When one of my local daily papers—
AM-NY—ran this
story, it provoked two angry letters in the following day’s edition.
“What perverse logic is at play here?” asked the first reader. “How
about feeling better about yourself and helping animals, children, or
community?” A second reader objected to “victims of violent actions or
situations” seeking to “feel better about themselves by creating other
victims.”
While it may seem a more obvious choice (for sane people, at least) to
give wounded humans an opportunity to heal through efforts that involve
compassion and caring, we must never forget the deep connection between
volunteer soldiers and the American hunting culture.
I remember a 2004
New York Times
article called “In Iraq's Murky Battle, Snipers Offer U.S. a Precision
Weapon.” Author Eric Schmitt explained how American snipers earn all
those yellow ribbons we see on passing SUVs. “Soldiering is a violent
business, and emotions in combat run high,” Schmitt wrote. “But
commanders say snipers are a different breed of warrior - quiet,
unflappable marksmen who bring a dispassionate intensity to their
deadly task.”
Such intensity is often honed at the expense of animal life.
“Most snipers are familiar with firearms even before joining the armed
forces,” Schmitt wrote. He interviewed two snipers who “grew up on
farms, and both owned their first rifles before they were 10.”
According to Schmitt, these patriotic heroes “fondly remember hunting
deer as youngsters.”
You just gotta love the use of the word
fondly to “soften” the image.
To further highlight the age-old hunter-soldier connection, let’s
flashback to the early days of the 2003 US invasion of Iraq. That’s
when some gallant American soldiers, in their unswerving quest to
spread freedom and democracy, had an after-hours beer party in the
bombed-out and neglected Baghdad Zoo. When all was said and done, one
of those soldiers had shot dead a rare Bengal tiger. "Someone was
trying to feed the tigers," the zoo’s night watchman told Reuters. "The
tiger bit his finger off and clawed his arm. So his colleague took a
gun and shot the tiger." In that same Reuters article, we learned: “The
tiger was one of two in the zoo—once the largest in the Middle East,
today a decrepit collection of dirty cages and sad-looking animals.”
(No mention of U.S.-imposed sanctions, of course.)
If we want a better world for animals, we must make no excuse for the hunter. If we want peace for
all living things, we must dispense with the unconditional support for our (
sic) volunteer troops.
“War will exist,” declared John F. Kennedy, “until that distant day
when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige
as the warrior does today.”
Or, as Albert Einstein says:
“The pioneers of a warless world are the youth that refuse military service.”
Mickey Z. is the author of the upcoming novel,
CPR for Dummies, and his blog can be found
here.
Writings 
Subscribe to this comment's feed
