They're having an air show this weekend--there's a big Air Force base just on the other side of the river, and it's a big annual event--and wherever you go you can hear the roar of jets of the distance. I've gone a couple of times to scope out the weirdos who want to go stand around on a blistering hot tarmac and stare at the planes, but ultimately, it's not my thing, as I don't like heat, or crowds, or loud noises, or that particular brand of jacked-up pro-America hysteria that inevitably runs like a polluted river through any throng of people brought out to gawk and be amazed at the awesome military might of the United States.
I watched something on PBS the other night about the United States and its drone program and the inevitable psychic toll it takes on anyone with a conscience. It was truly heartrending, never more so than when the innocent victims of one particular bombing in Afghanistan were given the opportunity to speak. The pilots who did the actual bombing were advised they were most likely firing on women and children, with no military objective at all, and went ahead and blew these people to pieces, which shows that, in addition to creating a depthless sense of guilt among those still human enough to feel it, these programs--if not the military in general--encourages a psychopathy that only this kind of long-range, no-risk killing can
And that's what really disturbs me: the only real deterrent to military action for any nation--besides simple morality, of course, but when has that ever been a factor--is the hard fact of casualties, of death. When we take blood--our own blood, I mean--out of the equation, when you can sit in a glorified gamer's chair in an air-conditioned room somewhere and blow people apart on the other side of the world with no physical risk at all and then clock out in time to make it to your kid's soccer game, what's your incentive to stop? Money is all that's lost, and we as a nation have never had much problem pouring as much money as possible down the military’s throat. If we'd had these lifeless drones in the 60s, I imagine we'd still be dropping bombs all over Vietnam to this day.
There's something about the sound of an aircraft flying close to the ground that absolutely terrifies me. It's one of the reasons I don't go to air shows: the sound is so incredibly huge and overwhelming that it almost makes me freeze in my tracks when I hear it: I want to cower and hide: it obliterates in me all rational thought, and fills me with a paralyzing dread.
There's no logic in it: I'm safe. All I'm hearing is the sound of freedom.
