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Friday, January 27, 2012

What Does Honor Mean In 2012?

 By Linda Mains

What is honor in 2012? Does anyone really know what honor is anymore? It's funny to me, but some of the most dis-honorable people, that I have ever met, would constantly be throwing that word around, like Chinese fire-crackers. Some even get angry, when being confronted with all of their lies, because they will claim while standing in-front of you; "I'm honorable! Are you telling me that I'm not honorable?"

So is it honorable to fight in a war? Is it? I for one; am not really sure anymore, if "war" is such an honorable act? Are you? Look at what those marines did to those dead Taliban fighters? I believe that there is no honor in pissing on someones dead body...which must have been a giant blow to the moral of the Marines, since they are constantly priding themselves on just how "honorable" they are. My only question is; when you don't respect life, and are taught to destroy it...doesn't the simple "destruction of somebody's family member" automatically make anyone participating in that destruction "dishonorable?"

What I'm trying to say is; that people love throwing the word "honor" around like leaves to the wind. If your life style is questionable...then I just don't think, you should be using the word "honorable." Honor is reserved for those who live and act honorably! Killing is killing, and stealing is stealing, fighting is fighting...but can any of us do any of those things honorably? I don't think so? If you do; tell me how to do that, so I will understand how people whom are constantly telling the rest of us how honorable they think they are act...because, for the life of me, I don't and can't understand these people.

I get the honor your mother and father thing...but the dying for your country or a cause thing being honorable? I'm sorry; but I just don't understand it? I also don't think that dying for any reason is honorable. I'm going to tell you what I think dying for any forgettable war is; it's a "waste!" That person won't get to live or to experience a life, a life that was meant to be lived. Although, I think that governments and the mechanisms that grow empires, use the word "honor" to make men, give up the only thing that's too important to ever lose...which is their "life's!" Now I love walking down the street, and just living...so for anyone to tell me, that there could ever be any cause which would be honorable enough; to make me want to shoot at some man or woman. People whom I've never met, and then what if I accidentally kill an innocent child, or accidentally blow the lower part of that child's face off. I just for the live of me couldn't call any of those actions "honorable." Actions that I would have to live with for the rest of my life.

So what is honor in 2012? Is it bashing people on the internet? Is it threatening the life's of loved ones? Is it watching the homeless, and not caring? Is it talking trash about other people? The U.S reality is more like a Jerry Springer show, then anything else right now. So I really don't believe, with the way that our society is right now...that honor actually exists anymore. I wouldn't even know where to look for it, if it actually did exist somewhere, and wasn't just Nation building rhetoric, or rhetoric to make regime changes world wide. Although I really wish, that more of us actually knew what "honor" actually was, so that our young men and women wouldn't be so willing to die for forgettable wars and causes world wide.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Read ed your story but have to say not happy with it maybe because I serve my country and was willing to die for it.You see the honor part come with the Territory its also pride, n respect, that I wish more kids today would understood. If they respect them self more and other people they might be a better person.
We don't pick the wars it r job as being service men or woman. Not everyone likes war but sometimes it happens and we r order to go do r jobs just people do working 9 to 5 and not liking their boss.
Honor not just in war its in sports that we watch ,its earn just like respect.
I am tried of people attacking the Military they need to understand with out them you would not be able to say and do what you want. Remember its the freedom you have from a war fought long ago that lets you do that.

linda mains said...

not trying to make you angry...but can killing be done in the name of honor? Should war be a 9 to 5 job...when peoples life's are on the line? I believe that we should only fight wars when we absolutely have to, and that warring and fighting in them with so much at stake shouldn't become something that anyone would consider a "job." The government does use "honor" and that fighting in those wars as "honorable." But the reality is that people do die and people do get killed in those wars. You can be "not-happy" with the story...but it was not meant to make the vets or military not happy...it was meant to ask the simple question; can war or any war really be "honorable" when it's not fought for the right reasons?

Alberto said...

Damn!!! Linda!!! Your Love & Your Action Made Me Cry!!! =( Thanks!!!....XO

Anonymous said...

You are very honest! I like that.

Facesat said...

Hey Shawqi, how about talking about the torture and savagery of the people that we fight? For instance, the woman that was executed in the stadium in the Middle East. Her "crime"? Walking with a male that wasn't her relative.

The actions of the Marines, and other service-members, who violated other people's rights, ended up getting reviewed. Service members have been getting held accountable for their actions. They don't represent the totality of the United States Military, which IS honorable, and well loved by people overseas.

