HANOI KERRY PING
"MOUNT 52 : REPEAT"
Posted on 11/10/2004 3:35:05 PM PST by mykdsmom
WINSTON-SALEM -- Last week voters went to the polls to select a vision for the future. Now Americans must find a way forward together. This week, as we honor service and sacrifice on Veterans Day, an image from this political season must be put to rest.
The presidential campaign featured the resurgence of a myth from the early 1990s. That myth is that soldiers returning from Vietnam were spit upon by citizens or war protesters. That claim has been used to turn honest differences of opinion about the war into toxic indictments.
As a scholar of urban legends I am usually involved with accounts of vanishing hitchhikers and involuntary kidney donors. These stories are folklore that harmlessly reveals the public imagination. However, accounts of citizens spitting on returning soldiers -- any nation's soldiers -- are not harmless stories. These tales evoke an emotional firestorm.
I have studied urban legends for nearly 20 years and have been certified as an expert on the subject in the federal courts. Nonetheless, it dawned on me only recently that the spitting story was a rumor that has grown into an urban legend. I never wanted to believe the story but I was afraid to investigate it for fear that it could be true.
Why could I not identify this fiction sooner? The power of the story and the passion of its advocates offer a powerful alchemy of guilt and fear -- emotions not associated with clearheadedness.
Labeling the spitting story an urban legend does not mean that something of this sort did not happen to someone somewhere. You cannot prove the negative -- that something never happened. However, most accounts of spitting emerged in the mid-1980s only after a newspaper columnist asked his readers who were Vietnam vets if they had been spit upon after the war (an odd and leading question to ask a decade after the war's end). The framing of the question seemed to beg for an affirmative answer.
• • •
In 1998 sociologist and Vietnam veteran Jerry Lembcke published "The Spitting Image: Myth, Media and the Legacy of Viet Nam." He recounts a study of 495 news stories on returning veterans published from 1965 to 1971. That study shows only a handful (32) of instances were presented as in any way antagonistic to the soldiers. There were no instances of spitting on soldiers; what spitting was reported was done by citizens expressing displeasure with protesters.
Opinion polls of the time show no animosity between soldiers and opponents of the war. Only 3 percent of returning soldiers recounted any unfriendly experiences upon their return.
So records from that era offer no support for the spitting stories. Lembcke's research does show that similar spitting rumors arose in Germany after World War I and in France after its Indochina war. One of the persistent markers of urban legends is the re-emergence of certain themes across time and space.
There is also a common-sense method for debunking this urban legend. One frequent test is the story's plausibility: how likely is it that the incident could have happened as described? Do we really believe that a "dirty hippie" would spit upon a fit and trained soldier? If such a confrontation had occurred, would that combat-hardened soldier have just ignored the insult? Would there not be pictures, arrest reports, a trial record or a coroner's report after such an event? Years of research have produced no such records.
Lembcke underscores the enduring significance of the spitting story for this Veterans Day. He observes that as a society we are what we remember. The meaning of Vietnam and any other war is not static but is created through the stories we tell one another. To reinforce the principle that policy disagreements are not personal vendettas we must put this story to rest.
Our first step forward is to recognize that we are not a society that disrespects the sacrifices of our servicemembers. We should ignore anyone who tries to tell us otherwise. Whatever our aspirations for America, those hopes must begin with a clear awareness of who we are not.
(John Llewellyn is an associate professor of communication at Wake Forest University.)
Another friend Ret. COL USAF said they spit on him..he was enroute to his mom's funeral having come all the way from Vietnam for it.
I have news for you Llewellyn. We veterans won every major engagement with the VC and communist north. The military did NOT LOSE THE WAR....YOU and your ilk lost it here at home. Damn you to hell for that. You have that knowledge to carry with you for eternity.
Insults did happen to us upon our return from the war. Most of us were under orders to avoid provocations. Some of us could not.
Your evil against us is uncovered for all to see and it's ugliness has no redemption.
This is how the hippy dippy types who protested the war make themselves feel better about themselves. It's called denial.
