Everyone is furious about this photo of kids climbing on a Vietnam memorial

A photographer named Matthew Munson took several photos during a recent visit to Washington, D.C., and one in particular is stirring up conversation about American history, parenting, and respect.

Munson shared his photos to Facebook, and there's some standard DC fare—that obelisk called the Washington Monument, some military memorials.

It's an image of the Vietnam Women's Memorial, which serves to honor the women who served during the U.S. war with Vietnam, from 1955 to 1975. Atop this statue is a young girl using it like playground equipment. On the ground, another young girl appears to be climbing up. All this as a military veteran in a wheelchair, presumably escorted by family members, goes by.

The man pushing the veteran's wheelchair has a look of palpable disgust. The veteran himself has an unplaceable, one-of-a-kind look that hardly suggests pleasant thoughts. And Munson's Internet audience, chiming in with their comments on this particular photo, are similarly disappointed.

"the sky-scanning person is also female; presumably another nurse looking for the desperately needed Dust-off"

Which is all absolute horsehockey: there were no women medics in the field in Vietnam. That sculpture is total fantasy for the women's groups.

All of the truly heroic "looking for a dustoff/medevac" was done by medics and corpsmen with the combat forces.

Damn thing has irritated me since it was put there.

Despite your private emails and public posts on an unrelated thread, I'm going to attempt to reply to you as politely as possible.

During my active duty USAF years, 1977-1986, I worked with and associated with many Vietnam war veterans, both combat and those simply combat era.
Not a lot of “Stolen Valor” attempts were going on during those years.
I met my friend Sue in 1982. At that time she was the “dependent spouse” of an active duty USAF TSgt.
I saw photos of her in uniform, numerous scars on her body, and had no reason to doubt any of her “war stories”, because she didn't talk about it often, and I knew by then not to ask ANY combat vet for more details than they cared to freely offer.
My dependent husband (former USAF) drove her on two occasions to the nearest VA hospital for treatment, bypassing the base hospital.
She was the correct age, her conversations with me, as an active duty USAF NCO neighbor in base housing, and her general attitude and demeanor added up to the point that I accepted her consistent “war stories”.

I wouldn't call her a “lady” in same sarcastic way your snarky little comments have added up at this point.

I am, however, extremely familiar with the attitude.

My mother actually owned combat boots during the Korean war.
Both she and my father both wore them on active duty in the USAF in Greenland, where they met. He was an MP, she was a radio operator. Neither called themselves combat veterans.

I am not a combat veteran.I've also never claimed to be a combat veteran.
But I am a military veteran.From a family with a long history of proud military service.

You sir, may take your little hissy fit games elsewhere.

I have now reached the upper limits of my ability to be polite.

Thank you for your response and thank you for your service. I too have been taken in by war stories from people who were just good story tellers.

You are correct, that not so long ago, it wasn't a good thing to talk to anyone about combat - we veterans were shunned at best and sometimes even assaulted after our war. For some strange reason we began to see phonies come out of the woodwork later and it looks like you were taken in just as I was.

I'll quit bugging you - I'm just happy that you are the honest one in this story.

"I have now reached the upper limits of my ability to be polite. "

Oh, trust me: you never even started with a semblance of courtesy!

Lying about combat is a serious matter and your made-up story about "Sue, the wounded Vietnam combat veteran EOD tech" was so obviously false from the get-go that only a gum-chewing, comic book-reading adolescent would have believed it.

If you can't be honest, don't post. If you do post false things, expect return fire.

Comes with the territory.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.