<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"> <html> <head> <meta content="text/html;charset=ISO-8859-1" http-equiv="Content-Type"> <title></title> </head> <body bgcolor="#ffffff" text="#000000"> Gar Lipow wrote <blockquote cite="mid95e490300511261229s153d60b2mbe1978eedccf5faa@mail.gmail.com" type="cite"> <blockquote type="cite"> <pre wrap=""> </pre> </blockquote> <pre wrap="">But Boddi is the one insisting on "thanking" them and "gratitude" (as is umm Leah I think). Almost nobody on this list is talking about demonizing returning soldiers. I twice gave a Vietnam era example that specifically rebuts the idea that I'm for "demonizing" returning troops. And Carrol has mentioned on occasion that he was involved in the part of the movement that provided coffee houses for returnees during the Vietnam war, so I bet he could tell similar stories if he wanted to bother. (Mind you I don't want to take this too far. Not holding returnees a little bit responsible for their own actions is to deny them agency - which is also a form of disrespect.) But gratitude and thankfulness for their actions is IMO way over the line. When you go that far, you have just conceded most of the premises of a particular form of military-worshipping right wing extremism. </pre> </blockquote> Yah I agree I just think the point needs to be made that there is nothing that separates soldiers culpability for the war from Americans who approved and then later confirmed that approval in a national electoral vote.  So singling out soldiers for special treatment here is rather odd.  And I might say that the degree of Agency a senator, congessperson or civilian has is greater than that of a soldier.  Notions that they have a choice because they could revolt or refuse to serve is equivalent to holding that the US population is guilty because they did not revolt or refuse to pay their taxes which are ultimately what is funding this rampage in the garden.  So yes all Ameicans need to take responsibility for their agency.  And if they did then they might find it easier to convince soldiers to deal with their cognitive dissonance in a more healthy and progressive way.<br> <br> Travis<br> </body> </html>