THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS

Today a good peice from Slate that more articulately explains the sort of truth distortion that has dissappointed me and to which I myself have fallen victim. Slate's peice discusses the paradox of the war autobiography. But yet in everything I have read about the New Republic "scandal", people's shock at hearing soldiers make fun of a victim's melted face doesnt sound that alarming to me anymore. I need to read all of the NR peices but frankly from what I've heard about the points in contention, soldiers making fun of even the most horrific things is totally believable, for me it would be what would make the peice believable frankly.

http://www.slate.com/id/2171840

But because soldiers make fun of victims, does that neccessarily make them inhumane? Or , in fact, deeply human? Such emotionally driven politically incorrect spasms are pretty frequent amongst a decent number of folks I have encountered. My observations don't make an expert, but my experiences with soldiers of various ranks have taught me that nothing, and I mean NOTHING, is off limits to soldier humor. There are countless words for penis, vagina, sex, women, men, kids, foreigners, religions, weapons, you name it and there is an obscene name for it in the field. The more PC its supposed to be, the more inappropriate language it will receive. Its the way they make the horrifyingly obscene bearable I think...by making it funny you can laugh and get through it.

These jokes are not because our troops are callous, ignorant, or unmanaged, but because humor is a very human way of dealing with pain and horror. We make fun of that which we fear or feel guilty about, its a classic thing to do. A part of me has imagined what it could have been like to sit at a table with soldiers and victims mixed. How awkward both parties must have felt. The soldiers seeing the terrible effects of IED damage on a woman's face, the woman feeling a mixed sense of embarrassment, fear and anger. Neither side knowing how to handle this situation. (And if you think you do, you are lying to yourself). The silence making everyone squeemish...then someone (probably "that guy") had to say something. And when you put your average 19-30 year- old guy in a room with something that makes him feel bad, 9 times out of 10 you will get a joke of some kind. Its how they handle it, the end. What those soldiers did is perfectly believable but it doesnt make them monsters to me.

A friend of mine is a lieutenant in the Army and after being out in the field for months, he took leave for New Years Eve to have dinner with myself and a group of other civilian friends of mine. He knew a few people at the table but not most of them.

Throughout the night he appalled the table with jokes about anything from sex to missing limbs to farts to ejaculate. This guy is a good friend of mine and prior to spending alot of time out in the field rarely spoke in such a way. At first it pissed me off, but then I realized he was nervous and was resorting to the only form of social communication he had been using for nearly a year. I respect this guy alot, he serves his country very well and when interacting with him one on one is deeply personal and thoughtful. But group situations, new faces and a short amount of time to adjust to civilian "speak" probably was just too much to ask. He was doing things and living in a way that no one at the table could relate to. No one knew how to ask about his job, to exchange similar experiences or quibble intellectually with him on the long range gun power of the Chinese military. With a few more days at home my friend would probably settle down and regain his ability to socialize non-offensively, but for now it was how he was coping. And that was okay frankly. I think the military asks alot, we all ask alot from our soldiers and while this kind of behavior isnt "excusable" I do think its explainable.

I have spoken with soldiers about their use of humor and sarcasm(and written about it in a previous blog I think), for some of their jokes seriously offend the hell out of me, or just shock me at how ruthless they can be. I've been given answers like "It's how you deal" or "What else should we say" and that answer has to be good enough for me. Sure, I want a better answer, I want some neat pyscho babble about fear and insecurity, I want them to be more self aware. But those are my selfish civilian needs and expectations. I want them to make sense of their world for me, so I can make sense of mine.

Im also reminded (although I am trying to keep this brief), of an situation I was in amongst civilians that reminded me of the cruelty the NR reporter describes. I was in San Diego, land of the beautiful people, visiting friends of mine. I had arrived with a few friends of my own to their house but they were gone. We hung out in the courtyard of their apartment building and waited. During which, a young mother came out with her son who had some sort of birth defect which caused his head to be mishapen and his facial structure to be somewhat crooked. Despite his "abnormalities" he was beautiful and we played with him until my friends arrived.

