What a shame

So number one on my list of things I can't really get my head around today is people and their inherent desire to cover things up, lest they be judged. Last night on the phone my mom told me about a local boy back home who died. He was a soldier in Iraq. The thing is he didn't die in combat. He committed suicide when told he was coming home. The tribute in the paper however, led people to believe the former. Now I'm sure they had their reasons. Maybe they're worried people would think him a coward. Maybe they're worried about the judgmental kind of christians. You know the kind, the ones that forget about your loss because they are too busy informing you that your loved one is going to hell. Whatever the reasoning, they are taking away or rather masking a larger problem. See, the number one killer of marines is not combat. In fact, combat related deaths are third on this list. The numero uno spot belongs to suicides. The number two spot "training accident", many of which are actual suicides that the military doesn't want you to know about.
My problem is this, nobody wants to admit that our boys and girls are coming home sick. Mentally ravaged by the war and what they've seen. Our government and military would rather call them pussies than get them the medical care that they require. It is for this reason many soldiers never come forward with their mental illnesses. I feel horribly sorry for our men and women, who enlisted to serve their country, only to fight a war over oil. It makes me sick that our brothers and and sons, our sisters and daughters are dying, expendable to the American elite whose sons are safely at home driving their Hummers and Expeditions. Princes don't fight the war. Battered and broken they come home, if they come home at all.
Don't let someone blow sunshine up your ass! Realize that "The land of the free, and the home of the brave", is not all it's cracked up to be any more. And when you meet or hear of a soldier suffering from PTSD, dont' look down your nose at him. You can support our troops without supporting this God forsaken war. And the next time you hear of someone who mentally broken took their own life, don't point fingers, he is trying to deal with challenges you and I will never know.