John Grant; innocence or ignorance
I got a call last night from someone who alerted me to a Philadelphia Enquirer opinion piece written by Geezers for Sitting on Our Hands (Vets For Peace to some people) member John Grant who has made it his mission to shut down the Army Experience Center in Franklin Mills Mall outside of Philly. I wrote about their protest there last week. Also, check out Skye, at Midnight Blue who lifts a corner of the Philly anti-war refrigerator to shine a light on some of the cockroaches dwelling there.
I waded through the drivel about the Army’s tax payer funded child abuse and the complaints that the staff of the AEC “soft sell” Army recruiting (imagine how much he’d complain if they “hard sold” it instead), but it was the last few lines that I really have to take issue with;
The taxes that support the Army Experience Center come from a variety of Americans, many of whom – like me – are troubled by this means of recruiting young people. Society agrees that many of them are not developed enough even to drink a beer or drive a car.
This is not an argument against defending ourselves, or against employing violence when it’s necessary. This is an argument for giving kids the information they need to make the best decisions for themselves. One thing we can do is instill in them a much more rich, complex, and cooperative view of human life on the planet – not the good-guys-blasting-bad-guys dichotomy drilled into them by the Army Experience Center.
First of all, it wasn’t society who raised the drinking age, it was the government. I’m pretty sure, if polled a vast majority of Americans would return the drinking age to a more reasonable 18 years of age and then just punish the people who violate the responsible civil behavior.
Secondly, sometimes bad guys need blasting and the “rich, complex and cooperative view of human life” is abundantly provided in countless other mediums outside of the AEC. Now, if the AEC is living quarters for the sequestered youth of Philadelphia, Grant might have a point, but I’m pretty sure the teens who live in that area experience other things outside of the Army’s recruitment facility. And they’re not as dumb as Grant and the rest of the Geezers For Sitting On Our Hands think.
Grant and his pals should be more concerned about the image of veterans that is being propagated in Pennsylvania by their own universities, among other stereotypes taught in college. He should be concerned about a whole generation of veterans being smeared by their own government. But that task must seem daunting to Grant since he prefers to focus on a few video games at the Mall.
Category: Antiwar crowd, Usual Suspects
Thanks for the mention, Jonn!
I had to laugh at the ‘rich, complex and cooperative view’ statement. In an age more teens learn about the rich, complex and cooperative view of blasting away your adversary in video games such as Grand Theft Auto IV, Grant has no comment.
Actually, most people aren’t willing to say it, but it was Mothers Against Drunk Driving that caused the raise in the drinking age.
Jonn wrote: MADD has been granted legislative powers?
At least, in Michigan, it was the legislature who passed the law, raising the age and the governor signed it. I’ll bet it was secretly that evil McChimpyBushHitler who was behind it all.
Again with the splitting hairs John. The government may have raised the drinking age, but it was citizens who pressured them to do it.
Those gawddammed citizens again. If we could just get rid of the citizens mucking up this country, the government would run just fine, eh, Alphabet?
That is the way that I was taught it happened. Yes they have now power to pass the law and was not the one to bring South Dakota to the Supreme Court over not changing the drinking age. But They where the ones to start the process.
What caught my eye was this:
“The taxes that support the Army Experience Center come from a variety of Americans”
Considering how few “Americans” of his ilk actually pay taxes (most pay NO taxes & get EIC to boot), where’s his beef? If he actually pays taxes, then he’s got a complaint. But DON’T lump ME in with your protest against the AEC.
(mumble-mumble-damn communist!)
foreignboy508:
What the Heck is your point? Do you need a 5th grade civics lesson to understand how a bill becomes a law? (My wife is a teacher and would recomend the School House Rock series, in that case.) This discussion has degenerated into an argument over how legislation is created. I was saying that its a dumb argument and that civic groups like MADD and others were the catalyst for government action. Like it or not, but I didn’t think we were here to debate a 20 year old law that has largely been accepted.
I dont like the use of video games to simulate combat experience. I understand why it is being used, but how realistic can it really be? Is the room 115 degrees? Is there a friednly fire simulation? A simulation that shows what its like to be surrounded by civilians while trying to find the one guy in a crowd of 25,000 plus trying to kill you? I don’t think so.
I think that there are other methods that could be used, but the military is going to use the most sophisticated tools to get the fastest results. I can’t really fault them for that. At the same time, I can’t fault a segment of the population for not liking the idea.
See John Grant salute Hugo XChavez at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mdhYsAHwE0w
Thanks for spelling the name right. Look, all the drinking age chat is irrelevant; they let kids age 13 play at hunting down and shooting humans. I’m for legalizing pot, so don’t try to trump me with the libertarian crap; if pot were legal we could better stop 13 year olds from getting it and using it.
Skye & Raoul have a long-standing vendetta against me. The Chavez BS is tiresome. So what? I can’t leave the country for fear Raoul and Skye will frown about where I go? Hugo Chavez is the democratically-elected leader of Venezuela with much better election cred than George Bush had here; furthermore, I have been critical of Chavez’s showboating. Obama is smart to engage with Hugo; as Obama said when asked why he spoke with Chavez, “Look, my army is 600 times stronger than his. I did not feel threatened.” Face it: The western hemisphere is moving to the left. Check out the inauguration June 1st in El Salvador of El Presidente Mauricio Funes of the FMLN.
The AEC controversy is not about violent video games per se; it is about using politically diverse public tax dollars to fund selling Militarism as a brand and as a place to corral kids into the military — without providing them balanced information. I’ve joked that we should have a Peace Experience Center next door with video games that follow a young vet wracked with PTSD as he maneuvers through a day of serious frustrations and citizen ignorance. We could come up with a host of such post-tour-of-duty games. But, you guessed it, we don’t have access to millions of tax dollars.
Some of the comments, here, are good, like HM2’s. The more all this is discussed in the open the better.
John Grant
Tiresome to have to admit you’re a communist Sub-Subcomandante Grant?
You rail against the United States for being capitalist, imperialist and militarist, something that aligns perfectly with the Communist Party USA web site, are a Chavez groupie and cher on the FLMN. But you’re NOT a communist and water isn’t wet.
BTW, explain to everyone here why you didn’t have the intergrity to insist on the removal of the black funeral wreath props outside Walter Reed before you gave a protest speech.
Raoul, You are immersed in yesterday, man. You need to learn how to dialogue. First, you listen, then you respond, instead of just repeating the same things over and over and over and over. Move on. The world is changing.
[…] and bystanders get hell too. Remember the protests at recruiter’s offices? They are not over: The taxes that support the Army Experience Center come from a variety of Americans, many of whom […]
Move on. The world is changing.
Except for the CCPM and their stepchild – The Geezers For Peace who are still stuck in the mud at Woodstock.
The world always changes, even Obama is changing his stance on EVERYTHING he promised as a candidate. Change is good 🙂