When they did, they looked at me in amazement, as if I was playing with a baby bigfoot and literally asked in front of the mother "what are you doing!?!". I was appalled. Here these are, very well educated and priveleged people and they stared at the child as if he were a monster. The mother withdrew with her child, certainly embarrassed. Later that night, we were all hanging outside and the mother and child returned. People whispered and stared at the child as he skipped around looking at everything. Then a very svelt, gorgeous blonde scooted over to him and- keeping distance from him- yelped at him saying "no, dont touch that!!" when he approached the food table. It made me so sick I apologized to the mother and I left the party immediately. So to me, its not offensive that "these soldiers" would act so inappropriately, but that people, in general, sometimes really suck.

We want these soldiers to detail everything, be brutally honest and then when they do and we don't like what we hear, we call them liars or miscreants. I can't help but think of a quote I heard once, that consistently applies to the revolving door of "truth" I hear up at Walter Reed and the truth tug o' war I read in the papers: "Its not that I told a lie, its the the truth changed" and another that a Navy engineer once told me "Well, thats the truth, but its not accurate".

What makes a memory true? If they are true to the soldier, if that is how he or she felt, shouldnt that matter? Is the truth allowed to change with time? I think if its not what you like to hear, or see, or learn about our troops then that is YOUR problem, as it has been mine. These people do something the rest of us dont want to do and cant. If they deal with it in ways that seem grotesque to us, or unbelievable or obscene, so be it.

Making monsters out of them to me only proves who the real monsters are, those that sit and treat these people's stories as entertainment to be digested and debated rather than just heard and pondered. Sometime's its obscene, boring or callous, sometimes its down right sick, but my question is, what makes you so interested?



"It seems very pretty," she said when she had finished it,

"but it's rather hard to understand!" (You see she didn't like to confess even to herself, that she couldn't make it out at all.)

"Somehow it seems to fill my head with ideas -- only I don't exactly know what they are!

However, somebody killed something: that's clear, at any rate -- -" Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There

LEMMINGS


Then there are some days when I really draw a curtain around my feelings about the war, about the vets / soldiers, about the "insurgents" and terrorists and you know what....

Very very rich men have deceived very very poor and uneducated boys into committing suicide for them. On both sides. I mean lets look at it: in the West you have big rich guys with their own agendas coercing younger guys (who are usually pretty religious) into going off to "save the world" in the Middle East. And then over there, you have what? Very rich guys herding young men who feel optionless and who are also usually religious, in order to do their bidding. You think Osama or George or Muqtada or John F. is strapping a ruck sack or a bomb to their back and heading over there? Shit no. And I look at my generation of men, of young men, and what I have heard them say about their lives...that they feel meaningless, that they want to do something extraordinary, that they fear sitting in a cubicle for the rest of their lives and that they dont know what their doing with their lives. We've outsourced most of our manual labor and expect these guys to be happy typing on a computer. The world in a short time became solely about fulfilling every womans fantasy and desire. With mens desires being considered animalistic or selfish. Oh how the tables have turned. And executive Mom wonders why her son wants to go to Iraq.....

Some days I feel like telling them that they are employees, just like the rest of us, they just dont sit in cubicls they sit in the sandbox. Sometimes I feel like telling them that they are just stupid. Some days I dont feel sorry for one of them, if you want to go off and get yourself hurt for some rich asshole who doesnt give a shit about you then fine. These boys want their war and they want it bad. My generation of men have been raised to believe that most male skills are useless and we've stuck so many of these boys on drugs to cure their "ADHD". For fuck sake they are boys! Do we have any drugs to "cure" women of their constant paranoia, vanity or jealousy? No men have just been told to shut up and that women's flaws are about "needs" or "ambition".

The feminist agenda at some point, transformed from being about equality to being about domination. The oppressed became their oppressors. Schools, the workplace, social gatherings are all geared to appease and comply with womens needs, expectations and standards. Classrooms are for women now, and I guess they deserve it after years of oppression right? But in order to raise the status of women and girls does that mean we have to lower the status of men and relegate them to bullet sponges? Hillary voted for the war, so don't buy it for a second when she tells you she opposes the "Vast Right Wing Machine"....she runs the Vast Left Wing Machine that doesnt give a shit about these guys either.

I belive boys and girls are lost. Boys dont they feel like they dont have a role and the war gives them something to do. Girls believe they have to become president or a CEO in order to be successful. But genetic heritage is a serious thing and it doesnt disappear just because Title 9 is passed. On either side. I'm not defending male dominance but I can't abide female dominance either. Talk about mission creep.

