{"id":122734,"date":"2022-02-11T07:26:46","date_gmt":"2022-02-11T12:26:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=122734"},"modified":"2022-02-11T07:27:25","modified_gmt":"2022-02-11T12:27:25","slug":"analysis-of-stolen-valor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=122734","title":{"rendered":"Analysis of Stolen Valor"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Yet another article on Sarah Cavanaugh.\u00a0 There have been a lot of them coming out.\u00a0 This article, however, gave some good analysis of Stolen Valor by a psychiatrist and a doctoral thesis.<\/p>\n

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An accusation of stolen valor rocks North Kingstown\u2019s VFW Post 152, prompting a resignation and investigations<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

By Bill Seymour<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

NORTH KINGSTOWN, R.I. \u2014 The fabricated story of military service, illness and other claims by a former commander of the North Kingstown\u00a0VFW Post 152 ranks among the growing number of \u201cstolen valor\u201d allegations in the country, said national experts on the matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe see an awful lot of stolen valor cases in all shapes and sizes,\u201d Jason J. Metrick, U.S. assistant inspector general for investigations with the National Archives and Records Administration, told The Independent.<\/p>\n

Two years ago, investigators at the National Archives took steps to make their research resources more available to federal and local law enforcement to deal with what they suspect is an increase in stolen valor cases to obtain benefits or loans during the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n

Glenna Whitley, co-author of the 1998 book, \u201cStolen Valor,\u201d told The Independent she agreed that cases are mounting as social media entices people to engage in more of this kind of fraud.<\/p>\n

The trend was felt locally last week when the commander of North Kingstown\u2019s\u00a0VFW Post 152 resigned over stolen valor accusations.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

That was the opening and background.\u00a0 Here is some of the information about Stolen Valor…<\/p>\n

If the pretending just occurs in their house or comes out during Halloween, the fantasy has no real harm, experts said. It is when those doing venture into the real world they get themselves in trouble by actually living their new identity, they added.<\/p>\n

In the sense of military impersonations, it can lead to focused efforts to convince people these military exploits are real, such as Cavanaugh did when giving speeches about service she never performed or battles in which she was never engaged, they said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~<\/p>\n

Dr. Anthony Gallo, a psychiatrist in North Kingstown, said that people often invent identities to get attention.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe military is an exalted status. Who wouldn\u2019t want to be a hero?\u201d he said, adding that there also are mental illnesses that can lead to these impersonations.<\/p>\n

Elishewah Rosa Weisz in her 2016 doctoral study, \u201cStolen Valor: The People Who Commit Military Impersonation,\u201d found several psychological explanations for military impersonation.<\/p>\n

\u201cAdmiration and respect which accompany high ranks and the excitement of combat positions are a considerable influence. Being admired and respected by people who listen to what you have to say, such as war stories, can be addictive. Besides admiration and respect there is the idea of uniqueness,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

People feel the need to be special and different from one another and since fairly few people in U.S. society enlist in the military and even fewer serve in combat positions, serving in the military makes a person special and unique. Impersonation may be a way for an impersonator to feel unique without having to go through the dangers and tribulations of military service, Weisz maintained.<\/p>\n

There are also various psychiatric disorders, she said, including some that contain symptoms of grandiose thinking\u00a0 \u2014 thinking one is a hero for example \u2014 of manipulation, and of lying.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll these manifestations may be visible and possibly necessary for someone to impersonate another, in some cases for decades. Psychiatric disorders may also benefit a person if the disorder is a Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) recognized disorder, which means there is a financial and therapeutic benefit to be gained,\u201d she said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, the experts are saying if you restrict your faking to just Halloween, there is no real harm.\u00a0 Seriously, some of this analysis is pretty good.<\/p>\n

So much more in the article<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yet another article on Sarah Cavanaugh.\u00a0 There have been a lot of them coming out.\u00a0 This … Analysis of Stolen Valor<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":663,"featured_media":122735,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[408,183],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-122734","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stolen-valor","category-stolen-valor-act"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122734","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/663"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=122734"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122734\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/122735"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=122734"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=122734"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=122734"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}