As I sit here tonight, my mind is troubled by a conversation I had with a friend, a fellow warrior. He told me that I should leave the country because I spoke out against our country’s warmongering ways. He compared me to Eric Snowden and called me a hypocrite.
But is it hypocritical to want peace? Is it hypocritical to question the morality of sending our warriors overseas to die or kill others in the name of some elusive notion of patriotism? We act as if we are the good guys in all of this, but history will remember us differently.
My friend calls me a Commie because I dare to speak out against our country’s actions. He tells me to leave the country in shame. He works for a private company now, and he tells me, his job is to “shut Russia down.”
Private companies, it seems, are just as eager as our government to quell the competition.
But do we really want to bomb others? Do we really want to spread democracy, whatever that even means? The truth is that we don’t have a democracy. We argue and fight about what it means to have a constitutional republic, but at the end of the day, we don’t really care about people who are not like us or close to us. We are willing to bomb others over there, but would we be willing to do the same to our own people here?
I am begging for peace. Can we not move past this cycle of violence? Can we not choose to sing songs out of our foxholes like the soldiers did on Christmas in WWII? Can a warrior beg for peace without being called a traitor and being asked to leave? What kind of society are we if we cannot even have a conversation about the morality of war without resorting to insults and threats?
I fought for this country because I believed in its values of freedom and justice for all. But now I see those values being trampled upon in the name of war. I beg for peace. I beg you to join me and take a stand against war mongering. Stop the bombs. Beg for peace. Let us be the society that we claim to be.
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