Yesterday was Veteran’s Day. According to the LA Times,
Veterans Day traces its origins to World War I, when an armistice was reached between the Allied nations and Germany. It went into effect on the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918. The following year, Nov. 11 became officially known as Armistice Day, a day set aside to honor those who had died in service to the country.
Mostly I would never even know that it was Veterans’ Day. After all, we all go to work and school around here and don’t spend much time thinking about it. But yesterday I was confronted with two very contradictory facts: a forced homage to American soldiers and the horrifying story of American soldiers who committed what can only be described as war crimes against Afghan civilians.
My daughter came home fuming from school. It turns out the school had ruined the beauty of 11:11am on the 11th day of the 11th month of the year 2011 (i.e. 11:11 11/11/11) by making the students observe a moment of silence to honor veterans. As my daughter was telling me of this enforced homage to U.S. soldiers, I was reflecting on the seemingly contradictory story swimming through the news about a U.S. Army unit that committed unspeakable acts of terror and murder in Afghanistan. Indeed, on the same day my daughter was forced to honor vets rather than celebrate a numerical miracle, Army Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs was sentenced for these war crimes.
The 26-year-old Gibbs had been convicted of murdering unarmed Afghan civilians and then cutting off pieces of them as souvenirs. Rotting fingers, teeth, pieces of bones and other keepsakes were found in his possession. He also has skulls tattooed on his leg. One for each dead Afghan, whom he referred to as “savages.”
Gibbs could have been sentenced to life in prison for his crimes, but instead will be eligible for parole in about 8 1/2 years. Perhaps the jury, made up of other service members, gave such a shockingly light sentence because they assumed Gibbs suffered some sort of mental breakdown. Gibbs could easily be among the many service members (perhaps as many as 20 percent according to a survey by the Rand Institute) who suffer severe mental illness, including PTSD and depression.
Or perhaps Gibbs wasn’t sentenced to more than 8 1/2 years because he represents a sort of masculinity that, while monstrous, is also potentially heroic. Americans long for heroic masculinity. They look for it on battlefields, among firefighters and police, even on football fields. And the sort of masculinity required for heroes often leads to horrific acts of cruelty and aggression.
This is a lesson we saw play out at Penn State this week. Not only was child sexual abuse allowed to continue for decades because “the game” and the sort of heroes it produced were seen as more important than the lives of the boys being abused, but when there were consequences, the same masculinity led to riots and death threats.
I’m not saying all U.S. soldiers or football players are monsters. Indeed, I am sure most are incredibly worthwhile people. We’re the monsters. We as a culture and a collective consciousness that demand a sort of masculinity that is encouraged to hurt and even kill others in the service of heroism. When those heroes destroy the lives of others, it is we who look away. A football coach who rapes young boys is horrifying, but the game, the game is what we need. Some soldiers who go out and kill Afghan villagers for fun and then dice them up into pieces, take photos of them, and shove the evidence of their glory into their pockets is shocking, but not so shocking that we as a culture will stop pretending that war is heroic.
Instead of observing Veterans’ Day or 11/11/11 11:11, we should have all taken a moment of silence to reflect on the fact that the only way to contain monstrous men is to contain our own monstrous need for heroes.