Who cares if a soldier dies?

Take a man and put him alone,
Put him twelve thousand miles from home.
Empty his heart of all but blood,
Make him live in sand, in mud.
This is the life I have to live,
This the soul to God I give.
You have your parties and drink your beer,
While young men are dying over here.
Plant your signs on the White House lawn;
"Lets get out of Iraq".
Use your signs and have your fun,
Then refuse to use a gun.
There's nothing else for you to do,

Then I'm supposed to die for you?
There is one thing that you should know;
And that's where I think you should go!
I'm already here and it's too late.
I've traded all my love for all this hate.
I'll hate you till the day I die.
You made me hear my buddy cry.
I saw his leg and his blood shed,
Then I heard them say, "This one's dead".
It was a large price for him to pay,
To let you live another day.

He had the guts to fight and die,
To keep the freedom you live by.
By his dying, your life he buys,
But who gives a PHYUCK if a Soldier dies!

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Yes, I am a mindless, Brainwashed, robot,
AKA an American Infantryman.
Yet somehow I think for myself.....

I just felt the need to try to get someone to discuss this.

There are those who do not support THIS war, but who have friends and family who have been injured and died in wars. And there are also those who will wave flags and sing patriotic songs... as long as no one asks them or theirs to make that ultimate sacrifice.

Anyone can say anything = talk is cheap. But come back with an arm or leg missing (which I hope you do not!), and watch the same rah-rah, hoo-hah people who were for war, claim that their meaningless tax breaks shouldn't go down, just so funding for veterans' affairs can go up.

As long as you're doing what you sincerely think is right, that's all that matters, IMO. Who cares if a soldier dies? I wonder about that myself.

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"Tweeter was a Boyscout before she went to Vietnam and found out the hard way... nobody gives a d@mn."

Loscon: well said.

I'll add that war opponents will tend to overvalue each soldier killed, both as a political point and because they feel that since the war is unjustified, each death is a waste.

War supporters will often undervalue each soldier killed, saying "they volunteered" or whatever else they need to say to downplay the cost.

But those are gross generalities. People with many loved ones at risk may support the war while grieving each loss. People with no loved ones at risk may oppose the war while not really caring about or feeling the losses.

On another board I read a discussion among (largely conservative) vets about what they saw as a growing cultural divide between the military and the nation as a whole. They saw this as a problem -- not in a "civilians are soft" way, but in a "what happens when the military's values are not the same as the citizens" and "what happens when most civilians don't know anybody who is/was in the military"? They were equally worried about a military that might feel the need to meddle in civilian affairs, and a civilian population that is so far removed from the realities of the military that they will carelessly use and toss away military lives and resources because the pain is not theirs.

The most interesting part of the discussion was the hypothesis that the cause of the divide might be the growing urbanization of America. The military ethos can arguably be called a rural ethos, and rural areas are declining as a percent of population. I think the figure they tossed about was that rural areas account for only 18 percent of the population, but 30 percent of the military. They openly wondered if that presaged a Prussification of the armed forces, where a small, insular military elite developed outside the mainstream of American thought.

Others pointed out that "small, insular military elite" pretty much defined the U.S. military for almost it's entire existence. But the counterargument to that was that we weren't a superpower back then, and the military was weak both politically and in fact. A small, insular group with the power of our modern military at its disposal would be a much different animal.

This may seem like a tangent, but it's not. Answering the question of "who cares?" means answering the question of "who understands, who empathizes, who has a stake." The fewer people that think they have a stake in the military, the fewer people will care.

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Man up.

Israel also has another version about this: becuase everyone join the army,there are some people,who want to be combattive,defend the country,while others don't....so those who want to be combattive have feeling similar to hateret to those who refuse to risk their lives and some even dessert the army,for political reasons,because they refuse to give 3-2(2 for wemon) of their lives to the country who defended them.
Maya Buskila,a famous israeli modeal and singer,refused to join the army,for religous reasons. few months later,you could see everywhere in israel her wearing underwear design.....religous? yeah right.
another one,a girl that won the "Models" show,refused to join the army for religous reasons. in the show she modeled in under-wear clothing.....again,religous.

Now don't get me wrong,not all those who join the army are combattive....most girls aren't combattive(very small percent are),and you can choose not to be combattive....but at least serve,show you respect the country that you reaised in,for at least 2 years.not asking for much.

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To be free people,in our own land,the land of Zion and Jeruaslem