First, thanks for your service and second, thanks for "beating the crap out of a love child" for spitting on you, and third, thanks for validating my comments about kalifornica.
Thank you not only for your fine service to the USA, but for beating the snot out of a snot faced cretan.
Marine, no better friend, no worse enemy.
This is a very disturbing story. The " academic " dismisses the reality of returning Vietnam Vets as an "urban legend" and says "we should ignore anyone who tries to tell us otherwise". He is right that the "meaning of Vietnam is created through the stories we tell each other."
An entire generation accepted the "stories" John Kerry and his ilk told this country about our soldiers activities and who these men were. The entire country believed the lies..the "stories". There wasn't the chance to tell the "true stories" ..and there were no "embedded reporters". And John Kerry was never made to apologize, say that he had lied, so the "stories" were kept alive as true until the Swiftees broke through decades of the Big Lie.
This is the first time in our country's history since Vietnam War that the Truth, the stories of Truth have come out!
I would like this "so called communications academic" to get out of his cushy, ivory tower job to really get into "communications". I am not a Vietnam Vet. However I have been a psychotherapist for over 20 years and I have "communicated" with Vietnam Vets. Their reality is true. This academic has probably never heard of Post Traumatic Stress disorder. He has probably never heard the vet "stories" about how their return after the war really was. There was no validation about what they had been through and no recognition, and in addition they had to face Kerry's lies. Kerry's traitorous behavior was not just limited to the effects on soldiers and POW's in Vietnam, but also for those that never had any treatment for the reality of the war when they came home. And worse than that they had to "hide" who they were because they were not validated when they came home.
Today, when soldiers come home, we recognize the trauma they have been through and validate their honor and their pain and offer help and support. We help them see the true meaning of their valiant effort, hoping they can heal, not only physically but also psychologically and spiritually.
This academic, like John Kerry, continues the lies and dishonours brave soldiers. to do that is not just political drival....To do that is a crime against the soul.
Call me, Dr. LLewellyn. I'd be glad to "communicate" with you.
Support for our Viet Nam Vets ~ Bump!
General Quarters, General Quarters
This is not a drill
All hands man your battle stations
General Quarters
I came home from Viet Nam in June of '66 and was stationed at Ft Hamilton,Bklyn NY and Ft Wadsworth, Staten Island untill I ETS'd in April of '68.......The demonstartions were often and as roudy as New Yorkers can be,,,, Don't tell me about being SPIT AT AND TRASH THROWN AT ... you know not what you are talking about. Buy the way......Where were you during that time and weren't you watching the same media that we were ??
Well my first thought was to be a bit caustic, but I wanted to make a point. I just know that when folks get in my face I really don't listen to their point of view. Just thought I would give the pointed headed little professor something to chew on. Am curious if he will respond.
What we have here is the begining of the left's rewriting of history so they can bring someone like Kerry to the national level without this becoming a problem again.
Because now it can be said that this researcher of Urban legends found it not to be true.
Did it happen a lot ?
as the exception, not the rule I think the story was spread with a broad brush.
I don't know where you were stationed after returning to CONUS but on the west coast (SF) and east coast (Fr Bragg NC) we WERE SPIT ON etc. So in my humble opinion, it was the rule not the exception. Maybe it depends on where you were while still in uniform.
I haven't sent an email yet, but here's the one I'm thinking of:
Well sir, I have never been certified as anything by a Federal jury, but I have written enough articles for publication (and edited them) to know when someone is covering up for lack of research by talking in generalities. I happen to know who wrote the article. He was a fairly well-known columnist. The mention of his name, and the date of publication of his column, along with some kind of at least argumentative analysis showing the dates of publication of these accounts might lead me to believe you did some research on it. As it is, all you do is quote another individual. Further, your "research" which any 11th grade English teacher would reject out of hand, consists of reading a book written by someone else and regurgitating his claims. Where did you get your doctorate, Bill and Ted's Excellent Graduate School?Does that work?
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