Heroism, Sacrifice, and the DEI Erasure
This writer is proud of his family’s military service.
My brother was drafted during the Vietnam War and served honorably as an Army MP.
My uncle was a career Army man who served honorably in World War II, Korea, and Vietnam.
They and other Black, Hispanic, Asian, Native American and female soldiers have sacrificed much in defense of our country.
Many of them sacrificed everything.
It is offensive and insulting to see their achievements being discarded.
At the behest of the current administration, numerous Department of Defense website pages have been deleted because they featured non-White or non-male military personnel.
Stories of valor and courage are being hidden because these pages ran counter to the administration’s anti-DEI agenda.
The backlash from these removals is causing a reversal of policy and at least some of these pages to be reinstated, but that’s not the point.
The point is that this should never have happened.
A webpage talking about Ira Hayes was removed. Hayes was the Native American Marine who helped to raise the US flag on Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima.
Webpages about the Navajo Code Talkers were removed.
A page discussing Black Medal of Honor winner Charles Rogers was removed.
A story about MLB integrator Jackie Robinson’s military service has been removed.
Arlington National Cemetery’s website removed pages devoted to notable internments of Black, Hispanic and women veterans.
Any mention of patriotic, freedom-loving People of Color and women are subject to removal.
We are not living in a country deserving of non-White, non-male military personnel.
This is not “My Country Tis of Thee, Sweet Land of Liberty.”
What we have is “Fight for Us, Then Forget You.”
Imagine how outrageously difficult it must be to be non-White and non-male in the current American military.
They serve under a woefully underachieving Secretary of Defense.
Their Commander-in-Chief is a loutish draft dodger.
They are risking your life for bigots who want to erase them from existence.
We’ve fought wars abroad in places that were freer for us than our home country.
We’ve liberated places though they were desolated and destroyed that were safer for us than our own city streets.
We’ve shed our blood on a thousand battlefields and given our lives in thousands of cities, towns, and villages, only for our sacrifices to be deliberately omitted.
Our country has never been worthy of our sacrifices, but today, it is even less worthy.
Why should we care about our country when it doesn’t pretend to care about us?
Why should we fight foreign wars when our worst enemy has always been at home?
These are questions that we have always asked ourselves.
We’ve served anyway despite knowing the answers.
It is time to break ranks literally and figuratively.
We should vacate the military and let them have it lock, stock, and grenade.
Let them have the all-White, all-male armed forces they pretend exists.
We’ve always answered the call to serve.
But for now, we would be better off hanging a sign saying,
“Do Not Disturb.”