honored, and that is what Memorial Day commemorates.
The children (veterans) shouldn't go unrewarded for their good works, even if their parents (government) were malicious in their motives and secret objectives.
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It is the obedient soldier who committed the unjust actions, though. "Just following orders" is not a valid excuse to absolve responsibility. Intentions matter, but evil acts with good intentions are still evil acts.
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For the sake of discussing the principle of responsibility. Every person is responsible for their own actions, and we all reap what we sow, however, the level of blame depends upon the level of knowledge, and the maliciousness of the intent. Responsibility goes deeper than just actions, the weight of responsibility relies upon the motive and objective of the heart.
"...Whoso kills his neighbor ignorantly, whom he hated not in time past; As when a man goes into the wood with his neighbor to hew wood, and his hand fetches a stroke with the axe to cut down the tree, and the head slips from the helve, and lights upon his neighbor, that he die; he shall flee unto one of those cities, and live: Lest the avenger of the blood pursue the slayer, while his heart is hot, and overtake him, because the way is long, and slay him; whereas he was not worthy of death, inasmuch as he hated him not in time past." (Deuteronomy 19:4-6)
It is not wrong for sovereign lands to defend themselves, nor take offensive action to thwart an attack, nor take action against evil corrupt sovereignties, so when an enlisted solder is under the authority of government, they have the responsibility to take action under command with the knowledge they have in a responsible manner. This doesn't mean corrupt and hypocritical governments should be allowed to commit murder and oppression. All injustice needs to be punished wherever it is found, beginning with those in authority, but every man is responsible to act according to his conscience with the knowledge that he has.
People now a days have much more knowledge of what is really going on behind the closed doors of the governments of the world, because of the public information available, but back in the days of WW1, WW2, Vietnam, etc they had very little knowledge of what was really going on. The newspapers, the radio, and the television were the only mediums of information they had about government actions, and therefore their consciences were pure and blameless for the actions they took in line of duty.
When we all stand before God those soldiers under command will not be held accountable for obeying authority, unless they took malicious actions themselves against humanity. The manipulators and liars behind the scenes are the real murderers of mankind, even if they used innocent soldiers to carry out their evil agenda.
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I agree with you in your verse citation. However, countries are not things that act, have rights, or bear responsibilities. Only individuals have those traits, and collectivism is neither rational nor scriptural.
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Pleasure to discourse with you!
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Two Words: Barbary Pirates
I'm glad we won that one. Oh, and so you consider what Switzerland did in World War II to be the most moral thing to do? Staying neutral was the way to go in 1941? That worked so well for so many countries, perhaps you could share how neutrality did global peace such great favors in the two world wars?
Saying what you say is a strange form of nationalism and national pride. Would a foreigner in 1941, seeking peace for the world, have tried to get the US to go home and stop fighting? No, the only ones promoting that line of reasoning were radicals within the US.... and the enemies of the US.
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Piracy is bad, but how does that justify government? And remind me again where the Barbary Coast is located. Last I knew, it was in the Mediterranean Sea coast of Africa. As in, not US business.
Hitler didn't rise to power in a vacuum. His rise to power was a consequence of the debacle that was the end of WW1, where the US intervened on the wrong side even if we assume there was a "right side" in the first place. Both Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, like the current chaos in the middle east, were consequences of militarism. maybe it's time for a new strategy, since the old methods invariably create worse messes than they were intended to address.
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You may need a history lesson. These marauders were taking hostages and stealing goods being shipped on the high seas. The area is North Africa, and the US was a seafaring nation once. We still are through our military.
In any case, we had to do some serious warfare with these petty thieves. A lot of good anarchy did back then, because the Islamic imams looked the other way at piracy.
Here's a few links. Seriously you should know about our first war with Muslim extremists.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Barbary_War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbary_pirates
There are defensive wars which occasionally are fought elsewhere. The shores of Tripoli being one of those.
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Again, you are making the argument "Bad things, therefore we needed government." It's not a rational argument. Why weren't the merchants armed? Why weren't local nations doing anything? You just say, "Government did X, therefore government is good, and government enforcers deserve praise." I think there are some slight holes in your rationale.
edit
Perhaps it would be clearer if I simply said, "Ends do not justify the means, and the details behind the events make your over-simplified analysis suspect."
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Interesting point not taken! First off, the beloved government was paying tribute to the Barbary states to keep our merchants safe. But that was taxpayer funded. Why not use the taxes to go kill them instead of paying tribute? I think killing them was moral and paying the tribute was not. That's what seemingly the politicians, navy admirals, marines, and Thomas Jefferson thought... but who are they?
Jacob says they were wrong, so we should have.... paid the ransoms? And the tribute? And told our merchants to go leave their wife behind and buy their own canons? Your own moral foreplay is destined to bring forth a bunch of hand-wringing whiners who just blather "peace" when the bad guys want to kill, maim, steal, and destroy things.
War isn't precisely moral... but it has its uses in the moral realm.
The next time our merchants are being captured and sold into slavery... maybe you should pipe up and tell the captors that you volunteer to take their place. You know, since war is such a bad idea.
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Should I quote this? I hope you understand my point. This is why history should be taught and learned in public schools. I feel you missed it.
"While Barbary corsairs looted the cargo of ships they captured, their primary goal was to capture people for sale as slaves or for ransom. Those who had family or friends who might ransom them were held captive but not obliged to work; the most famous of these was the author Miguel de Cervantes, who was held for almost five years. Others were sold into various types of servitude. Attractive women or boys could be used as sex slaves and was considered the original "fate worse than death". Captives who converted to Islam were generally freed, since enslavement of Muslims was prohibited; but this meant that they could never return to their native countries." (See link above)
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I hope you can understand my point as well. You create a false dichotomy in your argument, and use one atrocity to justify more atrocities.
Yes, historical events happened, but they are an opportunity to question why they occurred as they did, and question the justifications offered for the actions people took. It does not mean military action was necessary or proper because it occurred.
Remember, slavery was enshrined in the US Constitution, too. The US
engaged in piracycommissioned privateers. US government complaints against slavery and piracy are thus incredibly hypocritical. Of course, hypocrisy is an epidemic among politicians throughout history, too.Why were the options limited to "pay bribes or wage war"? Why weren't merchant ships armed against a clear and present danger? There's still something fishy about the whole narrative.
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Killing people is the ultimate recompense for evil. I am wondering... if the merchants are now armed (which some privateers were both), then is there a moral improvement over arming a paid professional soldier? I don't see everyone jumping through these moral hoops with you...
But
This is dichotomy. You just flipped the coin and said heads is good and tails is bad. But it's two sides of the same coin.
The government killing bad guys by fiat or by hiring mercenaries.... is that the moral dilemma? The act of going to war versus killing bad guys with small guns in a disorderly fashion?
On memorial day, why don't you give thanks to God for the mercenaries and merchants who shot bandits, and the judges who sent bad guys to the gallows? But heaven forbid you thank God for professionals who were fighting a war!
Who are you thankful for? Hmm?
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Merchants: Armed at their own expense, and only using weapons in self-defense.
Governments: Armed with funds plundered from the productive population, and invariably using those arms to initiate further aggression against peaceful people, as repeatedly demonstrated throughout history.
You have to perform some extreme mental gymnastics to equivocate these fundamentally distinct actions, intentions, and outcomes.
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