I know that for a fact. I've been on different countries on 5 different continents. I've interacted with people all over the world. While a lot of you people bicker and make promises, during disasters, we're there getting the infrastructure in place to get help to the affected people.

Now, back to the shithead rag-heads/terrorists that we're fighting downrange. They defend a culture that allows for "honor killings." Fuck that, there's no such thing as "honor killing." It's savagery and murder, plain and simple. They defend a culture that doesn't respect women's rights like they do in the West.

Heck, the dogs out there don't like the Arabs. I lost count of how many times the Iraqis came up to me for assistance, because one of our dogs, Iraqi dogs mind you, wanted a piece of their asses. What is it that they do to their dogs that will cause said dogs to hate them so much?

I'm sorry, but we don't go about kidnapping people, then slitting their throats. That's pure savagery. So is the shitty law that the terrorists wanted to impose on the Iraqi and Afghani people. That "law" is nothing but pure savagery. Who the fuck wants to go back to the dark ages? Not the Iraqis! That's one of the main reasons the Iraqi people turned in droves against the terrorists... who weren't working for the Iraqis best interests.

I know, I know, you're from Baghdad. We've got you versus... the Iraqis, both military and civilian, that I've worked with while I was combat deployed there. Hmmm, who should I believe here?

The Iraqi people highly disagree with your opinion. Do you want to know why the Iraqis showed their appreciation toward us while we were doing our combat patrols in their streets?

One main reason is that they weren't fans of that savage, dark age law that the terrorists wanted to impose on them. They saw who the real savages/killers were. It was the shit-bags that we were fighting, the shit-bags that didn't care for human life.

So don't lecture us about honor.

facesat said...

"Yes America really needs to get it together...our values have become questionable world-wide. We want to be loved and not loathed...by other country's we really have some friend-ship building to do. We need a U.S. PR guy after what the men and women in office have done to our country." -- Linda Mains

My observation, while overseas, strongly contradicts that opinion. Every country I've been to, I've seen evidence of a people that want to westernize. People want to become like us.

Our values are what made is the greatest country on this planet. It made us possible to do things that nations before us tried but failed to do. For instance, look up "Pax Americana" and what it was able to do for Europe... after thousands of years of them being at each other's throats.

Ron Paul has it wrong. He got George Washington wrong. When our founding fathers advised us not to get involved with alliances with foreign powers, and to stay out of their business, it was because we were in no position to do so. We were the weakest country, a fledgling democracy. We didn't have our acts together until after the Civil War. We came close, a few times, to perishing as a country before then. Look at Shey's (sp) Rebellion, Whiskey Rebellion, Indian Wars, etc.

If we, and the free word, are to continue to enjoy prosperity and their current standard of living, the US and other countries are going to have to remain engaged with the rest of the world.

Ron Paul needs to study Chinese history before he yaps about us not continuing to remain engaged with the rest of the world.

The cold hard fact is that every country in the world is going to pursue its interests, and this requires this country to remain engaged with the rest of the world. If we do what Ron Paul argues, another country will step in and fill the void. Someone else would run the game, and we'd have to play along.

There's no "Kumbaya my lord kumbaya" alternative. It's one or the other. We're the country that plays that game the best, and I'd rather keep it that way.

I'm a conservative, but I could never vote for Ron Paul... unless he pulls his head out of his ass when it comes to foreign policy. Obama is a better option than him.

Linda Mains said...

My only problem with forced Democracy...is "it won't work!" For Democracy to have any real value; "the people must want it!"

Do you really believe that most of the people or a great percentage of the people in Middle East; are really ready for Democracy?

There have been great Dictators and Kings, whom have been loved, and not loathed threw out history Facesat.How about Alexander the Great and King Author (that's if he wasn't a legend), Queen Elizabeth...and a few others.

But the political system or the leader...or both must be loved, and not loathed by the people. Nation building is all about the people! Why? Because when a large group of people aren't happy with a certain political system, dictator, or monarchy that's when you'll start to see; uprisings, violence in the streets. So if they people don't want Democracy there; then whom are "we" to shove it down their throats?

Let the people of those country's, pick the type of political systems that they want, for themselves. We the people started America with the thought of self-government, and we chose Democracy...and we decided for ourselves to move away from the Monarchy in England. No other country shoved Democracy down our throats.

The "people" in any land need to make their own political choices, to what type of political system that they want...otherwise we are wasting our time and money, on a way of life and political system (meaning Democracy), that mainly Muslims may not want in there land. It is there land, so to me it's there choice, to live how ever they like. And if they don't like the way that they are living; then they can all join in a fight, to change their system of governance.