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The veteran thing is strange. To a non-American the veneration of military personnel and veterans seems over-the-top to the point of self-parody. Watching the S

The veteran thing is strange. To a non-American the veneration of military personnel and veterans seems over-the-top to the point of self-parody. Watching the Super Bowl a couple of years ago, I wasn't sure whether I was watching a sporting match, or Starship Troopers. That said, for all the splashy thank-you-for-your-service it's a shame but no real surprise that veterans are getting shafted, behind the scenes, by one of the largest bureaucracies in the world.

peteretep 11y ago
There are plenty of classes of non-American, and most Anglo-Saxon countries also venerate their troops. It's also a reflex to what happened after Vietnam, where the veterans got an almost criminal level of under-appreciation, despite many being draftees.
- JabavuAdams 11y ago
  Yeah, I understand why. It's still shocking to see / hear. I say this as an arm-chair war nerd. Nothing good can come from this level of military fetishism.
  - peteretep 11y ago
    Perhaps. I'd argue it's not military fetishism though - there are no goose-stepping soldiers, missiles being wheeled through the streets, and so on. Closest they get in the UK is the Trooping of The Colour, which is a few centuries old, and hasn't caused a problem so far [citation needed — cf "Buzzfeed: The Three Countries the UK Didn't Invade?!"]. The focus appears to be on sacrifice and dulce et decorum est rather than on militeria.
- pjc50 11y ago
  I don't think troops are really venerated in the UK. This, after all, is what Kipling's "Tommy" was all about. http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_tommy.htm http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_tommy.htm There's some veneration in a distant way for the RAF following the war, and the Sun newspaper runs its own pro-military campaign, but it's not something that comes up too often in political language. "Poppy day" is becoming more politicised in worrying ways, though.
cryoshon 11y ago
Militarism has intellectual consequences. The tacit admission that US military members sign up to fight pointless wars is not allowed: loud patriotism drowns all dissent so that they will not be demoralized by the grim reality that they are expendable pawns. It's all PR, of course: the veterans end up as broken husks that are left to rot as soon as they get home-- a very convenient political issue that is stored safely in the bank for whenever a distraction or stirring election platform is needed. To answer your question: it is Starship Troopers that you are watching.
- peteretep 11y ago
  While I believe in American exceptionalism as much as the next guy, you guys do have a tendency to forget that we in Europe (and the rest of the world) have been doing this for a very long time. "Militarism has intellectual consequences" - is probably true, but the British and French (and Dutch and Prussians and Spanish et al) were doing it for 500 years, a period which gave us the birth of The Royal Society, Proust and Voltaire, Leibniz, and so on. The Islamic Golden Age happened under an expansionist empire. The Romans weren't short the odd intellectual as well... I'm sure someone more familiar with Asian history can give many examples too. "It's all PR, of course: the veterans end up as broken husks that are left to rot as soon as they get home" - while true, this is nothing new, either.
doktrin 11y ago
Absolutely. The VA is a disgrace, and it's a clear cut example of the government not living up to its obligations vis a vis veterans. However, my point concerns public perception, which is to a significant degree the focus of the OP. Specifically, the author made the claim that veterans are perceived as being an unexotic cause in public consciousness - whereas I think the opposite is true. I think their cause is a popular one in America. For comparison, this is how I personally perceive a few of the various underclasses he mentioned : The rural poor in Appalachia? Unequivocally unexotic : lower income whites often appear to be more scorned than pitied. Inner city youth? Periodically exotic. Veterans? Unequivocally exotic, in the sense that I perceive their cause to be one of the most popular in contemporary American society.
- JabavuAdams 11y ago
  Exactly.
- afarrell 11y ago
  One problem is that it is difficult for the VA to fire people for performance problems. There was a bill (HR 1944) that passed the House this summer, but the corresponding Senate bill was only introduced in November. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/1082/related-bills https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/108...
chishaku 11y ago
> According to the latest report, a follow-up to one McCain released in May, military services have dished out $53 million in sports-related marketing and advertising contracts since 2012. Of that, more than $9 million went directly to teams in the five biggest American professional sports leagues (the NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, and MLS). Although Flake and McCain determined that some contracts constituted legitimate marketing and advertising, such as stadium signs and recruiting booth space at games, 72 of the 122 contracts they uncovered involved inappropriately funded “patriotic tributes.” http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2015/11/paid_patriotism_the_pentagon_gave_50_sports_teams_taxpayer_money_to_honor.html http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2015/11/paid...
- Cymen 11y ago
  Exactly. It's not fetishism of the military, it's advertisement.
sremani 11y ago
As far as NFL goes, they(NFL & teams) are paid money, and the pomp and show is a seamless advertisement and a recruitment campaign.
logfromblammo 11y ago
To understand it, you need to know recent American history. During the unpopular American intervention in the Vietnamese civil war, draftees and volunteers returning home from duty were met with protesters, who showed them exactly as much respect as you might expect that an anti-war protester would offer to a soldier. The canonical anecdote is that the returning soldier was spat upon and accused of killing babies. I have never actually known any Vietnam veteran who claimed to have experienced this, nor any former protester who admitted to doing it. Nevertheless, the military leadership decided that this should not be happening. And so the Pentagon started dedicating more of their budget to the manipulation of public opinion. They have essentially produced the current state of public opinion through four continuous decades of advertising. It is occasionally revealed that the "thank you for your service" portion of a sporting event is sponsored directly by a hefty cash payment from the military. You can see how the federal government actually feels about its veterans by how it treats those no longer able to turn their assigned cog in the war machine. Not only are disability claims routinely reduced or denied outright, but the medical care that veterans get is often far inferior to that available in the nearby non-VA facilities. The vets find that for all the cheerleaders they see shaking pompoms on the sidelines while they are in the game, they are still completely alone with a traumatic brain injury after time runs out and everyone goes home. Part of me wishes it really was like _Starship Troopers_ (the book), and that veteran amputees would hang out near recruiting centers without their prostheses visible, talking loudly about all their VA, disability, and pension problems.

