More military ribbon abuse
Mr Wolf sends us a link to Marine Corps Times‘ Battle Rattle which went after the Six Flags Illinois security guards for wearing military ribbons based on the views of a former Marine whose child pointed out the ribbons after the Marine, Robert Smith, showed his son his own awards;
“I saw a 23- or 24-year-old wearing a Combat Action Ribbon with two gold stars,” Smith told Marine Corps Times. “Another guy had four rows of three ribbons. I know gunnery sergeants or staff sergeants when I was in that didn’t even have that many.”
Smith said he asked the security guard wearing the Combat Action Ribbon what the stars stood for, and he said they represented reuniting lost children with their parents. All day at the park, Smith said he was offended every time he saw another security guard’s ribbon rack.
“Every award I have means something to me,” Smith said. “It was belittling and hurtful to have [my son] say, ‘Oh, look. He has the same ribbons as you.’ ”
Battle Rattle says that they contacted Six Flags on Monday and by Tuesday, their policy had changed;
“We have the utmost respect for the men and women who serve our country and the rewards and recognition they earn,” said Katy Enrique, communications manager with the park. “It was never our intention to undervalue military ribbons by using them as part of our park’s recognition program.”
The uniform policy was not a company-wide policy, so only applied to the Illinois location, Enrique said.
Category: Who knows
“We have the utmost respect…It was never our intention…”
If I read that drivel one more time, I think I’m gonna puke. Ignorance is NO EXCUSE.
Great … the blabber mouth lady that come up with the oh so washed out “we didn’t meant to” has my first name as last name …
Yep yep … this day gonna suck
PintoNag: I have to disagree. When less than 1% of the population has any military experience or connetion, ignorance is the rule. Anyone can err due to ignorance. It shouldn’t happen, but it often does.
What I find inexcusable is continued bad behavior AFTER being educated. We don’t seem to have that in this case.
I’ll give the Six Flags folks credit for fixing the problem when it was brought to their attention. (I’ll give them the benefit of the doubt and take their claim at face value – for now.) They messed up, but the appear to be making the necessary change quickly.
Hondo beat me to it, but this is a result of so few veterans of the military in the US population. I’m guessing if they had any veterans working at Six Flags, they would’ve said something about it and told them the deal.
Granted, perhaps someone did and was told “ohhh, but they are so pretty looking!” Who knows.
We’ll see what they do next. This is something they can fix fairly quickly though.
“What? The ‘Distinguished Service Cross’ ribbon? We’ve not heard of that. We award that particular ribbon to securiy officers who have been complimented by guests for having nice fresh minty breath…”
Hondo: I agree with your reasoning to a point. I think what sticks in my throat with this kind of situation is that the offenders are security/police types. While you’re correct that most Americans might be ignorant of military awards and their meaning, most quasi-police types are very aware of the fact that those ribbons and medals mean something. The para-military magazines have pages and pages with full color photographs of all different kinds of equipment and accouterments for all services, both military and civilian, and descriptions. The fact that those departments wear them, even after having at least a rough idea of their true meaning, tells me they use them anyway, disregarding their military meaning.
As far as the apology by the management of Six Flags is concerned, it is both obligatory and canned. It’s damage control — nothing more.
I have to agree with you, PintoNag. To me, it sounds like they’re only sorry they got caught!
Peoples’ Republic of Illinois, home of Chicago (the world’s safest city due to gun control)… obviously no one serves and/or has sense there.
When I was a younger EM in TOG, I had a buddy in the PLT that worked a side job as a mall cop.
One day a kid got “stuck” in the escalator and our buddy “saved” him. (I think the kid could have lost a toe)
Anyway, the security company awarded him their equivalent of a Soldier’s Medal or such. It was some sort of grayish, purple ribbon or such if memory recalls.
We used to razz by buddy about it all the time, things like open his locker and put it on his ribbon rack and such.
All in good fun of course but the point is that he technically earned the ribbon for doing a good deed and the security company awarded him one of THEIR OWN RIBBONS to annotate his selfless service and accomplishment.
therefore, no excuse for what Six Flags is doing.
Today’s civilian-military disconnect grows wider each day. Another fine example now at Six Flags.
Shit, does this mean I again have to update my rack? I rescued a lost hooker from a rainstorm.
Fine! I’m going to make up another fake ribbon award for my sci-fi characters to wear, just for that.
I don’t like this laziness that stems from wanting to pat the employees on the head, but being too lazy to find something online that is suitable from a non-military awards company. It takes very little effort to find a non-mil awards company, but they don’t make the effort, and then they get the backlash from the BTDT people, and then they have to apologize.
Considering Six Flags in Illinois is about 15 minutes or so away from Great Lakes, and pretty much filled with freshly-graduated boots every fucking weekend, no, there’s no excuse.
NHSparky, that’s 15 minutes driving and an hour in line to get it.
“former Marine whose child pointed out the ribbons”
That’s the way to make dad proud!
I think they should give them ribbons with amusement park rides as devices. 3 roller coaster devices equals 3 children found etc.
That would look spiffy.
Combat action ribbons for reuniting lost children with their parents.
I think I’ve heard it all now.
One of the police dept’s I worked for came up with a ribbon award system. The HMFs had at first looked at real military awards and were going to just use those. I “suggested” it was a bad idea.
They just needed ribbons for “Best ass kisser” and stuff like that.
The security guards should have looked at boy scout merit badges.
Life’s hard in the concrete jungle that is Six Flags, Illinois. I mean it’s a scant 45 miles from Chicago. That’s practically downtown Afghanistan. Anything could happen on those neatly landscaped pathways. You have to be alert round those splashing fountains and cotton candy machines. Gotta be on your toes.
Or something.
Well, if you reverse my Texas Faithful Service ribbon, it looks like a USMC deployment ribbon. I’d had several of Uncle Sam’s Misguided Children question me about it (in good spirit). I figured the cactus leaves for multiple awards would’ve been a give away.