Rhetorical Why
When something to do with our military goes wrong, it's headline news. When the military excels beyond expectations, there is silence. Why? Why do I have to read insider publications and listen to word of mouth accounts from actual troops to get good news out of Iraq and Afghanistan? Why are the troops over there describing a completely different war than the world media?
posted by Charlie Foxtrot at 02:41
Noone and Nothing Forgotten...
1 Comments:
I think the short answer is: expectations.
The modern public is very insulated from both war and, for the most part, from cultures different to their own so they expect war to be short, painless and won.
When that doesn't happen, it's 'news' so it gets reported.
Also, I suspect you are hearing about the personal wars from the troops; the battles that come with individual faces and emotions attached. These small battles are the ones which add up to winning the bigger war and they are essential, but that isn't what the viewing/reading public want to see. They want to hear that we have won the bigger war and don't have time for the details (after all, there's football to watch and beer to drink!)
I don't like it either, but sadly that's the way our culture is going as long as we continue to let it.
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