ThomStratton.com

I recently read a few articles recently by veterans who don’t like being thanked for their military service. I can respect that. But I’ve also heard from a lot of other veterans who do like to be appreciated. The discussions in the comments sections have been interesting and varied. I’ve had to modify my thinking a little as a result, and I will probably behave a little differently in the future. But I still intend to express my gratitude.

That said, those who are uncomfortable with thanks make some interesting and valid points. Most of them boil down to the following:

I didn’t do anything important. – I sincerely doubt there is a job in the military that is not, in some way, important. Did your service consist of servicing jeeps? I’ll bet the soldiers who were able to escape an ambush because that jeep function properly are grateful for your service. And if more soldiers come home alive because of the service of those supporting them, then I’m grateful for that.

You don’t understand what we went through. – True. I don’t. I also don’t really understand what it’s like to be a policeman or fireman. I don’t understand what it is to repair electrical lines in a storm. But that doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate that someone does do it. I’m willing to try and understand if you’ll let me.

I didn’t believe in our mission. – I can certainly appreciate that. If you ask me, that’s all the more reason to thank you. You didn’t believe in the mission, but you did it anyway. That’s the heart of military service right there. You are essentially putting your life in the hands of the US Government, doing what they tell you to do, whether you can see a good reason for it or not. If nothing else, that is what makes military service worthy of thanks.

I chose this life. I enjoy what I do. I like the pay. No thanks are needed. Your taxes paid for my ‘vette. – Great! I’m glad to hear that! I’d be even more relieved to hear that if we had a conscript military like many other countries. But like it or not, the act of turning your life over to the US Government to do with as it will is not an ordinary thing. If my thanks are not needed, that’s fine. You have it anyway, but I’m also glad to hear you’re enjoying what you do. Not everyone does.

You’re just trying to alleviate your guilt for not signing up yourself. – Uh… No. Now you’re just being judgmental. I didn’t enlist, that’s true. But I don’t feel guilty about it. I work hard and pay my taxes without griping (much) because I know some of it’s going to pay you for your service. And, as a short, wimpy asthmatic with heart trouble, you should probably thank me for not serving, because I would probably be a liability in anything but a desk job. I do, however, regret that soldiers in times past were treated badly when they came home. And I regret that there are people out there right now who look down on people who serve in the military as ignorant brutes, as hapless pawns, as wannabe killers, or fools too dumb for real work. I want to make it clear that those people do not represent me.

It makes me uncomfortable. – For this I am sorry, if such is the case. And I can understand that. I recently had a colleague at work get called up for active duty through his reserve unit. I was tasked to take over his work. As we spent the next several days going through the hand-off he thanked me repeatedly for stepping in. I did feel a little uncomfortable. I wasn’t the one about to leave my family behind for nine months, missing my daughter’s high school graduation. Nor was I given any choice in taking on his work. Alternately, I also wasn’t the one going to help out people he didn’t even know in their fight against Ebola. Compared to that, there’s nothing particularly noble about taking over implementing changes to a data interface. I’m equally uncomfortable when, after singing in church, people come up to me and tell me how wonderful it was, even though I knew I had a frog in my throat the whole time and was only “passable” as far as what I knew I could do. But ultimately, responsibility for feeling uncomfortable in those situations is on our own heads. It’s no fair to place the blame on others whose intentions are good.

I’d rather you supported healthcare/benefits for veterans or paid more attention to who you elect so we don’t have to keep doing this. – Okay, that’s a valid point. But you’re kind of assuming I don’t. And I wish our political system were so transparent that we could know exactly how each candidate will respond when military force becomes an option before we vote for them. I also wish we had a world that was cut and dried enough to be able to tell the difference between a good mission, a bad mission, and a mission that simply needs to be done. Unfortunately, we don’t have that world. All the more reason to thank the people who pay the price for our lack of vision and clarity.

I served in peace time. – And I’d like to think that’s why we enjoyed that period of peace. I’m also glad that, since you were willing to volunteer, that you were able to serve out your time in a job that is still dangerous, even in peace time, and come home safely. But no one ever goes into service knowing that they’ll not be called on to put their lives on the line somewhere. You had the luck of the draw. I’m still grateful you served in the first place.

But ultimately I did not want to write this post to argue with veterans about what they should feel. I really would rather talk about why I feel a desire to thank you for your service, and why it might not be what you think.

Like it or not, America is a superpower. Everyone turns to us to bail them out of tight spots, even while cursing our name. Whenever disaster strikes somewhere in the world we’re often among the first to respond. We can’t do what we do without a strong military. That we are able to do all of this with an entirely volunteer military is extraordinary. Like it or not, few countries are able to match this. While I suppose this says as much about our incentive system as the people who step up, I’m not prepared to discount the people who do step up. We have influence in the world because we can still get people to volunteer to project that power.