peteretep 11y ago

There are plenty of classes of non-American, and most Anglo-Saxon countries also venerate their troops. It's also a reflex to what happened after Vietnam, where the veterans got an almost criminal level of under-appreciation, despite many being draftees.

JabavuAdams 11y ago
Yeah, I understand why. It's still shocking to see / hear. I say this as an arm-chair war nerd. Nothing good can come from this level of military fetishism.
- peteretep 11y ago
  Perhaps. I'd argue it's not military fetishism though - there are no goose-stepping soldiers, missiles being wheeled through the streets, and so on. Closest they get in the UK is the Trooping of The Colour, which is a few centuries old, and hasn't caused a problem so far [citation needed — cf "Buzzfeed: The Three Countries the UK Didn't Invade?!"]. The focus appears to be on sacrifice and dulce et decorum est rather than on militeria.
pjc50 11y ago
I don't think troops are really venerated in the UK. This, after all, is what Kipling's "Tommy" was all about. http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_tommy.htm http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/poems_tommy.htm There's some veneration in a distant way for the RAF following the war, and the Sun newspaper runs its own pro-military campaign, but it's not something that comes up too often in political language. "Poppy day" is becoming more politicised in worrying ways, though.

cryoshon 11y ago

Militarism has intellectual consequences. The tacit admission that US military members sign up to fight pointless wars is not allowed: loud patriotism drowns all dissent so that they will not be demoralized by the grim reality that they are expendable pawns. It's all PR, of course: the veterans end up as broken husks that are left to rot as soon as they get home-- a very convenient political issue that is stored safely in the bank for whenever a distraction or stirring election platform is needed. To answer your question: it is Starship Troopers that you are watching.

