Justin Timberlake…
…writes movingly about his evening at the Marine Corps Ball.
Yes, Justin Timberlake.
(And I bet he can pronounce “Corps” correctly, too.)
The New Neo
A blog about political change, among other things
…writes movingly about his evening at the Marine Corps Ball.
Yes, Justin Timberlake.
(And I bet he can pronounce “Corps” correctly, too.)
As per the recent post on the genetics of kindness I now wonder about the genetics of class. No matter really, Mr. Timberlake, throughout this episode, has shown that, however he came by it, he has it.
It reminds me a bit of the early days after 9/11, when reporters were first embedded with troops. Remember that weird (for them) coverage? Almost to a man or woman, these reporters seemed not only to be paying the usual lip service to “our heroes” (armed forces members, I mean NO disrespect by the scare quotes – more in the next paragraph!) but actually to be wowed by the character of the servicemen and -women with whom they were embedded. It was as if the reporters had had no prior contact whatsoever with people with a shared mission – or at least with a shared mission that was fundamentally constructive. The reporters seemed almost giddy.
The scare quotes: I never served in the military. My dad did; he was a helicopter pilot in the USAF, winner of the Mackay Trophy in 1979 (“most meritorious flight of the year”) for the rescue of 28 Taiwanese sailors from a sinking ship in a storm that, if it wasn’t a typhoon, was damn close. My dad was the sole recipient that year – and it’s bugged the heck out of him ever since, because (as he’s said to everybody for years, including last year when the helicopter he flew in that mission was retired and my brother took him to Wright-Patterson to be one of the speakers at the ceremony) he was only the commander of the mission and one of the pilots. His whole crew were heroes to those sailors; they lived through that night because my dad’s unit was mission-ready, got their birds in the air fast, and were able to hold them steadily enough in the wind and rain to get every man off the ship before it went down.
In my un-heroic opinion, a person isn’t a hero by virtue of signing on to serve. That person is a potential hero, certainly; he or she stands a greater chance of becoming a hero than most of us; and his or her willingness to serve immediately marks him or her as a deeply responsible citizen worthy of great respect and gratitude – and I yield to no one in the respect I have for those who serve. But until a member of the armed services is called on to look the great bargain in the face – “your life, perhaps, for your mission” – it’s premature to throw the h-word around.
I should clarify that I also mean no disrespect to Justin Timberlake! It’s to his credit that he discerned the character of his dinner companions, and that he was so willing to write about it so personally.
“In my un-heroic opinion, a person isn’t a hero by virtue of signing on to serve.”
Yes! With an all-volunteer military, we owe those who choose serve a tremendous amount. But it isn’t an unlimited obligation.
And a hero on the battlefield can be a jerk or a creep in regular life. Prior service is not a free pass to crap on cop cars.
I recall some fcomments here and there that the embeds early on might be sucked in and become too sympathetic, not real journalists.
Sure hope so. Leaven the business.
You know, if I had had a date at a party where she had, oh, maybe two hundred buff, combat-hardened big brothers watching me, I’d be pretty darn civilized.
I’m willing to overlook character flaws (“jerk” or “creep”) when I know the individual has displayed true courage in the past. Maybe it is just me, but courage, moral and physical, trumps an awful lot. Certainly not defecating on a ploice car or private vehicle, but simple character deficencies, yes.
Nice to know that Mr. Timberlake recognizes unselfish service for what it is. Would that others of his chosen profession would do likewise.
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Just thought I’d repost this. Some might find it interesting.
—One of the reasons why I love ML Alternative and just finished rereading it and reseeing it and rehearing it for the third (full) time, is because ML Alternative deals with honor, emotions, humanity, security, warfare, and sacrifice in a very tasteful and truthful fashion.
9/11 and Pearl harbor were both idealistic long term goals for people to try to avoid happening in the future, as well as personal losses and motivations for people to never see happen again. In times of war or danger, it is useful and good to revitalize people’s motivations. For without motivations, they will not have the morale or will to continue the fight. They won’t do what they are supposed to do. They’ll slack off. They’ll find ways to avoid their duty. All with the consequences of getting other people killed. Getting themselves killed is fine. Nobody cares if a traitor to the US, due to some discontent about some gay policies or war policies, get himself killed by betraying American secrets to the enemy. I wouldn’t, and nobody I know in certain circles would either. We would say, “good riddance”. But killing yourself and getting a whole bunch of other people killed at the same time, big difference.
Another thing mentioned in ML Alternative is the concept of how individuals determine the worth of their goals. If their goal is truly worthy, if they truly want it enough, they won’t mind doing 20 things they disliked doing so that they can do the One Single thing they wanted to do. If a person pouted, threw tantrums, or got depressed over doing those 20 things they dislike, it’s obviously because they never really cared about their supposed goals in the first place. Their resolve isn’t hard enough. Thus they don’t deserve to have their personal goals accomplished yet. Truly disciplined people with strong will power can get a lot of things done, because they’re patient and do a lot of stuff they dislike, to make sure the mission succeeds. In comparison, child thugs like Obama can hardly be bothered to get up in the morning. When something goes wrong, it’s time to take a VACATION. Work those slaves to death, and take a vacation. Yea, that’s the way for people with goals to act.
The motto of the Valkyries, the primary military unit featured in Alternative, is:
1. Fulfill your duty with all of your strength.
2. Despair not until your last breath.
3. Make your life count.
The thing about units and people who often take a lot of casualties is that they crack a lot of jokes. They don’t appear sad, especially the more experienced ones, when combat losses are reported. This leads external observers to think they are cold or they just don’t care. The thing is, units that have a history of long combat losses have figured something out about this. When one person gets sad or starts speaking about someone dead or wounded in a sad way, everyone else in the unit starts getting the same way. This can totally destroy morale before important battles, and get even more people killed due to distraction. So efforts are made to control and reduce external displays of emotion. Only pride and positive emotions are allowed, when speaking of the dead or of the fallen.
Despair not until your last breath, because you might find death coming closer if you’re distracted by things like emotional depression.
Duty is often times seen in the creed of accomplishing the mission, a very large theme in the US Marines. The USS Johnston in Leyte Gulf is a good example, for the Navy, of what a deathride or full exertion of effort to accomplish the mission looked like. The Johnston was tasked with escorting a couple of escort carriers, covering the Marine invasion of some island. The Johnston accomplished that task, despite the row upon rows of enemy battleships before them. Which leads us to 3, make your life count. If you are going to die, at least make sure your one single life, that you can only lose one, has a lasting effect. Rick Rescorla was putting that into effect. Not stopping and giving into despair, nor all that much concerned about the future of himself. Just doing what had to be done, until the final end. Confident that his efforts would have lasting positive benefits beyond the duration of his own life.
Motivations, glory, pride, tradition, and honor are important aspects of motivating people to be able to accomplish such dire tasks. It doesn’t matter what a person feels, so long as it isn’t despair, so long as they can fight. Rage, hatred, anger, love, compassion, none of that really matters. All that matters is whether they can funnel it into producing results in battle. But it certainly tends to help if people have strong motivations pushing them past difficult and painful moments. It helps to have a tradition of never giving up, to push you that one percent more over the top. It helps for honor and pride to be your personal reasons for fighting, even if you have no idealistic reasons or gradiose ones for joining the war.
Different people make and need different heroes, for the times. But most of them tend to be able to accomplish a long term goal, irregardless of the problems they face emotionally or physically. The original def of a hero was that he had to be able to do it alone, on his own power. In the modern world, most people are interdependent on others to accomplish a goal.