Posted on 04/17/2019 8:29:11 AM PDT by GuavaCheesePuff
It ain’t what happens here that’s important. It’s what’s happening back there. Lieutenant, you’d hardly know there’s a war on. It’s in the papers, and the college kids run around screaming about it, but that’s it. Airplane drivers still drive their airplanes. Businessmen still run their businesses. College kids still go to college. It’s like nothing really happened, except to other people. It isn’t touching anybody but us. —Staff Sergeant Gilliland, “Fields of Fire,” by James Webb.
All of us in or recently out of military uniform have experienced the reflexive thanks of the nation. We are thanked for our service, both individually and en masse, on television, at baseball games, in church, at the bar, at the diner; by rock stars, presidents, CEOs, the elderly, little kids.
(Excerpt) Read more at thefederalist.com ...
You can’t tell me what to do. You’re not my dad.
I think this article is silly. I volunteered to serve and you can thank me all you want. And I am not ashamed I didn’t see any combat....I’m grateful.
Sums up my feelings. I never thank guys for their service. I compare it to seeing a famous actor at a restaurant and going to their table and telling them how you loved them in some movie or something.
Tell that to Nam vets who were spit on when they came home. A lot of them had crushed feelings when the Iraq war vets came home to a parade. I went to a Welcome Home Nam vets with my folks (Dad and Uncle served) in Branson, MO - had the traveling Wall there. Over 70,000 vets plus their families.
My standard response, time permitting:
“It was
—always an honor
—always a privilege
—often a pleasure
and never a right.”
+. I still shake hands and welcome home every vet I see. I do thank the younger generations for their service. No one in uniform pays for a meal in my presence. I make arrangements to pay anon.
Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan has left a raw feeling in Americans mouth.
Imagine what America would be without these wasteful wars.
Think of America post-World War II and the Korean War.
When I finally moved back to my home state, Pennsylvania, a couple of years after my active duty ended, it sent me a check for $750 which, in 1973, was enough to buy me a new motorcycle. That was some thanks with a bit of weight.
Just say you’re welcome, you rude jackass. Were you raised in a damned barn or something?
When my dad sees a Nam vet he tells them “Welcome home brother” and that’s it.
You’re probably too young to remember, but when they have those big parades after Desert Storm. It was widely talked-about and understood that the outpouring of love and support for the troops was kind of America’s way of apologizing to the Vietnam vets. Sometimes you just got to get over yourself
When I see ex-military people wearing hats or jackets that show where they served, I figure they’re proud of their service and appreciate any recognition of that.
I make it a point to thank every service man or veteran that I see...I thank the police also for the job they do.
We sure weren’t thanked when we returned from Vietnam and I do NOT want that to happen again....
I’ve had more than one instance of younger vets reacting very negatively to being thanked. It was something I was raised doing, and did almost reflexively, but now I don’t. I figure that none of them are looking for thanks anyway, and the younger ones often very much don’t want it.
I think that “thank you for your service” is shallow and irritating. Most often it comes from someone who didn’t serve. I’d prefer hearing “I am volunteering” or “My kid is volunteering”. The number of people that have not served is incredible. Maybe they might just apologize, “I’m sorry, I did not serve when I could have or should have.”
Will any one of you who has a servant plowing or keeping sheep say to him when he has come in from the field, ‘Come at once and recline at table’? Will he not rather say to him, ‘Prepare supper for me, and dress properly, and serve me while I eat and drink, and afterward you will eat and drink’? Does he thank the servant because he did what was commanded? So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’”—Luke 17
It’s the idea behind this, not the direct application. I find it liberating. Cuts through Thank me!/Don’t thank me! baloney.
So for you an actor paid to recite script in a movie is tantamount to risking one’s life in service of the United States?
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