Today I found out that the son of someone here at work was recently killed in action while on a tour of duty in Iraq. I don't really know the dad all that well, but my heart is breaking for him.
Last Saturday night I was the one at the party who made my gung-ho for war friends shut up. They were talking about military strategy, and I couldn't argue that their theories were sound of you want to win a war, but, I told them, I just couldn't get past the fact that every single soldier is a person, and they all have moms. I wouldn't want to be the mom of a soldier who died, it would break my heart. I'm sure I didn't change their minds, but at least they had the decency to stop sounding so bloodthirsty. I'm also sure that they went back to talking about it after I was gone.
I know that I'm a wuss, and that projecting my own emotions onto something so much bigger than just me is incredibly over-sensitive, but if you can't do that, if you can't imagine yourself in someone else's place, then you can't make the most informed decision. Understanding how war affects the people involved is a crucial part of whether or not war is worth it. Isn't it?
It should be.
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