I don’t want to stand up in a crowded airplane and sing a song. A fallen soldier deserves dignified quiet, not a celebration of bombs bursting in air.
Just as the NFL thugs don’t understand the anthem, neither do the “sing it for the fallen” people. The song is a celebration of America—all of it. This is the soldiers, sailors, Marines, as well as the construction workers, engineers, pizza makers, and stay at home moms. It celebrates a nation of no specific ethnicity or ancestry, a nation where every person is nobility and is also a person who serves in their own way.
If you want to honor the troops, demand that the wars be won in the most brutal way possible, utterly destroying the enemy, and then let the troops come home.
Good post.
While the FA was wrong in the reason she allegedly gave to the Dr. Gaudry, there is a decorum and protocol to be followed as a fallen service member is taken “home” for burial – it is about the solemnity and dignity of transporting the fallen and demands respectful silence with hats off, hands on hearts, heads bowed, military and former military members saluting, all in respect for the fallen, and for the family and for the military member(s) accompanying the body. It is not the time to break out in song, doing the “flash mob thing” even if the song is the National Anthem, even if the intentions are, well - well-intentioned.
Likewise, it would also not be appropriate for those gathered to watch the changing of the guard at Arlington National Cemetery to break out in singing the National Anthem (or for that matter, taking a knee) either just because they “feel” moved to do so and want to be part of it. I’ve been there twice and would never think to break the silence and solemnity of the ceremony. And the transport of a fallen soldier is really no different. It is the time to pay respect and not break into song and make it about “me”.
If any of you haven’t yet, watch the movie “Taking Chance”. It is based on real-life events, Lt. Col. Michael Strobl, a volunteer military escort officer who accompanies the body of 19-year-old Marine Chance Phelps back to his hometown of Dubois, Wyoming. It is extremely well done, non-political and Keven Bacon is superb as Lt. Col. Michael Strob and I watch it every Memorial Day and every time, I cry.
It shows the how the military, in the case the Marine Corps, follows a strict protocol that honors the fallen, escorting the body from the time he lands in Dover AFB and his body is respectfully prepared for burial by the military mortuary, and all the way, along the many flights and transports then finally home to his family and for burial. It also shows how other people are moved by Chance’s and Lt. Col. Strobl’s journey home along the way. And no one breaks out in song.