If you Want to Support the Troops End War

Editor’s note: (Hi it’s Jamie, I am the editor.) To my conservative friends who may see the title and assume I got high at a Phish show and went full Ralph Nader, you might be so mad reading the title you want to go start another illegal war, but please take a deep breath. I truly believe what I am about to say is not only something we will all agree on but especially conservatives and vets. I am friends with more soldiers than I ever have been, men who I look up to, and I have even said a version of this on FOX News. Hang in there!

There is something that has always bothered me about Memorial Day.

As we end decades of failed wars in the Middle East (kinda), as we fund Israel and Ukraine with taxpayer dollars, and as Twitter Generals strategize chess pieces whose names they will never know, there will be a lot of patriotic pandering being spewed by people who have never even picked up a paintball gun, on their way to barbeques where zero vets will be in attendance.

I want to honor the men and women who have died.

I want to show respect to my friends who still serve.

It’s not them that make me want to hurl a chair through a window.

It’s the Memorial Day posts from the people who have continuously banged the drums for war but have never served. Whose kids will never need to serve.

They act like they are part of the team instead of part of the problem.

It’s like the FBI Tweeting “Happy MLK Day! He sure had a dream!”

It’s like saying “We won!” when your team makes it to the NBA finals. The years of dedication and hard work being sweat out on the courts while you drank beer on the couch and turned off the TV every time they started losing.

There is this idea, started by people who benefit from it, that being anti-war makes you anti-troop. I believe it’s the opposite.

I believe being anti-troop is sending men and women out to die so you can profit.

I believe being anti-troop is sending men and women out to die so you can win an election.

I believe being anti-troop is sending troops to fight in wars that not only won’t make us safer but will cause more blowback and in turn more wars so that you can make more money and win more elections.

Fear is a vicious cycle that they teach in Washington on day one. It comes with the move-in packet.

It is PRO troop to tell troops, I don’t want you to die.

This is not complicated. This is not throwing paint at returning vets coming home from Vietnam.

If you told any of your friends, “Hey man, I would rather you not die.” they would not say, “Stop being anti-me!”

I don’t want you to see your friends shot or crippled. I don’t want to support a government that will send you to a desert to settle their unwinnable grudges while they sit back in recliners and you come home with PTSD.

Where is the support for the soldiers who come back home with addictions? Go look up the suicide rates for vets. Where is Lt. Twitter with solutions for that?

Anyone who will send you out to die but won’t look you in the eyes when you come home is a coward. They don’t get to wish you a happy Memorial Day.

This is not a post to debate the finer points of war and when it is and isn’t necessary. War sucks. It’s tricky. Countries need to defend themselves. And a lot of times bad guys don’t play by the rules.

I get it.

But it seems pretty fucked to send dudes to die in wars that make us less safe, then go to pool parties with our families after sending out a tweet with American flag emojis.

If you Want to Support the Troops stop sending them to die cause I would rather honor someone when they are alive.