As callous as this may sound, I think the American public puts far to much emphasis on human death. People die. Everyone dies. Its just a matter of when and where. Death is guaranteed.
This country has lost its stomach for real death, yet seems to possess an insatiable appetite for death in fantasy. As a culture we cannot get enough of it in print, film, and music.
We appear to have become a culture that prefers fantasy at the expense of reality. It is as if we are culture in denial.
This is now the alternative reality...the parallel universe we live in.
Hollywood stars and producers peddle a never ending stream of death and misery, yet these same peddlers are the most vociferous opponents to the war; real death.
The contemptuous comments of Sgt Barnes in the Oliver Stones 'Platoon' sums it up with delicious irony: "Death? What do you guys know about it?".
Look around you...look at the youth of this country...our future leaders. The only thing they know of death is that its not real; its a fantasy.
When I look at WWII and its enormous cost in terms of human life, I can reconcile the tragedy knowing that death is part of life.
We as a nation have gone soft, and have forgotten that sometimes people have to die, so that others may live, and though tragic as it is, its normal.