Vanity What?????

I have not posted much over the last couple months. It isn’t that I don’t know what to write, or don’t wish to write. Nor is it a function of not thinking. It is more a reaction of distaste and dissatisfaction, perhaps from thinking too much. I don’t know about anyone else, but today’s world, especially in my venue here in the states, is barely recognizable anymore. This country, its culture and its inhabitants have become as oppressive as they are alien.

I’ve never harbored illusions about the ‘reach’ of my commentary, and in an atmosphere where fewer and fewer people read for edification or comprehension, I have even fewer illusions. I’ve also never been concerned about any reader’s reaction to my musings and opinion, convinced that if any of my revelations made someone else look around with an opened eye or flexible mind, that that was sufficient. It is unimportant that anyone agree with me, as long as they exert some individualized creative and critical thinking about whatever subject I expound upon.

Firmly convinced that everyone is entitled to their own opinion, just as long as it is their opinion and not that of the last person they spoke with, I also admit that many human actions and thoughts stymie me. I’m flummoxed by what many people consider important. I’m also totally in the dark about what their motivations could possibly be. Being an American, I am naturally open, out spoken and casual in my approach to people, but I still respect a form of Class that arises from character. These days, few people exhibit class in any form, but instead, they ‘‘just ain’t got no couth.”

For example, I truly detest pretension in all forms. When said pretensions have morphed into personal or group vanity, it’s not only offensive but silly. In my area of the nation, there is a leaning toward vanity gates – those entryways to housing developments or so called prestigious neighborhoods. Such foolishness becomes highly competitive and too often results in ostentatious eyesores that can fill a quarter acre of land. Then, of course, there is the vanity that results in petty, hypocritical, and stupid people driving the largest and most expensive SUV available, oft times wearing Support the Troops or environmental signs on the rear bumper, oblivious to the reality of conspicuous consumption or wasting or destroying precious natural resources.

Then there are the vanity license plates – and it is the one I noticed several days ago that has haunted me and spurred me to set fingers to computer keys. The plate read POW – 3545, and in lower print at the bottom should anyone fail to recognize the initials it read Former Prisoner of War. When did it become a point of either vanity or glorified group identification to flaunt being a POW? What is the internal or intellectualized reason behind such a display? What reaction is the person seeking? Are we to feel pity that he was ‘taken’ during a war which may well have been unjust? Are we to feel awe that he survived the experience? Are we automatically to give him the right away because he suffered? Are we to immediately tie that to “Veteran” which over the last decade as been considered a significant political selling point?
I’ve never approved of war, which is in reality a failure of intellect as well as a failure of humanity, even though I recognize that in a few truly desperate situations there is no alternative to fighting FOR each other. However, rather than glorifying being a POW, doesn’t said capture in some way signify failure? Isn’t one of the tenets of battles to put as may of the enemy out of commission as possible before they do the same to your side? Naturally, we would all be pleased and grateful that such a person would survive, but shouldn’t we temper our adulation with the realization that they shouldn’t have been caught in the first place?

Perhaps it depends on your political affiliation and/or viewpoint, but giving anyone a pass because they were a POW seems short sighted. Obviously, the first recognized name associated with being a POW would be John McCain, but his experience hasn’t necessarily made him a better person than someone who was not a POW. In McCain’s case, he may be adamant about issues like torture, but he seems weak and two-faced about other things – like being such a slimy sycophant to George W. Bush, whose political machine purposely smeared the man and his family during the last primaries, who has reserved to himself the right to torture anyone, who has decided we should spy on each other, and who has withdrawn the ancient writ of habeas corpus thereby further destroying the Constitution of these United States, obliterating all but one article of the Bill of Rights.

So, you were a POW. That doesn’t mean you are of exemplary character or morally perfect. That doesn’t mean we should venerate you, or make you superior or special, or that you should crow about it. After all, somehow when the chips were down, you blinked.