Similarly, attacks on our home soil have been few and far between because we have a strong military. In my mind one of the greatest roles of the military is to discourage those who wish our country harm. That’s why I feel service in peace time is just as valuable.

Serving in the military is not just another job. As I’ve mentioned above, when you join the military you set aside a great number of your freedoms. You have some control over the trajectory of your career there, but you do not get to choose your missions. You go where they tell you, whether it’s fighting terrorists and insurgents in Iraq, having a staring contest with the North Koreans across the DMZ, or rendering aid in the aftermath of a tsunami. While a small percentage of the over-all military is directly in harm’s way at a given time, a lot of work goes on behind the scenes to keep the point of the spear sharp. You don’t know going in whether you’ll spend your time at a desk in Texas, on a flight line in Minot ND, or the sweltering heat of Baghram Air Base. You don’t know, and may have no say in how often you have contact with or can see your loved ones. When something goes wrong at home there may be darn little you can do.

While I have the highest respect for police and firefighters, they have a great deal more personal freedom in their service. This does not diminish their service so much as increase the respect I have for the military and their potential to go anywhere and do anything–including die–at their government’s whim. Like it or not, that’s not a normal job. You cannot equate what you do with what I do. I write a check to the government for a dollar amount that is always less than what I make. You write a check for up to and including your life. In my job my greatest fear is that the company might have a downturn and I’ll have to go find another job. In your job, I’ve heard vets express, your greatest fear is that you’ll screw up and your follow soldiers will die. There is a big difference between my job and your job.

Your reasons for joining up don’t negate the fact that you did. Some join for truly altruistic reasons. Some join because of the incentives. Some join to get an education. Some may even join just to see the world. Some just want to avoid boredom. Whatever. There are other ways to fulfill those desires. But you chose the military. Service is service.

In the past, some have not had the choice. They were drafted. They may not have wanted to serve, but they did. That, too, is worthy of respect and appreciation. Many found ways around it. They didn’t. Even if they didn’t find themselves on the front lines, service is service.

You represent all soldiers, especially the ones that didn’t come back. And you also represented all of us. Undoubtedly some soldiers have sacrificed a lot more than others. I understand that, and I believe most Americans do also. When we thank you, we’re often not just thanking you, but every soldier you represent. Is that fair to you? I don’t know. You certainly represented all of us to every foreign person you contacted during your service, and I believe that the vast majority of you represented us well. So when I thank you for your service, I’m thanking all soldiers, since there are a great many I will never meet, and far too many I will never even have the ability to meet in this life. I’m not just thanking you, but thanking all the soldiers I won’t be able to, through you.

I wasn’t around to change the lack of welcome and respect given soldiers in the past. I don’t want that to happen in my time. One of the soldiers quoted in one of the articles above said he would prefer to be called a baby killer and spat on, as at least that person has an opinion. That’s unfair. I have an opinion, too. No, it’s not that all soldiers are saints, heroes, or the best of America’s youth, though some are. I don’t ignore that nasty things happen in war. I’m not viewing all soldiers through rose-colored glasses. I simply believe that serving your country in a role that calls on you to do hard, even violent things at the orders of a government, whose cause may or may not be just, is at least worthy of respect and a measure of understanding.

There are atrocities. I know that. People violate the code of conduct we expect from our troops. They usually deserve to be punished and shamed. But that does not detract from those who did their best to serve honorably, even when given difficult, even conflicting orders. And until I have a way to be completely sure which type of soldier you may be, I’d prefer my default assumption was that you did your job, and did it as best you could. You may disillusion me at your leisure.

Your families seem to want to hear gratitude for sacrifice, yours and theirs. One of the most common comments I’ve seen in reading up on this issue comes from family members who absolutely love it when we treat their veteran loved-ones with gratitude. Perhaps that’s because they live in the middle-ground between the civilian public and the men and women in uniform. Perhaps they are more bothered by public indifference. They certainly deserve our thanks, perhaps as much or more than you do.

While you may not be one of them, there are a great many who need to hear it. I’m sorry if I make you uncomfortable. If there’s some sort of clue you can give me that you don’t want to hear it, I’ll try not to say it. But clearly there are those who don’t just like to hear it, but need to hear it. Which is the worse crime, to make you uncomfortable, or to not render aid where needed? I think I’d prefer to err on the side of bolstering those who need it.

That all said, your arguments against my gratitude are not falling on deaf ears. You’ve given me a lot to think about. You’ve impressed me with the level of discourse accompanying all these posts. Veterans on both sides of the question have stated their feelings politely and clearly. And you tell me you’re no one special? I’ve never seen a more polite series of discussions on open forums. Not only is it appreciated, but it has an impact. Those who state their case calmly and politely engage my thinking a lot more quickly than those who try to shout or insult me into submission.

