{"id":40587,"date":"2014-03-23T21:32:42","date_gmt":"2014-03-24T01:32:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=40587"},"modified":"2014-03-23T21:32:46","modified_gmt":"2014-03-24T01:32:46","slug":"stolen-valor-what-it-should-be-teaching-america-about-its-veterans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=40587","title":{"rendered":"Stolen Valor: What it Should be Teaching America about its Veterans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p dir=\"ltr\">I am going to open up with <a href=\"http:\/\/www.news10.net\/story\/news\/local\/community\/2014\/03\/21\/civilian-explains-why-he-donned-military-uniform\/6683771\/\">this link<\/a> to a young man explaining why he donned an Army Combat Uniform and wore it around campus, until several young veterans called him out and asked him to remove the garment. (This is the link to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=9HC0DGMfrnw\">original video<\/a>) The Veterans were arrested for Disturbing the Peace and making threats. The young man who was wearing that uniform has now become the victim in the eyes of his local news organization&#8211;in this act of bullying&#8211;as they portrayed it.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Here are some simple facts to warm this conversation up:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li dir=\"ltr\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The young man is well within his rights to wear that uniform as he pleases. It is a first amendment right.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li dir=\"ltr\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The news organization can say whatever they want as long as it does not endanger the public. It is a first amendment right.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li dir=\"ltr\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Disturbing the Peace is defined as: \u201ca crime generally defined as the unsettling of proper order in a public space through one&#8217;s actions. This can include creating loud noise by fighting or challenging to fight, disturbing others by loud and unreasonable noise (including loud music), or using offensive words.\u201d These young veterans legally violated this law.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I\u2019m not disputing any of this. That is the country we live in. What this case does do is highlight the differences between the veteran class and the non-veteran class.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I am going to focus on two key points. The first being, why Stolen Valor means so much to us as Veterans, and why civilians don\u2019t understand. The second being, a highlight of the behavior differences between Veterans and civilian personalities as highlighted in this case.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\"><strong>Why Stolen Valor matters.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Lawyers, doctors, and accountants are all professional fields in which you have to meet a series of minimum requirements to be able to participate. And all of those careers carry felony charges for impersonating and practicing the profession without proper licensure. There are no laws supporting the impersonation of a service member. Why? Because it poses no risk to the public for the impersonation. It isn\u2019t fair, but it is the truth.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">All of those jobs carry with them a high amount of effort to enter into those fields. They also carry high financial rewards compared to the Military, which has high costs and fewer rewards, which is why Stolen Valor has become such a hotly contested issue for us. The civilian population doesn\u2019t understand that we don\u2019t put any piece of our uniform on without earning it, not the stripe down my Dress Blue pants, the bars on my sleeve, or the ribbons and badges on my chest. Every one of those items is a representation of a cost paid, either by myself, those beside me, or those that came before me, individuals who I am now able to call my brothers and sisters. All of that said, those ribbons, badges, bars and stripes when added together don\u2019t amount for anything of marketable value.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">They represent something.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The licensure attained by doctors, lawyers and accountants has a marketable value. They will attain a higher wage. That licensure, which they worked so hard for, does have value after they earned it.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I have only placed my awards onto one resume (by request of a military provided resume coach), and I was offered an entry level position.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">I understand, it is capitalism. But when we remember the blood, sweat, and tears that go into everything that makes up our uniforms, and all that we got from it was a strip of cloth or a shiny badge . . . that is why we get so emotional about them. That is why you can hear that Ranger\u2019s voice cracking when he fended off the passive-aggressive assaults from the crowd, while he defended something he earned, which was being portrayed by someone as cheap trinkets that the young man wanted to earn.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\"><strong>The difference between veterans and civilians.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">75% of Americans do not meet the minimum requirements for military service according to a report titled: \u201cReady, Willing, and Unable to Serve,\u201d published by Mission Readiness (You can find more information about them at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.missionreadiness.org\">www.missionreadiness.org<\/a>). According to this <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2013\/05\/27\/opinion\/americans-and-their-military-drifting-apart.html\">article<\/a> in the NY Times (which also addresses the divide between the military and civilian class) less than .5% of Americans are presently serving. That means that only 2% of those eligible to enter military service do so currently. There was a time, WWII, when 12% of the US population served in the military, which was in a time of the draft. This is important, because in an all-volunteer military we need to consider the types of people that it will attract, especially in a time of war. Whereas, during draft time, those able were obligated to serve, capturing a more diverse (not demographically, but value-wise) segment of the population as opposed to today. That, is actively serving, including guard and reserves.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The total population of Americans who are veterans is about 10% now. I want to throw this number out there, although it is less important for my argument.