The Old Lie

[poliphilo]

The Queen turns up

And all the pajandrums of church and state in their silly get-ups.

And of course the military all chingling with medals.

And the word glorious gets used a lot. As in "our glorious dead".

That's what upsets me.

We are still telling ourselves that death in war is glorious.

Here are the images from Falluja. And death in war is glorious.

And images of the coffins of Black Watch soldiers coming home, having been killed by suicide bombers. And death in war is glorious.

Wilfred Owen tried to spike our guns. It's one of the most famous poems in the language. It even gets taught in schools.

"The old Lie, dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori."

(Note that Lie has a capital "L")

But it doesn't get read at the Cenotaph. Not in this august company.

The Queen is wearing a black hat. Tony Blair is wearing a black coat. The military band plays Elgar. And death in war is glorious.

Comments

[silent-mouse.livejournal.com]

This hits close to home, more than you would imagine. I happen to live in that small country in the Middle East that is constantly at war, no matter what time it is. And lately it seems more and more like a war of choice, at least many parts of it.
And we were taught at school that "dulce et decorum est pro patria mori". But somehow it didn't make sense to me then, and it doesn't make sense to me now. I'd rather simply live for my country, but that's not very glorious, it seems.

[poliphilo.livejournal.com]

Politicians find war very helpful to their prospects. Scare the electorate, identify yourself with the cause of national safety and honour and they'll vote for you because it would be unpatriotic to do otherwise.

It seems to work for your leaders and it has certainly worked for Bush (who would have been a gonner by now if 9/11 hadn't given his presidency a focus.)

[silent-mouse.livejournal.com]

Indeed, this works like a charm for our "leaders" - but what makes me wonder is the fact that here we are not talking about soldiers that volunteered to serve and are very far away, it's the electorate itself that gets to die a glorious death. And still people vote for those leaders. And still they feel that death in any war is glorious, even after they lose children and friends.