peteretep 11y ago
While I believe in American exceptionalism as much as the next guy, you guys do have a tendency to forget that we in Europe (and the rest of the world) have been doing this for a very long time. "Militarism has intellectual consequences" - is probably true, but the British and French (and Dutch and Prussians and Spanish et al) were doing it for 500 years, a period which gave us the birth of The Royal Society, Proust and Voltaire, Leibniz, and so on. The Islamic Golden Age happened under an expansionist empire. The Romans weren't short the odd intellectual as well... I'm sure someone more familiar with Asian history can give many examples too. "It's all PR, of course: the veterans end up as broken husks that are left to rot as soon as they get home" - while true, this is nothing new, either.

doktrin 11y ago

Absolutely. The VA is a disgrace, and it's a clear cut example of the government not living up to its obligations vis a vis veterans. However, my point concerns public perception, which is to a significant degree the focus of the OP. Specifically, the author made the claim that veterans are perceived as being an unexotic cause in public consciousness - whereas I think the opposite is true. I think their cause is a popular one in America. For comparison, this is how I personally perceive a few of the various underclasses he mentioned : The rural poor in Appalachia? Unequivocally unexotic : lower income whites often appear to be more scorned than pitied. Inner city youth? Periodically exotic. Veterans? Unequivocally exotic, in the sense that I perceive their cause to be one of the most popular in contemporary American society.

JabavuAdams 11y ago
Exactly.
afarrell 11y ago
One problem is that it is difficult for the VA to fire people for performance problems. There was a bill (HR 1944) that passed the House this summer, but the corresponding Senate bill was only introduced in November. https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/1082/related-bills https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/108...

chishaku 11y ago

> According to the latest report, a follow-up to one McCain released in May, military services have dished out $53 million in sports-related marketing and advertising contracts since 2012. Of that, more than $9 million went directly to teams in the five biggest American professional sports leagues (the NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, and MLS). Although Flake and McCain determined that some contracts constituted legitimate marketing and advertising, such as stadium signs and recruiting booth space at games, 72 of the 122 contracts they uncovered involved inappropriately funded “patriotic tributes.” http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2015/11/paid_patriotism_the_pentagon_gave_50_sports_teams_taxpayer_money_to_honor.html http://www.slate.com/articles/sports/sports_nut/2015/11/paid...

Cymen 11y ago
Exactly. It's not fetishism of the military, it's advertisement.

sremani 11y ago

As far as NFL goes, they(NFL & teams) are paid money, and the pomp and show is a seamless advertisement and a recruitment campaign.

logfromblammo 11y ago

To understand it, you need to know recent American history. During the unpopular American intervention in the Vietnamese civil war, draftees and volunteers returning home from duty were met with protesters, who showed them exactly as much respect as you might expect that an anti-war protester would offer to a soldier. The canonical anecdote is that the returning soldier was spat upon and accused of killing babies. I have never actually known any Vietnam veteran who claimed to have experienced this, nor any former protester who admitted to doing it. Nevertheless, the military leadership decided that this should not be happening. And so the Pentagon started dedicating more of their budget to the manipulation of public opinion. They have essentially produced the current state of public opinion through four continuous decades of advertising. It is occasionally revealed that the "thank you for your service" portion of a sporting event is sponsored directly by a hefty cash payment from the military. You can see how the federal government actually feels about its veterans by how it treats those no longer able to turn their assigned cog in the war machine. Not only are disability claims routinely reduced or denied outright, but the medical care that veterans get is often far inferior to that available in the nearby non-VA facilities. The vets find that for all the cheerleaders they see shaking pompoms on the sidelines while they are in the game, they are still completely alone with a traumatic brain injury after time runs out and everyone goes home. Part of me wishes it really was like _Starship Troopers_ (the book), and that veteran amputees would hang out near recruiting centers without their prostheses visible, talking loudly about all their VA, disability, and pension problems.