I vow to try and find better ways to engage with veterans. It may take me some time to improve on “thank you for your service.” I’m not exactly a social ninja. Maybe I should be saying, “I’m grateful for all of you who serve,” or “I’m glad you’re home.” I will certainly try to be more aware of those military families around me who might need my support. I will try find ways to get to know you at least a little before issuing a blanket “Thank you” so that you can know that I know where you’re coming from at little better. I’ll try to be a little better prepared to buy a veteran a drink or offer him a job, should the situation arise.

All I ask is that you not immediately doubt my sincerity if all I can manage is “thank you for your service.” Maybe it’s not the best way to express it, but it is meant sincerely. I’ll certainly understand if you respond much the same way I do when sweet little old ladies thank me for my solo in church: with an uncomfortable, but well-intentioned, “you’re welcome.”

Evidently the “Digital Natives”, the generation that have grown up with the latest electronic conveniences, are not as sold on e-books as one might think. According to an article in the Washington Post, while they consume general content electronically, when it comes to reading for learning or leisure, they prefer printed books.

The article lists several reasons, but the one that resonates most strongly with me was this explanation:

“I can’t imagine reading Tocqueville or understanding him electronically,” Nordquist said in between classes while checking his e-mail. “That would just be awful.”

Without having read Baron’s book, he offered reasons for his print preference that squared with her findings. The most important one to him is “building a physical map in my mind of where things are.” Researchers say readers remember the location of information simply by page and text layout — that, say, the key piece of dialogue was on that page early in the book with that one long paragraph and a smudge on the corner. Researchers think this plays a key role in comprehension.

Another significant problem, especially for college students, is distraction. The lives of millennials are increasingly lived on screens. In her surveys, Baron writes that she found “jaw-dropping” results to the question of whether students were more likely to multitask in hard copy (1 percent) vs. reading on-screen (90 percent).

There are quirky, possibly lazy reasons many college students prefer print, too: They like renting textbooks that are already highlighted and have notes in the margins.

While Nordquist called this a crapshoot, Wallis Neff, a sophomore studying journalism, said she was delighted to get a psychology textbook last year that had been “run through the mill a few times.”

“It had a bunch of notes and things, explaining what this versus that was,” she said. “It was very useful.”

Shades of “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince”?

I can’t say I’ve given e-books a real try. When I took my MBA program the textbooks were electronic, but I convinced my employer, who was footing most of the bill, to let me print them out. I’ve read a few books that were only available electronically, and I found it a bit disorienting. There’s no real feeling of progress–the words just keep coming! And no, you can’t find your way back to a particular section quickly. But I’m an old fuddy-duddy who is so deeply engrained with the old “book” paradigm that I suppose I’m not a reliable critic. Nor are my D.N. children, as I’ve brainwashed them into believing in physical books. But I’m a bit surprised to find that the Digital Natives aren’t completely sold on e-books, either.

On the other hand, there are quite a few e-books being sold, so I find myself questioining this particular study. If it’s not the D.N.s, who is buying all those e-books? We need to see some real numbers. Is the purchase of e-books based on something else that cuts across demographic lines? It could be. One of my co-workers is an avid e-book reader, and he’s in his seventies. He has hearing difficulties, so audio books don’t work for him. And while I’m not an e-book reader, I am a regular audio-book consumer. But that’s to fill a specific need–make my commute more productive–and I still read more physical books in a year by nearly twice as many.

In any case, I’m not so sure the e-book revolution is over and that print has lost. I think it’s too early to tell. If this study is correct, it may well be that e-books will be the fad that fades away. I doubt it, as I do think e-books fill a specific consumer need that won’t go away. We may go on for quite some time with the needle stuck halfway. And I’m okay with that. I’m not ready to have print go away.

Last year I posted about a reality TV show about three couples who agreed to let someone else arrange their marriages and meet that person for the first time at the wedding. I speculated that I thought it could work, but it would take a lot of work.

I remembered that post recently and decided to see if I could find out what happened. I found this report. I was pleasantly surprised to find that two of the three couples had decided to stick it out, though it’s clearly been work for them all. In some ways I suspect the pressure of being on Reality TV helped. They may have had a more vested interest in making it work, for one, but they also had those same experts who had matched them in the first place as resources. Both couples turned to those experts for counseling, and it appears to have helped. They also had something most couples don’t have: they have actual “game film” they can turn to when learning how they can improve their communication.

