Selective Heroism

most of us consider our military as kind of modern day heroes. They sacrifice their lives for what they believe in.

Why then, when the police kill demonstrators, are the victims not hailed as heroes and the murderers brought to account?

People such as Jordan Feder, Carlo Giuliani, Rachel Corrie, those shot at Kent State, and others who have died fighting for their beliefs are not remembered, nor are they honored. They have done more for us than most people wil ever know. Why then, do we so insist on forgetting them?

long live the resistance, and may the fallen rest in peace. Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable, and their reckoning will come.

www.carlo-giuliani.com has some pictures of carlo's death (they are somewhat graphic)

[edit on 17-11-2004 by General Zapata]

"heroism" is used as a method of advancing a cause. It rallies people and makes them feel just in their leaders' endeavors. That is why we refer to the people who died in 9/11 as 'heroes', when in fact the label 'victim' would have been more appropriate.

It's interesting to see that whenever the word 'hero' pops up, an agenda isn't far away...

this kind of malevolent exploitation makes me we are all heros in each different way, its the massive campaign of propaganda that has engulfed any descecy left in the word "heroism" think about how they hammer away at storys like jessica lynch, when there is probably another tough young ladie who went through 10x the hell and was killed and not even spoke of only to remain a statistic in the ever so illusive confirmed body count from iraq. its controlled media that potrays situations like a finely crafted dramatic event, to keep the ever so arrogent average american always on the edge of their seat clammering for more. ive never bought it, and i never will, cold hard facts will do just fine for me thanks.

�10 x the hell� was never spoken of because it never happened.

Why do they say "the men and women" when speaking of troops in combat when it's only the men that do the fighting?

You said you only wanted reality---the fact is most people don�t want reality.

Zapata,

We don�t call the Vietcong heroes either. The Communist we fought in Vietnam were easy, it was the Communist in American that beat us, and won the war for their comrades---they were called hippies, but you probably knew that.

exactly my point sleeper, and I am glad that it was discovered so easily. The word 'hero' has lost any actual dignity originally attached to it, replaced by hollow propagandising (is that a word? )

Originally posted by General Zapata
exactly my point sleeper, and I am glad that it was discovered so easily. The word 'hero' has lost any actual dignity originally attached to it, replaced by hollow propagandising (is that a word?

)

Yes, that's the word ... but with a "z" I think.

In regards to the "communists" in the U.S. during the Viet War, I believe many of them were not truly communists but had more Socialist/Left leanings. The Hippies were actually divided into many subsets of belief although the majority were against the War as it was against the Ideas they expoused of Free Love and Peaceful Coexistance.

haha. I'm australian, so its with an 's'. *shakes fist* an 's'.......

Don't have to say you are Australian, just say that you speak/write in English.

Police in western countries have become increasingly paramilitarised. This is true of poorer countries too, but we expect that right?

�10 x the hell� was never spoken of because it never happened.

Why do they say "the men and women" when speaking of troops in combat when it's only the men that do the fighting?

there are many fanatic iraqi women who pick up the gun once their man has been slain. i have seen pictures of several iraqi women with AK in hand. they hate us just as much as the men, and are more then willing to die for their beleifes.

Originally posted by sleeper
We don�t call the Vietcong heroes either....it was the Communist in American that beat us, and won the war for their comrades---they were called hippies, but you probably knew that.

Well, that�s not entirely correct and if you knew anything about what the "hippies" were all about, you'd understand that. Sure, there were the Hanoi Jane types, but they were the minority. They weren�t all that way and grouping them together like that is no better than those nitwits calling a vet �baby killer�.

A true hero does something profound, disregarding their own safety to help another. While an unfortunate event, the shooting at Kent State would not qualify anyone for heroism. Martyrs maybe, but not heros. The firefighters who were running UP the stairwells at the WTC qualify, the man who was badly burned pulling 3 people out of a burning house does also. I have a hard time calling people who died in the name of a cause a hero.

As for the death of Carlo Giuliani, well I don't know what to say. A hero wearing a ski mask? hmmmmm I dunno about that one...

Peace,
BG

Originally posted by sleeper
Zapata,

We don�t call the Vietcong heroes either. The Communist we fought in Vietnam were easy, it was the Communist in American that beat us, and won the war for their comrades---they were called hippies, but you probably knew that.

Yeah that is a pretty poor concept of the hippie movement.
And just an FYI, Ho Chi Min appealed to the US for years and was totally ignored until he then appealed to the Russians, only then did the US enter the war in Vietnam. You need a good understanding of the IndoChina Opium Wars before you go hollering about the communist hippies in the US.

Well, to make the author's comparison valid, it would have to be:

Military = Police
Insurgents = Demonstrators

So the question would be, why don't we worship the police when they crack the noggin of a demonstrator?

As for all this analysis of hippies being socialists instead of communists, etc., it wasn't that complicated, really. A few hits on the bong, and these lyrics from Walking in Memphis come to mind:

She said, "Tell me are you a Christian, child?"
And i said, "Ma'am, I am tonight!"

Savvy?

I knew lots about the hippies I even smoked weed with them; most were very generous about sharing their drugs with GI�s.

I was young as were most of the soldiers, and drug use in the military was common and encouraged, especially for those who were destined to be on the front lines. My platoon received a special brew of weed, marijuana mixed with unnamed narcotics that when smoked made us capable of doing extra ordinary things while fighting. However, we were never sent into combat because Nixon began pulling troops out. I was saved by the hippies, although, I wasn�t looking to be saved.

I wasn�t there because I wanted to free the world from Communism; I joined to go to Vietnam as did many of those who served, for the adventure. Most of the guys in my company had been to Vietnam several times---and liked it there---the drugs, the booze the parties, the excitement of battle were the main draw.

The real Vietnam stories never made the papers---and many of those who were there don�t want the world to know the truth. The drug use, the killing of Americans by other Americans----black, white, Hispanic against each other, filled up many body bags and the Vietcong got the credit.

Nevertheless, I still believe the Vietnam war was for the good---in the long run---it open up the eyes of the world to the spread of Communism, not from the Vietnamese but from the Soviet Union and Red China---that�s who we fought in Vietnam, besides each other.


[edit on 18-11-2004 by sleeper]