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Today, when America is still technically at war, there is no hiding the potential consequences of military service. This is a spectacular filtering process. By virtue of the War on Terror, we only recruit those who understand that going to war is a distinct possibility. Those people are more devoted toward personal and national values, hard working, and risk averse, which is also an important consideration.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">We don\u2019t see the world the same way, and we are quite willing to step outside of our comfort zones, which is important when we consider how insulated America is from the reality of the struggle to survive. We pay lip-service to daily struggles, but in the developed world, if we completely quit trying, there is a government sponsored safety net to help us meet our daily needs. Only by stepping outside of that net, which is a substantial effort, can we find within our nation the daily struggle to survive.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The consequence of this insulation is our transition up <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Maslow's_hierarchy_of_needs\">Maslow\u2019s Hierarchy of Needs<\/a>. We no longer need to concern ourselves with the physiological or the safety levels, and have moved into a mixture of the love\/belonging and esteem levels. If you want proof of this, go onto your Facebook page. You will find it all over, watching how friends and family interact and what they talk about. Or, for that matter, look back to the News 10\u2019s representation of the interaction between the young man and the veterans who called him out. Their focus wasn\u2019t on the safety afforded the country by those veterans who have put themselves into harms way, it was on the young man\u2019s need to belong to an organization he is unable to join&#8211;because he is unfit.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Unfit.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">In a nation where everyone wants to belong, there are organizations in which we are unfit to join. You simply don\u2019t meet the minimum requirements. These requirements aren\u2019t set forth by any small measure. The consequence of us loosening the standard on the physical and mental capabilities of an applicant has a far greater consequence compared to that of most civilian sector jobs. In the most extreme of positions&#8211;which makes up approximately 12% of the military population, the remainder being in support roles&#8211;the consequence of being unfit may potentially have deadly consequences. Now, this isn\u2019t having to come in on Saturday to finish a report, or receiving a lower tip from an unsatisfied table. In the combat arms community, being unfit is a gross liability to one\u2019s self and those around them. Even our support elements, which are less in the direct line of fire by the nature of their duties, understand that their failure to act isn\u2019t a late shipment and an unhappy customer. It is a nineteen-year-old who doesn\u2019t have ammo or chow.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">These types of extreme circumstances, paired with having a military raised in a time of war, create a culture of doers. Within the ranks, we don\u2019t have a culture that promotes conversation. I promotes action. We need to get things done now, or this will be the consequence. That isn\u2019t true for the better part of our country, which has a heavy focus on conversation, which was why in this video we heard several people asking those Rangers why they were going after the civilian impersonator. They asked the question, confused at the veracity in which these Rangers addressed the problem in front of them, and when they got an answer they walked away or called the police (Because public safety is not the responsibility of every citizen, it is the duty of the police officer).<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">The sad part is our voices are being drowned out, because the indifferent, unaffected class of civilian Americans who are untouched by war are a growing population, while the population of veterans is dwindling.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">US Population 317,736,457 (Taken on Mar 22, 2014 at 2127 UTC US Census Bureau)<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Post 9\/11 Vets 1,761,446 \u00a0(Taken from US Census Bureau)<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">It is only a matter of time before the .5% of veterans is all that remains of our veteran population. And this nation\u2019s perspective only further alienates their veterans, a class of people who have dropped down a level on the Hierarchy of Needs on behalf of others, those who are currently portraying us as bullies and impersonating us to gain recognition for acts that were not their own. We have foregone the safety level, and sometimes physiological level, and have stepped down the pyramid. It wasn\u2019t for our own sakes, the economic return wasn\u2019t there, especially compared with the opportunities that exist in the civilian sector&#8211;at a much lower cost. We did this because we believe in something, that it was worth it for others for us to do these things.<\/p>\n<p>The hard part is awareness. There is only one way to educate a person about the differences in perspectives to truly make them understand. But that was why we did it, so that those who we left behind wouldn\u2019t have to endure what we did. The consequence of our own actions is the ignorance of the civilian population. As a result of these differences, the insurmountable divide that is ever growing between a population of ignorant individuals and a dwindling population of the aware will only get worse. They will segregate themselves from us and us from them.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I am going to open up with this link to a young man explaining why he &hellip; <a title=\"Stolen Valor: What it Should be Teaching America about its Veterans\" class=\"hm-read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=40587\"><span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Stolen Valor: What it Should be Teaching America about its Veterans<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":646,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,84,30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-media","category-military-issues","category-phony-soldiers"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40587","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\/646"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40587\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}