teach your children well

The Past is Just a Goodbye
Crosby, Stills and Nash (YouTube)

From the HuffPost:
Never Forget, My Children, The Importance Of Remembrance Day
How can I impress upon them the importance of this very special day?


















Photo: American Soldiers Guarding Poppy Fields in Afghanistan

The author of the above-linked article has two "lovely" daughters and a degree in - wait for it - Child Studies!

And she's teaching them war. She's teaching them to see a military career as a hero's walk.

I suppose it's possible to misinterpret Graham Nash's famous, heart wrenching song: "Teach Your Children Well", but the lyrics are most definitely anti-war, and it was written during one of the most shameful wars ever - Vietnam! - participation in which was not a choice; those kids were drafted into horror! Those who resisted the draft were no longer welcome in their own country!

Well, I guess if we teach children to see war as heroic, that's one way to fight the draft because it won't be needed.

Another way is to do what some women did during World War II: they taunted men they saw on the street if they were not in military uniform! (My mother was one of them.) The men who did sign up in most cases did so because there was a deep depression* happening and there was no other work for them! (My father was one of them.)

With my father gone for almost 6 years, my mother (along with lots of other women who suddenly were "liberated") landed a job weaving serge for military uniforms. Others were employed in factories that produced non-perishable food to ship overseas to military posts. And others were employed in weapons manufacture.

Yes, the war was good for Canada.

My father survived the war, barely. He said the closest he came to death was when a tree fell on the foxhole he was in. The only other story he told me was this: "We, as artillery, were bringing up the rear, and the guys on my vehicle noticed a dead German lying in a ditch. One of his shoes had been blown off revealing a big toe sticking out of a hole in his sock. We looked at that toe and started to laugh, and it was quite a while before we could stop laughing."

Later my father was promoted to Captain, with a driver and a valet, and it kind of went to his head, so it was quite a comedown to return home and find that, again, the job market was dim, and he was a mentally wounded man.

Our soldiers weren't heroes, they just needed a job, and had no clue what they were getting into.  Today's young people are smart enough to see that the same thing is happening now. No jobs except possibly the police force or the military. And this woman wants to believe that those dead war heroes improved her children's lives!

Nash's song was inspired by a famous photograph by Diane Arbus,"Child with Toy Hand Grenade in Central Park." The image, which depicts a child with an angry expression holding the toy weapon, prompted Nash to reflect on the societal implications of messages given to children about war and other issues.

For starters, the HuffPost writer says she looks for ways, all year long, to impress on her children's minds the (what? the romance?) of war. She reminds them how young Canadian heroes left their homes to fight "for Canada". How are they not to gather that this is what she expects of them also? It would be better if their bedtime story were "War is a Racket".

She tells them "This is what sacrifice looks like, children. Real sacrifice."  Does she also fill her house with ghastly images of Jesus on the cross, with blood dripping down?  Does she not realize that her family members - and Jesus, if he existed at all - were not sacrificers, they were sacrificees!

Most mothers are unwilling to sacrifice their children to any "war to end all wars". They weep when their kids sign up to be dead heroes. They dream of peaceful, productive lives for them.

But this mother wants to keep the image of death in front of her children so they can never just look ahead. Meanwhile, Nash's song suggests a much healthier alternative:

Become yourself
Because the past
Is just a good-bye

"I will take them with me to buy poppies" she writes, seemingly oblivious to what the war on the children of Afghanistan has produced: the constant stench of death and field after field of poppies, blooming for the consumption of the Western drugs epidemic.

They knew Osama Bin Laden wasn't there; it was simply yet another "regime change" venture that Canada willingly helped with. The bad, bad Taliban had forbidden the growing of poppies, with very good reason!  But now the poppy fields are guarded by US soldiers. and the produce, exported Westward, is fuelling the opioid crisis!

Yes, war is good for Canada if you want to drug yourself to death. This is hardly the kind of heroism any mother should wish on her children.

"The least I can do is cry" she says.  It's the least alright.

Speaking out against war; recognizing it for what it really is - useless except to those few who profit from it. Writing against it rather than glamourizing it would be so much more than "the least".

She might also consider campaigning for better treatment of disabled veterans, who are given cheap medals and then basically ignored. Yes, it's better to be killed in action than to be sent home wounded, and/or mentally screwed up.

In my opinion, this woman's ongoing campaign to toss her children to the dogs of war amounts to child abuse. It appears their only option, to paraphrase Nash, is to just look at her and sigh and know she loves them, no matter how morbidly brainwashed she seems to be.

She actually takes pride in postponing anything to do with Christmas until after Remembrance Day. I should think so - it's almost two months away! Not to mention that it's a pagan tradition (Jer 10, 2-4) and little more than a shopping festival - a bread and circuses distraction, fostered ad nauseum by media and merchandisers.

I will not wear a poppy; I will not attend Remembrance ceremonies; I will not sing O Canada because it's a call to war; I hope that Christmas gets indefinitely postponed until a less hypocritical, less mind-controlled world exists. But if there's any kind of demonstration AGAINST war, I'll be glad to attend.

* Photo: Food Line at the Yonge Street Mission (Toronto) in the 1930's

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