Thursday, July 23, 2009

No True American Soldier



I titled my post very deliberately, to try and understand the logic behind Lt. Col. Peters' continued assumption that Pfc Bergdahl must have been some kind of deserter, or as O'Reilly puts it, a person who is mentally disturbed. I suspect there is a psychology behind wanting to depict this young man in exactly this way. "No True American Soldier" reaches towards the fallacy known as "No true Scotsman." The basis of the fallacy is that, if one believes that "all x's are y", then upon coming across an "x" that, no matter how great the "x's" bona fides might be, does not conform to "y"--why, then that was "no true X".

So if you want to suppose that the American soldier is impervious to capture and humiliation because it opposes your own narrative of the brave inviolate soldier untouched by enemy rapscallions, why then, your inconveniently held soldier is not a hero or even a soldier anymore--

"No true soldier" would be in this inconvenient situation, after all. For how inconvenient--read Will Pitt. For how big a douche Lt. Col. Peters needs to be, take my word. I say he's a "true douche".

But I understand that no true douche apologizes.

I say he won't apologize.

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