I only know my own response -
Apr. 23rd, 2004 11:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburgSo fair warning.
Photographs of flag-draped cases bearing American casualties from Iraq should not have been made public under a Pentagon policy prohibiting media coverage of human remains, officials said.
"Quite frankly, we don't want the remains of our service members who have made the ultimate sacrifice to be the subject of any kind of attention that is unwarranted or undignified," said John Molino, a deputy undersecretary of defense.
I've seen the pictures. They're lovely tributes, as far as I can tell. We honor our dead with great care, even when nobody is looking. That's what I'm taking away from them.
I'm the person who spent more on my late husband's obituary than nearly any other part of his funeral. I think the plot was the only thing that cost more. I wanted people to see his passing - there was nothing "undignified" about the fact he was dead. He was a unique creation and gone forever. Here's your last chance to admire him - know something about him - before history moves on and leaves him behind.
Are survivors to be embarrassed now? That's incredible to fathom - are we creating yet another class of eta to be ignored in our culture? And those wounded and returned home, is it to be a secret?
These people, while I don't agree with any part of the why they have been put in harm's way, have given so much of themselves in doing it - that needs recognition above and beyond any part of my opinion of whether it was right or wrong.
Or popular.
Pro-life, my ass.
The whole thing relegates lives to the level of currency. You don't photograph the money you spent; you don't photograph the lives you spent.
...the shame is fucking incredible...there are no words.
EDIT: This is just as incredible - because they were volunteers, they were troublemakers? Wow.
Photographs of flag-draped cases bearing American casualties from Iraq should not have been made public under a Pentagon policy prohibiting media coverage of human remains, officials said.
"Quite frankly, we don't want the remains of our service members who have made the ultimate sacrifice to be the subject of any kind of attention that is unwarranted or undignified," said John Molino, a deputy undersecretary of defense.
I've seen the pictures. They're lovely tributes, as far as I can tell. We honor our dead with great care, even when nobody is looking. That's what I'm taking away from them.
I'm the person who spent more on my late husband's obituary than nearly any other part of his funeral. I think the plot was the only thing that cost more. I wanted people to see his passing - there was nothing "undignified" about the fact he was dead. He was a unique creation and gone forever. Here's your last chance to admire him - know something about him - before history moves on and leaves him behind.
Are survivors to be embarrassed now? That's incredible to fathom - are we creating yet another class of eta to be ignored in our culture? And those wounded and returned home, is it to be a secret?
These people, while I don't agree with any part of the why they have been put in harm's way, have given so much of themselves in doing it - that needs recognition above and beyond any part of my opinion of whether it was right or wrong.
Or popular.
Pro-life, my ass.
The whole thing relegates lives to the level of currency. You don't photograph the money you spent; you don't photograph the lives you spent.
...the shame is fucking incredible...there are no words.
EDIT: This is just as incredible - because they were volunteers, they were troublemakers? Wow.
