John Llewellyn, an associate professor of communication at Wake Forest.
http://www.wfu.edu/wfunews/2003/030603c.html
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.)
The left lives in a fantasy world.
Labeling the spitting story an urban legend does not mean that something of this sort did not happen to someone somewhere...
In other words, the label is utterly worthless. Thanks, perfesser.
"John Llewellyn is an associate professor of communication at Wake Forest University"
Not a vet?
oooohhh.... A liberal "intellecti"... Not smart enough to win elections, but smart enough to give opinions and insult everyone else. Got it.
I was about to ping you to this (you were the first to come to mind) but you beat me to it.
More vile absurdities from the lying, amoralistic academia nutjobs.
jun 70 lax airport ..... all the wonderful california liberals.... vvaw.. spat, through eggs, urine in a bag, fecies, called us everything they could think of.... I wore my uniform home through Atlanta, to Fayetteville, NC. I had it cleaned and it hangs in my closet to this say to remind me of them... and Kerry ..... and Fonda....
Even if Dr. LLewellyn were right, which I don't believe for a second, he doesn't bother to cover what Kerry did to the vets when he admittedly lied to the Senate about their killing babies and other civilians. Llewellyn is way off track with this screed.
John Llewellyn, an associate professor of communication at Wake Forest.
http://www.wfu.edu/wfunews/2003/030603c.html
Scholar of Urban Legends?
Gosh...sounds like snopes...
I appreciate your service Race.
Cindy
Lemme tell you something. This Dr. will need a Dr if I ever get my hands on him.
They not only spit, but they threw human waste at our group.
Bull Shi'ite!
And you're still an idiot.
bttt
Heard of many people who were spat upon. In this case the issue becomes an "urban myth" when it's convenient to change history.
He forgets that the SOLDIER would, if he responded, be in serious trouble with his chain of command, and could expect to be court-martialed for assault, battery, and conduct unbecoming.
This makes me so mad...I'm shaking.
I don't know what to say.
I'll have to get some control before I do say anything because this is a total lie. That's all these so-called educated people do is lie!
And you can bet your bottom dollar they vote dem!!!!!!
Yeah.
He certainly can't do serious research interviewing those dopers at DU!
Give me a break.
Sounds like he's trying to start his own Urban Lie.
Welcome Home, soldier...
hand salute
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