Kneeling

People have been bombarding me with my opinion on NFL players kneeling during the national anthem. My response, expectedly, left both sides of the debate unhappy.

My first issue is that I am being hunted down to be asked at all. I don't know about everyone, but I didn't join the military to be some special class of citizen that needs to be babied constantly. My opinion on this is no more important than any American's opinion. I would beware anyone telling you that this or that is demeaning to veterans. Not that it doesn't happen. One that comes to mind is the woman who pictured herself yelling at Arlington Cemetary. That is disrespecting the military. That woman also paid dearly for that error in judgment. Case closed in my opinion. I wish her no ill will.

But when it is a point of patriotism, that affects me no more than it does any other citizen. "But I had friends who came home under that flag!" says the angry Facebook veterans. "I have sacrificed more!". So have I. But I am not taking their sacrifice to make everything about me. I lost friends, those men were lost to their wives, their children, their parents, and much more. We lost them as a country, not just me or just veterans.

Also, the reasons we were supposed to be out there was to protect those very rights that these NFL players were expressing. If you are going to fight to defend those rights, then use your status as a veteran to suppress them when you get home, I don't know what exactly you were fighting for. Don't think the US is the first country in the world to use our veterans as a means to suppress the rights of their people. This was a critical element that our founding fathers were against.

Now to piss off the other side. I am not a fan of the kneeling. Not because my feelings are hurt, or because I think forced patriotism is a sign of a healthy country. But because I believe in the goal the NFL players are striving toward, and I think this is taking them further and further from it.

To be clear, I do think that our country has serious problems with race relations, and those problems are more serious than just a cab not picking someone up or people crossing the street to walk. It's issues that suppress a large segment of our population, causes them grief and suffering, and can easily lead to their death. Even from a selfish viewpoint, millions upon millions of Americans before trampled upon effects all of us, even if we aren't the ones with boots on our backs.

"So you think cops hate black people and are just looking for excuses to murder them?!?"

No. I think police officers are incredible people with very difficult jobs that many of us could not handle. I think your average officer wakes up every morning wanting to go out, do their job which is keeping us safe, and go home to their family at the end of their shift. I also think they are critical elements of our society.

But, as one of my First Sergeants used to say, there are dirtbags in every group. He called it the rule of 10%s. 10% of the military is dirtbags who need to be found and thrown out, 10% are the heroes that will save the day, and 80% are the average joes that need to be lead. I'm a Marine, and I guarantee if you ask me or any other Marine, we can tell you stories of dirtbags who should have never been in uniform and never put behind a rifle. Marines who were idiots. Marines who were racists. Marines who needed to be thrown out. That realization doesn't mean I hate Marines. Not at all. That's just being honest. I got to be one of the detainee guards who escorted The Pendleton 8 out of Iraq. I sure as hell don't feel bad about that.

That is where I am sitting with police officers. The vast majority of them are awesome people. But there is scum that needs to be thrown out, and it terrifies me when they not only aren't but when wagons get circled for officers who don't deserve the backup. It's because the police are such important and essential parts of our government and our life that we have to hold them to the highest standards. Not low standards because the job is difficult.

Which brings me back to why I am not a fan of the kneeling. When I discuss the issue of US police with people, including people who are completely against my position, the best way I bring them around to understand is changing the issue from a civil rights issue, to a government overreach issue. These are American citizens being killed by government officials, and we need to do something to curb that.

But in brief, I think that kneeling of NFL players isn't the best method to further their goals. But I think it would be wrong of me as a fellow American to ignore my neighbor's plights because they didn't bring it up to me in a manner I felt comfortable with. I also think it's ridiculous that the kneeling is being portrayed as insulting to veterans. I have asked many, many people, and I can't find a single instance in American history where kneeling before something is insulting. Many, many examples of the opposite though. Beyond that, nothing about the flag or National Anthem should mean any more to me as a veteran than any American civilian. I think our founding fathers would be disgusted by the government using veterans as a shield to suppress civilians' speech.

If it looks like a duck

This Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner thing has been pretty entertaining. Not going to lie, when I first heard about Bruce looking to switch sides midgame, I wondered if he was just pulling a stunt to get some of that attention his step-kids were getting. Considering how long this has gone on, and how invested Jenner is in the situation, I'm going have to go with it being legit.

The latest controversy is Jenner winning the Arthur Ashe Courage Award. Many people are throwing a fit about that. Some made up completely fictional stories about her getting the award in the place of an injured soldier. Trust me when I say that us veterans love being used as ammo in your debates. Almost makes it worth getting injured. Others have made whole lists of people who should have won instead. Others still are just lining up the insults to fire away.