I’m not surprised to learn that what got one couple through a rough spot was an external trial they faced together. I think shared struggles can bring people closer together. One thing I did find interesting was that one couple appeared to have an instant connection, and yet they seem to have struggled just as much as the couple who were on shaky ground from the start. That seems to point to a willingness to work at it being one of the key ingredients to a lasting marriage more than attraction.

At any rate, my hat is off to those couples who had the guts to even do this in the first place. I wish them well, and hope they remain happily together.

I just heard the news that Leonard Nimoy has died. I’m not even remotely sure what to say at this point. He was a significant part of my childhood. I was Spock for Halloween. I’ve felt kindly toward him most of my life.

He had a good run, I think. But the sky is just a little darker now for the lack of his star in it.

When Judge, a retired police dog in West Deptford, New Jersey had to be put to sleep dozens of police officers turned out to show their respect and offer their support. Judge apparently had severe Cushings Disease, the same disease our sweet Lady struggled with.

Police dogs are extremely well trained, and the danger they face in the line of duty is no less just because they view much of what they do as a game. I know the officers who work with them value their abilities greatly and view them as comrades in arms.

I know police across the nation have come under a great deal of criticism of late, but I remain undeterred in my admiration for the men,  women, and dogs who willingly put themselves in harm’s way every day to keep us safe and enforce the laws we rely on to hold society together. Do they make mistakes? Absolutely. Under the conditions they work in it’s a credit to their restraint and dedication there aren’t more. Nearly no one is happy to see a cop.

Are there bad cops? Sure. But that there are people willing to even be cops is an amazing thing, really. It takes a special type of person, and I for one am glad there are still people willing to be police officers.

So I’m not surprised that Judge was given the farewell salute he was. Only cops truly appreciate what it is to be a cop, and I’m certain Judge was accepted as “one of them.”

I’m grateful for Judge, Cpl. Michael Franks, his handler, and all police men and women who put themselves out there day after day. To all of you, my deepest thanks.

I imagine by now everyone has heard about Lady Gaga’s performance of a “Sound of Music” medley at the oscars. I didn’t see it at the time, as I don’t watch the Oscars. But based on comments I heard from people who I’d be inclined to trust on the issue, I decided to give her performance a look later on.

I don’t care much for Lady Gaga, to be honest. She’s just another attention-hound pop star who will do pretty much anything to make the headlines. She just does it in a premeditated way that makes it easier for admirers to believe she’s making an intellectual statement at the same time.

Well, this time she decided to be respectful of the material. Her performance, while not especially memorable, was understated and fairly classy. She chose to make a statement by not making a statement. She chose not to go for shock value. Perhaps she realized that she was treading on an American institution and decided not to throw pink paint all over the Lincoln Memorial, so to speak. I know other artists who wouldn’t have hesitated to do so.

So I find it interesting that I’ve gained some respect for Lady Gaga–not because of what she did, but for what she didn’t do. She may not draw the line where I would with most of what she does, but it’s refreshing to see someone at least willing to draw the line.

Evidently the Academy Awards ceremony was held this weekend. As this excites me about as much as the Superbowl (ie. not at all), I didn’t really pay attention. I learned a long time ago that Hollywood and I disagree greatly on what constitutes a good movie. And, quite frankly, I’m more than a little tired of taking up my limited time to listen to overpaid, spoiled brats who get thousands of dollars of goodies just to show up lecture me on how to live. Wage equality? Physician, heal thyself. I’ll know they really mean it when the highest-paid actors willingly forego their big checks in order to keep things more even with their peers. Racism? I’ve never had a problem with movies with black leads. A good story is a good story, a good actor is a good actor. So why doesn’t Hollywood produce more movies with black leads? There’s certainly plenty of evidence that Hollywood is more than happy to produce movies to advance lots of other agendas, even at the expense of profits, so don’t tell me they can’t make more movies with black leads.

Hollywood, be the change you claim you want to see in the world. Then we’ll talk.

Of course just as telling, perhaps, was the social media posts that showed up on my Facebook feed. Of all the posts about the Oscars made by male posters, nearly all were about the actual awards–agreeing or disagreeing with choices. The one notable exception was someone praising Lady Gaga’s performance of a medley of The Sound of Music songs. Of the posts made by female posters, the majority were critical and/or objectifying of individuals. That singer is too skinny, the other sang flat. That male actor must be gay because he takes his mother to award shows. So-n-so is a hottie. So-n-so’s dress was abysmal. Rrrrraarrr, gotta get me some of that.  That sort of thing.

You may form you own ideas about what the difference means, or whether my results are typical. All I know is that I’m getting tired of being lectured on how terrible middle-class, white males are when everything around me suggests that the problem may be elsewhere. Let s/he who is without sin cast the first stone, okay? Oops, sorry for the lack of trigger warning on that religious reference there.