Well, Armistice Day was specifically commemorative of the armistice that ended WWI, so I suppose the change was to commemorate/honor veterans more generally?
My grandfather never spoke of what he did in the military to his sons or granddaughters - we learned more from one newspaper interview he gave in his first week home (before he and my grandmother married) than ever from his mouth. He was at Guadalcanal and had been drafted by the Washington Redskins before he was drafted by the US military--he'd never got to play a single game.
He was deeply moved by what he was forced to do. By killing, by seeing his friends killed, by nearly being killed himself.
It was never romanticized. Over the years he wept each time he learned of another death of any of the 1st Marine Battalion. Quietly, without fanfare or comment. His silence was far weightier than any words he could have said.
Honoring his memory and the memory of others who have served isn't about honoring killing -- it's about honoring the willingness to trust that their actions and deaths will prevent the killing and suffering of so many more, and further, being willing to follow orders to that end knowing that their death is not only
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Um - in what way do my feelings constitute baggage for any past or present soldier? That statement confused me.
As I said in the OP, I'm in no way arguing that anyone else shouldn't honor veterans however they see fit. I just find it problematic, myself, and I would far rather honor someone for other, I would say better, reasons than warfare. Therefore I do not really observe this holiday.
"By extension, honoring those who do the killing is to me just a little questionable."
I don't disagree with you that wars are usually entirely unhelpful and could be avoided.
But I disagree that this is day of remembrance is about KILLING. It's about remembering the fallen, and that those who did not were willing to do so because they believed (whether you think it was erroneously, or no) doing so would ultimately save lives. And then returned home and lived again... did not allow the horror and the death to be how they were forever defined. It's not a day about glory nor about war (per se, armistice is about ENDING war), and I think to characterize it as such is a dis-service to remembrance as a show of respect and acknowledgment of loss and personal sacrifice and honorable action (because there certainly WAS that, no matter what you think of the decisions that lead to the context in which those actions were done
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There are thousands of veterans who never saw a battlefield, but served their country all the same. The National Guard come to mind first. These men and women have been called in to help on every natural and man made disaster in the book. They sandbag rivers, pull people out of buildings, aid the hurt. The Coast Guard, who by definition are part of the armed services but who we so often forget. The folks are willing to go out in the worst of weather to find those lost at sea. My nephew Gil is one of these servicemen. And yes, he has jumped into a rough ocean to pull an unlucky boater out.
It is all, battlefield or no battlefield, service to our country that should be remembered.
I completely understand where you're coming from, I too feel on some level that war is senseless, but will admit that I do feel that sometimes it's something humans have to resort to when all else has failed. In the Gita, a Hindu religious scripture, there's a beautiful back and forth between Arjun and Lord Krishna about this. Arjun is hesitant about going out into battle where he seems fellow kinsmen he grew up with standing on the opposing side. Lord Krishna understands his concern, embraces him for it, but then tells him that some times human nature takes such a sharp turn for the worse, that strength and battle is needed in order to allow good to prevail again
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Here in the UK we rather confusingly have two dates which are marked: Armistice Day itself (11th November, because of the end of WW1) and Remembrance Sunday, which is the nearest Sunday to 11th November. Two minute silences tend to be held at 11 am on both dates; when I was younger it was mostly Remembrance Sunday that was noted, but in recent years there's been a resurgence of interest in silent remembrance on both dates. I suspect there's a combination of causes for that: it began with the 50th and then 60th anniversaries of the end of WW2, and has probably been emphasised too with the resurgence of army losses through Iraq and Afghanistan (after a brief lull following the more-or-less-end of the Troubles in Northern Ireland).
Like many people I do feel ambivalent about it; it's hard not to feel conflicted when so many lives - military and civilian, let's not forget - are currently being lost in conflicts that I'm not sure should be taking place and may well not be achieving anything. This is made harder for me by the slogan which
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He was deeply moved by what he was forced to do. By killing, by seeing his friends killed, by nearly being killed himself.
It was never romanticized. Over the years he wept each time he learned of another death of any of the 1st Marine Battalion. Quietly, without fanfare or comment. His silence was far weightier than any words he could have said.
Honoring his memory and the memory of others who have served isn't about honoring killing -- it's about honoring the willingness to trust that their actions and deaths will prevent the killing and suffering of so many more, and further, being willing to follow orders to that end knowing that their death is not only ( ... )
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As I said in the OP, I'm in no way arguing that anyone else shouldn't honor veterans however they see fit. I just find it problematic, myself, and I would far rather honor someone for other, I would say better, reasons than warfare. Therefore I do not really observe this holiday.
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I don't disagree with you that wars are usually entirely unhelpful and could be avoided.
But I disagree that this is day of remembrance is about KILLING. It's about remembering the fallen, and that those who did not were willing to do so because they believed (whether you think it was erroneously, or no) doing so would ultimately save lives. And then returned home and lived again... did not allow the horror and the death to be how they were forever defined. It's not a day about glory nor about war (per se, armistice is about ENDING war), and I think to characterize it as such is a dis-service to remembrance as a show of respect and acknowledgment of loss and personal sacrifice and honorable action (because there certainly WAS that, no matter what you think of the decisions that lead to the context in which those actions were done ( ... )
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It is all, battlefield or no battlefield, service to our country that should be remembered.
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Like many people I do feel ambivalent about it; it's hard not to feel conflicted when so many lives - military and civilian, let's not forget - are currently being lost in conflicts that I'm not sure should be taking place and may well not be achieving anything. This is made harder for me by the slogan which ( ... )
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