Now in all honesty, at first I wasn't really biting on the whole award thing either. It kinda felt like Obama winning the Nobel Peace Prize. How about we give it to people who actually went through what the award was designed for, not just for what the potential of what they might go through? But at the end of the day these awards aren't mine to give. If the people in charge of them want to give it to Justin Bieber, that's their problem, not mine. I had never heard of the Arthur Ashe award until this spectacle.

But as time went on, my feelings on it started to change and I couldn't really nail down why. At first I thought it was because the groups I saw fighting the hardest against it were people I didn't really want to associate with. But after a talk with Jonathan Ester, I nailed down what it was. The hate and the rage that came with Jenner winning that award ended up proving on the backend that she deserved it. The fact that it caused such vehement rage from people showed there is still one hell of a problem with transphobia in the US and beyond.

You can see it even in childish things like calling Caitlyn "he" or "him" still as a pointed insult. Think about the morals these people are standing on. "Jenner wants me to refer to him as a woman, but fuck that. It is against my something to do that!!". What the hell? If some straight up dude asked me to refer to him as a she, whatever homie. That's your deal and I don't care enough to argue with you on this. Hell, when I lived in the South I had people throw actual fits by calling them by their legal first name rather than the super cool nickname they went by. I had to argue with people to write their legal name on official paperwork. "No dude, you can't put Maverick on your I-9. Come the fuck on". But I played their reindeer games otherwise, because why do I care if James wants everyone to call him Jimbo. Or Charlie doesn't want to be called Charles because that's his dad's name. I don't have an religious exemption against nicknames, just like I don't care about calling a trans person by whatever pronouns they want.

The funny part is this is bringing about a "counter-offended" group. Those who pretend calling a trans person by their prefered pronouns is the trans person being the offended ones. They don't realize they are the ones who are really being unreasonably offended ones. I can't think of any religion that bans calling a woman a he if that's what she wants. Practically all of them have something about not being a dick though. So which part are you going to follow? If you really don't care about these issues, you wouldn't be making these ridiculous stands for no apparent reason.


Show where we talked about this. View at your own risk. I did threaten to molest Puppet Master:

To Hate, Or Not To Hate

Sooooo, this one I can't even quite agree with myself on. My emotions tell me one thing, but logically I can't help with disagree with myself. This topic isn't really one I am excited about. But I figured it has been something that has been picking at me, so I might as well put it down to paper.

First, I would like to clarify. I fully believe anyone who sexually assaults a child should be executed. I'm not exaggerating there. It ties back to anyone who commits rape should be executed. And since a child cannot give consent, that is rape. Any politician who has the guts to go forward with that will have my support. People may call that extreme, but I don't think so. I think capital punishment is more than reasonable for a crime like that.

Which brings us to the point of this topic. As I said in the last post, I don't believe sexual orientation is a decision. I have known many gay people who wished they could convert to hetrosexuality because of how difficult being gay made their life, and found it impossible. Personally, I never remember making the decision to be straight. That is also scientific consensus. You'll find very few unbiased studies that say otherwise, if any. So until something concrete comes out otherwise, I am going to have to stick with that solution.

But this brings up an issue. If we do not choose who we are attracted to, can I hold a non-active pedophile rehensible for his/her predisposition? By non-active, I mean someone who is attracted to children, but who hasn't actually acted on it. Because anyone who acts on that is abusing a child and (in my opinion) subject to the penalty I described above. Currently, even if someone never acts on it, I feel fully justified in thinking they are an awful person. Being attracted to children is so disgusting to me, that I couldn't imagine lifting a finger to help someone being attacked for that. I can't even say that I wouldn't be an attacker.

Is it really fair for me to so vehemently hate someone who never had a choice who they are attracted to. In this episode of This American Life, a 19 year old realizes he is a pedophile, and talks about how difficult it was for him to find help for it. Even psychiatrists were disgusted by him and refused to help, even though he fully realized his attractions were a problem and went out to seek help for it. He started a support group to help pedophiles get help and to ensure that they never harmed a child.

That group fully understands that their attraction is wrong and hates that about themselves. Can I hate them when they never had a choice? Would that be any different from hating someone for the color of their skin, or disabilities they were born with, of the family they were born into? Logically, I cannot support that. But just because I am able to break that down to myself like that, leaves me unconvinced I want to change my attitude. This leaves me like a ship without a rudder. I do not want to go against my ethics and hate someone for something they didn't have a choice in. But I don't know if emotionally I am ready to make that adjustment in this case.


Our show on this topic: