the 20th anniversary of the death of pat tillman is almost upon us. there's a feature article on ESPN's website about it. if that name doesn't ring a bell, google it. i'll sum up why it might here:
tillman was an elite athlete, a star professional american football player in his prime when 9/11 happened. he turned down a multimillion dollar contract offer from his football team to enlist in the military and be sent to afghanistan, where he was killed, as it turned out, by 'friendly fire'. the military honchos lied about the circumstances of his death to cover up the culpability of higher ups in the chain of command who made grossly incompetent and callous decisions which endangered the lives of their men, for which pat tillman paid the ultimate price.
the ESPN article featured an interview with tillman's mother on this 20th anniversary of her son's death. here's one question that was posed with her answer to it:
How would you describe the way the military handled this and the way it treated your family for the last 20 years?
Oh, it's horrific. It's shameless. Not only did they lie to us, they lied to the whole country about it. If someone this high-profile and his family can be treated this way, then what are they doing with other families that don't have the voice? Nobody expects their leaders to do this. And of course it speaks to what is so concerning to Pete, that not only did this harm our family, in more ways than I can express here, but it harmed many of these soldiers.
The chain of command just threw it downwards. And a lot of these guys [in the platoon] have been harmed with PTSD, with moral injury, moral trauma. It's because they've been betrayed. They've been betrayed by their leaders, who don't have the courage to admit they made a mistake. And of course people forgive mistakes. You may be angry at first. You may question. You may be upset. You may beat on their chest, "How did you make this happen?" But eventually you come to terms with it and you're grateful that they told you the truth. But we can't say that about them. I'm still angry about it. I mean, there's no contrition. They've never apologized to us. They've never apologized to the soldiers that they gaslighted basically into thinking that this was all their fault. It's just lies upon lies upon lies. And they did it so tactically, so strategically.
keep in mind that this is on ESPN, the reigning king of sports journalism in america. it's very high profile. this interview was probably read by millions of sheeple. it's corporate establishment media, the very same media i've repeatedly railed against in the past for it's duplicitous role in our dystopia, as a 'ministry of truth', to use an orwellian phrase. yet even here, for anyone who reads beyond the headlines, evidence is revealed of our extreme dystopia, in this case in the form of official corruption and callous disregard for the lives of a public they purportedly serve and selflessly lead.
in spite of this, that public remains largely indifferent towards or ignorant of this particular aspect of dystopia. they'll still salute the flag and answer the patriotic call to 'serve their country', if and when that call comes.
there's no understanding sheeple. one might think they'd eventually wise up. one might also wonder when 'eventually' will happen, since it hasn't yet, in spite of centuries or millennia of such abuse of 'authority', the world over.
tillman has been described by many as an authentic hero. if that be the case, and i'm in no position to dispute it, if that be the case then i must piss in his heroic wheaties by observing that anyone willing to kill and be killed for their country as a patriotic duty is a brainwashed fool. i, as an unpatriotic coward, may be just a plain fool for saying so, but it is what i think, so help me.
https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/39954768/nfl-cardinals-tillman-afghanistan-9-11
