My Acculturated colleague Erin
Vargo wrote a very nice reflection
this week on the bipartisan values we share as Americans, and on the Veterans
Day “Concert for
Valor” at Washington, D.C.’s National Mall, a three-hour concert that
included Rihanna, Carrie Underwood, Bruce Springsteen, and others. Vargo felt
that the show depicted a “universality of America’s regard for our veterans”
that crossed party lines. But some were less than thrilled about Springsteen’s
choice of material for an event intended to honor our nation’s warriors.
Justin Moyer at the Washington Post wrote that Springsteen
sparked social media unrest for playing – along with Zac Brown and Dave Grohl –
Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Vietnam-era anti-war song, “Fortunate Son.” Some
folks inherit star-spangled eyes,
songwriter John Fogerty’s rock classic goes. They send you down to war/And
when you ask them, “How much should we give?”/They only answer, more, more,
more.
The Weekly Standard wasn’t too thrilled with
the tone-deaf selection, either: “It was a particularly terrible choice given
that Fortunate Son is, moreover, an anti-draft song, and this concert was
largely organized to honor those who volunteered to fight in Afghanistan
and Iraq.”
Springsteen went on to perform what
Moyer called a “dirge-like version of ‘Born in the U.S.A.,’” a song often
misinterpreted, by politicians who aren’t paying attention, as a patriotic
anthem. Both that piece and “Fortunate Son” present the American soldier less
as a hero than a victim of pointless, immoral wars and a pawn of greedy
politicians who send him off to do their fighting for them, and who then cast
him aside upon his return home.
The Post’s Moyer defended Springsteen, pointing out that both songs, “while they
criticize the armed forces, aren’t anti-American in the sense that, for
example, the Islamic State is anti-American. By offering a critique of our
nation’s policies, they celebrate its promise.” His article prompted nearly
2700 heated responses from commenters, some of whom felt that it was perfectly
appropriate and patriotic for Springsteen to raise the issue of the ugly reality
for veterans. Better to spark a conversation about that than to bury it, they
claimed.
And there certainly is a host of
serious issues that our veterans face: unemployment, a shocking suicide rate, a
Veterans Administration that has been revealed to be ignoring the vets who need
its assistance and care. Had Springsteen raised some awareness about these
problems, say, in between songs, that might have been more appropriate than
anti-war anthems.
Veterans Day is not the time to
critique the government’s policies. It’s a time for honoring the warriors who
served their country, who did their duty at risk of life and limb, regardless
of the rightness or wrongness of those policies. It’s a time for paying tribute
to the sacrifice of our soldiers and their families, not for attacking
politicians or questioning the motives for war. By performing songs about how
those warriors fought in vain, and then were discarded and dishonored back
home, Springsteen portrayed them as pitiable and their service as a futile
waste. Regardless of whether there is any truth to that, it’s the wrong message
to be sending on this particular holiday. That message, simply put, is one of
respect and only respect.
There are others times and ways
to protest wars: voting, protests, marches, contacting your political
representatives, and yes, writing songs. Every other day of the year, we can
put our backs into solving the serious problems our veterans face. But on
Veterans Day, leave your protest signs in the garage, put your politics aside, and
concentrate simply on saluting the men and women whose service deserves our
gratitude and respect.
(This article originally appeared here on Acculturated, 11/14/14)
