A Joel Stein Inspiration

Most parents adore their children. We protect them. We love them. We support them. It’s not always easy. We have “good days” and “bad days.” In many ways, our children represent the best part of ourselves. They might have mom’s sense of humor and dad’s ability to fix things. Sometimes, the bad traits get stuck in there as well. A bad temper or a learned behavior like “rolling their eyes.” Whatever they acquire from us, they represent our immortality. It is a way to preserve ourselves long after we’ve gone.

As children, we see our parents in many different ways. They make us eat when we don’t want to. They buy us stuff. They ground us. Perhaps the worst of all, they make us clean our rooms. How many of you remember being dragged off somewhere that you didn’t want to go? At any rate, it’s perfectly clear where you stand in your relationship with your parents. They are in charge. They tell you what to do and when to do it. At times, we think we hate them. Other times, we love them. Kids generally have two views on everything. Either they like something or they hate it. Neither position is firm nor does it last very long.

Have you ever seen your parents fighting about something in front of you? Remember how that felt?

As a child, we couldn’t wait to become an adult. To many of us, becoming an adult was also a rude awakening. There are so many things we didn’t know about or didn’t expect. Sure, we can now stay up as late as we want to. Staying up as late as you want is not all it’s cracked up to be. Life now has more serious consequences. Instead of being sent to our room, if we break the law we can now be fined or sent to jail. The authority figure we thought we left behind when we moved out of our parent’s house has morphed into a much bigger parent. They now have different names like boss, superior officer, or the government.

So what’s the point of all of this so far?

I’d like to point out that there is one organization out there that has taken an oath to protect you. In fact, they will voluntarily die for you, if necessary. They are the United States Military. I guess you could call them “our children.” No official U.S. agency has gotten more praise or more condemnation.

Joel Stein’s latest column in The LA Times is an example of such condemnation. In his column “I Don’t Support The Troops” he writes, “I'm not advocating that we spit on returning veterans like they did after the Vietnam War, but we shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea.” Joel’s column has more to do with people who are against the war in Iraq and still say that they support the troops. In his mind, you can’t have it both ways. He makes the assumption that those who affix a yellow ribbon magnet to the bumper of their car are doing little else to “support” the troops. In some cases, he’s right.

In other cases, he’s dead wrong.

I believe that it’s possible to support the troops and also not agree with what they are doing. I’ll give you an example. Let’s say you have a daughter who happens to be in her early twenties. She’s just met a man. You absolutely do not like him. He makes your daughter happy and so, you grin a lot and accept it. Along the way, you let your daughter know that you don’t approve of him but you also let her know that it’s her decision to make.

Do you stop supporting your daughter when she decides to marry him? No. You attend all of the family functions, parties, and birthdays. If your daughter needs anything, you give it to her. In other words, you support her. You may not care for the man she marries but, you do whatever you can to support her. You want to see her happy and if this “man” makes her happy then by golly, you’ll have to put up with him.

In Joel Stein’s column, he’s addressing the parents who “say” that they support their daughter but who never attend the functions or offer emotional and financial support. They simply say they support her in words and not deeds.

And so, we have those same types of people when it comes to whether or not they support the war in Iraq. Do they send care packages? Do they write letters to the troops or have a “pen pal.” Have they visited a soldier who has been wounded? Beyond buying a yellow ribbon, what else have they done?

Some view our military men and women as children of the body politic. In many ways they are so, imagine this if you can. You are in the military and thousands of miles away from home. To you, knowing that the folks back home are rallying behind you lends credence to what you do. You feel good about yourself and what you’re doing.

Now, imagine being thousands of miles away from home and the folks back home are fighting amongst themselves over why you are thousands of miles away from home. They argue about the job you are doing. Some of them want you to come home right away and others think you should stay.

Finally, imagine yourself as a young child. You are in a fairly big department store with your parents when you suddenly realize that you’ve been separated. Has this ever happened to you? Can you remember how you felt? Yes? Sheer horror and panic are two words that I would use.

So here we are. Our military children are away from home fighting for us and for our freedom. They are in the biggest battle of their life.

Here we are at home, fighting in front of them and the world.

Regardless of your position on the Iraq war, I’m sure the kids look back at what’s going on over here and feel pretty lousy.