Suicide
Paresh Nath,The Khaleej Times [UAE]This year [1930], when we all needed something
to take our minds off our troubles, miniature golf did it.
If we cannot find bread, we are satisfied with the circus
--Elmer Davis
______________
2008 saw the fourth straight year of increases in soldier suicides, with this January being the grimmest month since record keeping began in 1980, with 24 soldier suicides.
Iraq and Afghanistan Vets of America [IAVA] Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff said, "The DOD and the VA must take bold and immediate action. Our new report recommends tangible, effective policies to help troops and veterans get the care they need (Congress Must Act.)" A Florida Today editorial good-heartedly echoed his concern.
"Yes they must. Lest more brave men and women in uniform and out become casualties of war."
But here is a novel thought: Why not stop sending these troops on second, third and fifth rotations in a meaningless endeavor? The solution goes beyond money and programs. If you sincerely wish to stop the casualties, you stop the war.
Any good therapist will help you identify and shift the causative behaviors which are yielding poor results. A bad shrink will just give you more drugs. Ditto a good economist, a good General and a good President.
Ending the wars is the solution. Anything else contributes to the problem.
Iraq and Afghanistan Vets of America [IAVA] Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff said, "The DOD and the VA must take bold and immediate action. Our new report recommends tangible, effective policies to help troops and veterans get the care they need (Congress Must Act.)" A Florida Today editorial good-heartedly echoed his concern.
"Yes they must. Lest more brave men and women in uniform and out become casualties of war."
But here is a novel thought: Why not stop sending these troops on second, third and fifth rotations in a meaningless endeavor? The solution goes beyond money and programs. If you sincerely wish to stop the casualties, you stop the war.
Any good therapist will help you identify and shift the causative behaviors which are yielding poor results. A bad shrink will just give you more drugs. Ditto a good economist, a good General and a good President.
Ending the wars is the solution. Anything else contributes to the problem.
Labels: troop suicides increase, veteran suicide
posted by rangeragainstwar at 10:37 PM
7 Comments:
many times when a soldier commits suicide; in the field, or back home, the motivation is to express some shred of control. between tours, it can be a way to tell the command that if anyone sends me to my death it will be me, not ya'll.
during one of my "long dark nights of the soul" i thought that i had things completely figured out. i was going to shoot myself at the kitchen table. the first responders would see the note i left under a kitchen magnet on the fridge.
i was cleaning my gun.
then, i told myself that anyone capable of that delicious an irony, that wry gallows humor, had to stick around, just in case somebody tossed me a straight line.
MB,
Why don't you just contract out the cleaning of your weapons?
jim
MB,
I'm glad you recognized your essentiality, and I hope you've gotten lots of straight lines with which to practice your humor ;)
I'll second Lisa's comment. I'm on record several times now as to MB being a treasure. Read the Group News post and responses regarding the Geronimo lawsuit. Hope you'll keep us posted on an outcome, MB. As always, Jim and Lisa, thanks for continuing RAW.
my cousin, the brilliant attorney, has been tangentially involved with that lawsuit. we are descendants of geronimo from a by marriage standpoint. we are descended from cochise and taza, who were father and brother in law to geronimo.
it's strange when viewed from a white society perspective because our concept is matralinieal. when apache men marry, they marry often outside the tribe or band. this is in part due to some very restrictive proscriptions against incest. this also had the result of making family and marriage ties that crossed all over the southwest.
often the apache had to range as far as texas and montana to find an enemy we weren't family with.
i will certainly keep folks updated on the geronimo suit. i hope that it addresses the real issue of whether or not it is acceptable for ivy league college boys to use human remains for their silly games.
As an aside, since I can't add anything to the on-topic discussion already noted, I've always found patrilineal arrangements curious. If the intent is to keep the goods and property "in the family", as it were, the notion that the side of the family that should be in control of the goods should be the male side seems to skirt reason.
A child HAS to have 50% of the mother's genes. Ain't no biological alternative. But there's NO reason that it has to have 50% of the father's, unless someone has managed to find a way to prevent human beings from being human. Matrilineal descent seems to me a very commonsensical way to ensure that the family wherewithal stays with the people sure to be related to the family.
Leading to the very malleable issue of "who is family", of course, which is a topic I'm not even willing to tackle...
FDChief,
Picayune point, but offspring does not necessarily have 50% of the mother's genes; however, it must have some of each parent's genes. Your point is taken: we know who the mother is.
Why patrilineal: control, of course. We are not after certitude of inheritance under this system, but rather patriarchy's imposition of a semblance of it. You cannot control women's behavior, chastity belts be damned! But you can imprint your name upon the offspring.
It seems to me the issue of family is clear-cut, if bifurcated: there are genetic families, which do not guaranty amity or even familiarity, and there are intentionally-constructed families, not necessarily related by genetic material.
The latter often provides a truer bond than the former.
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