Shit I cant escape the thought that sometimes I think feminism caused this whole thing. I mean look at it. Not that either side needs a legitimate reason to fight but I do think that both sides are fueled by some interesting gender issues. The boys over there don't want their women turning into our women and the boys over here dont want our women to become their women. Boys on both sides feel desperate, aimless and have urges that only a woman or a gun could satisfy and they don't know what to do about it. The real moral nightmare is that there are old men in charge who have these guys on a leash for completely different reasons.


I dont know where I'm going with this post, but its just some crap I had to get down on paper. It will probably be revised at some point. Sorry for the rant.

WOULD THE REAL CRAZY PLEASE STAND UP


It’s been several months, hell half a year nearly since my last entry and as I read through my own words I think two things: Jesus I talk a lot and wow this is a boring blog. But at the same time I never wrote it to be exciting to anyone else, I wrote it for me. I think there are some gems of clarity amidst most of the aimless ranting but I think this is also why I haven't been writing. At some point, as I had indicated in previous posts, my perspective-heck my motive- for volunteering and befriending veterans at WRAMC became rather clouded.

Course I've also had some logistical problems, one being that my sister wrecked my car and it’s taken me a while to get it fixed. Not having a car has pretty much put the breaks on me getting up to the hospital frequently, which I lament. But I guess the break was needed. I intend to reactivate my volunteer activity once I am driving next month, but will do so with restraint. I have still interacted with several of my friends up there and those that have left, but for a while there it all got to be too much.

And I feel like a wimp saying that and have felt like a wimp. Sure the car thing really cramped my style but I think a part of me was just really tired. Before I knew it, I was caught in a bunch of Malogne House drama and it really started taking a toll on me emotionally and professionally. Also the Washington Post articles brought increased scrutiny and suspicion from both patients and staff at the Malogne House. The Rec Director who used to call me frequently with volunteer opportunities stopped and the USO had to issue an email about volunteer decorum. I am not saying they threw the gauntlet down but the door was not as wide open as it had been for civilians trying to stay close to patients.

And rightfully so. A reporter had made herself into a Trojan horse and found a way to breech the "perceived" code of silence about conditions at Walter Reed. I've commented on her work repeatedly but combined with my own drama I think I really had just had enough for a while. I also just didn’t know what to do.

I had made friends with a few patients and we frequently hung out socially. I would occasionally do them favors (give rides, bring meals) but after a while with a few of them I just felt really manipulated. I went back and forth...is it okay that they are thinking selfishly, I mean they have given so much right? But then I started hearing things....once you spend enough time at the Malogne House no one is immune from accusation or suspicion. On the surface everyone seems so supportive (and in many cases they are) but behind closed doors patients talk a lot of shit. I suppose it is the same way when you are in the field (from what I've heard). And it makes sense; just because you get assigned to a unit doesn’t mean you have to like everyone. But the drama there is really overwhelming; at least it overwhelmed and disappointed me.

Mind you, I have never claimed that these folks are perfect. But I guess, and in two specific cases that I cared deeply about, I was really let down to find out that most of what these two patients had told me was a lie.

A lie. Shit what is a lie at this point? Hearing that a patient is basically faking her injury or that another patient is not taking his meds so he can receive a higher discharge / disability payment was pretty discouraging. Not that I was discouraged by these individuals mind you, but that the truth about their circumstances really made it hard to know what the right thing for me to do was.

Their reality was and is their reality. If the female patient I spoke about is faking the severity of her injury, maybe it’s because she doesn’t know how to go home, or has nothing to go home to. But I have to be honest here; I think this girl was pretty fucked up before she joined the military frankly. I think she’s been a drama queen from day one and really liked being a drop dead gorgeous girl in the military. Time after time she would tell me about the drama in her life and how all these guys were assholes and yet I would see her flirt her ass off with almost anyone. I'm no psychologist but this woman has severe mental problems, whether or not they were intensified by war is certain, and what is more certain is that she is the military's problem now.

At first when I met her I was truly sympathetic to her plight. It’s not easy being a woman in the military, and certainly not easy to be a woman in the Malogne House. While there are many families there, there are a lot of very young and very horny guys there to deal with. Watching her interact with various patients I began to understand why she was always getting into trouble. This girl is a major flirt and she lies like hell. About her past relationships, about her injuries, heck told me she was raped out in Iraq and then later laughed it off as a joke. I hated the feelings that I had about her. I hated how confused I felt around her and how manipulated. But I have to think that this is part of the readjustment back to civilian life right? But I’m not so sure. It wasn't just her; everyone I met up there would tell you one thing about their life only to have it refuted behind their back as soon as they left the room. I had gotten, (what I thought) was very close to this patient, only to find out that most of what she had told me was a lie. But if it was truth to her, did it matter? Is truth just a matter of perspective?

