dagblog - Comments for "MISSING COMPONENT"

Actually what I had in mind

Dennie Briggs — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 14:09:16 +0000

Actually what I had in mind was the idea of empathy, that fundamental quality which makes us human, and is found so missing in our lives today. Everyone is born with it; for so many it is blunted or even momentarily destroyed early in life, then schooled-out with the push towards math & science, along with the practice of competition. Sugar-coated religious morality confuses the psyche and soon one ends up in the "rat race" or the "trance of ordinary life." Fortunately, empathy is still there and can come forth under unusual circumstances, as it did with Sgt Meyer—not only in the battlefield, but as he met with his Commander-in-Chief.

As someone has not served in

Elusive Trope — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 12:47:39 +0000

In reply to MISSING COMPONENT

As someone has not served in the military (and probably would have had a total breakdown by the end of the first week of basic training), one facet that has popped out in the numerous stories over the past decade about those that serve is for how many it is family tradition, and if not family than community tradition.

Those who choose to volunteer do so not as an individual making an individual choice, but as member of a group. Sometimes we get so locked into our cultural primacy of the individual that we forget (I know I do) that some people make decisions through a paradigm that is ctually more like traditional Asian cultures where the individual is subsumed into the whole.

There can be something deep and profound about the person who signs up to do their service, just as their father, aunt, uncle, grandfather, cousin, four neighbors down the street, etc did before them.

Yes Dennie... It is true

oldenGoldenDecoy — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 20:07:24 +0000

In reply to MISSING COMPONENT

Yes Dennie...

It is true that on the field of battle... no one but your brothers-in-arms has your back.

Although, in the long run there are also no true victors.

There is a cliché that goes, "To the victors go the spoils..."

But, in this day-and-age there are no victors nor bonuses, perks, or treasure when a defeated force in retreat is slaughtered.

To those of us who have served honorably, this is also a very important "Missing Component."

~OGD~
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