One of the guys that she had "befriended" used to act like her protective boyfriend. Pretty soon word came to me that she and he were fighting and weren't friends "no more". She said that he was a liar and he said she was a liar. They both accused each other of misusing their meds or being addicted to the wrong ones. The guy ended up going home and getting married over Christmas, apparently he had been engaged the entire time. When he told me he was married he looked at me confused and said "You knew I was engaged!" I certainly did not and he certainly never made it clear to me (nor did he act like it) that he was engaged. The female patient eventually went home for a while and the male patient returned and busied himself with getting out of the Malogne House so he could set up a new life with his young wife. Who apparently is an illegal immigrant....(?!)

Great.

Weeks became months and I didn't hear from either of them for a while. Which was fine with me as I really didn't know what to do or who to trust. I didn't go up to Walter Reed looking for a new social life and resigned myself to pulling back on the social aspects of my vet relationships and returning to more structured volunteer work.

Months later, I approached a third party adult (a Mother that I have referenced before) who I deeply trusted about these two patients. She knew them both closely as well, as they were all sort of permanent residents there. She explained to me how the female patient was faking the severity of her injury and that doctors had basically told her that there was nothing wrong. So what was she still doing there? The mother told me that she’s basically riding the system until she is forced to go home. No one is taking care of this woman basically. She is young, obviously psychologically troubled and is literally left alone in her room until the military gives her new orders. No one can get a straight answer from her about why her family isn’t more involved, or about the progress with her injuries. I've been tempted to march up to the hospital myself and demand answers about her, if only to try to get her the help she really needs.

Oh yeah and the male patient that I had trusted even more than the female one got a job selling guns in MD and apparently had to move out of the Malogne House because the military had found out he was living there with an illegal. Apparently he is not taking his meds because he wants to get a bigger disability payment.

Deeeep exhale.....

So I decided to approach the male patient with the information I had learned. I tried to trust that he would be honest with me and I wanted to approach him as a concerned friend rather than an accuser. When I asked about his meds he told me that his doctors had put him on the wrong medication and that is why he wasn’t' taking anything. Oh yeah and he also discredited the mother I had spoken to. He began to tell me stories about how "she was crazy" and "that family is fucked up". I felt as if I had no where to turn for "truth". The fact is that three years later, and months after this has all occurred I still can’t sort out my feelings.

When I first started going up there, as you might have read (for the few that are) I thought I was the one missing something as a civilian. I thought I was the one that was confused, and while I think that is still true, I guess I was naive thinking that would find the truth with the soldiers themselves.




So months have passed. I miss my friends, at least I missed the times we had before I really knew them I guess. For months I felt really shitty, about myself, about them, about the war in general. I had veteran fatigue and became pretty depressed. When I first started at the hospital I thought the world of these guys and girls and believed that everyone just had it wrong. But now I'm not so sure. I've been told that I am holding our military to too high a standard, that within any organization there are liars, cheats and thieves. I chewed on that a while, and it makes sense. I had made boy and girl scouts out of soldiers with checkered pasts. I did this selfishly, because it what I needed to believe. But believing something enough doesn't make it true apparently.

My friend is a union electrician and says that the union is the same way. Heck my cozy white collar office is the same way when I really think about it. Shit- I have my own skeletons and issues and fibs I tell to coworkers and even friends. Why did these patients owe me the truth when all they wanted was some company and a few laughs. I mistook myself for a confidant, when I was more like the bartender in an airport. People spill their guts, brag about shit and then leave forever. You can strip away all the bullshit we all tell eachother, the characters we play, but civilian or soldier we are all human. Was the simple lesson to be learn here that people aren't perfect?

When did I absolve myself and them of being human and flawed? Why did war change what I expected from people? Why did I assume it forced people to be honest, or somehow better people? How could I have been so delusional? Who's the real crazy one now eh? Did I deceive them into thinking that I was their friend when I was really maybe just a peeping tom, trying to sort my own shit out. Who is the liar? Who is using who? Me or them?