Why I'm Anti-War

I have today, Veteran’s Day, off as a holiday for the very first time, I think. I’ve always had to work or go to school on this day, but now that I’m all white-collar and work in academia, I’ve discovered that this is a holiday that people actually get to stay home for, not just one of those days when banks close as an inconvenience to everyone.

Soldiers. Afghan cities bombed nightly. War. Interning at the USS Constitution. You can see the Bunker Hill monument as you cross the bridge over the river from Boston to Charlestown. It’s all got the little wheels in my head spinning like mad.

I realized this week that it’s easier for me to think about changing my concepts about gender, marriage, sexuality, baby-making, name-changing and class issues than it is for me to change the pre-sets in my mind about the Civil War.

Messed-up, hunh?

My visions of the War of Northern Aggression are harsh and bloody and seem to have been born in me, although I know that’s not true. My grandparents still refer to the Civil War as the War of Northern Aggression, but it wasn’t just them that capitalized that title in my mind. Even though my parents were hippies, I grew up hearing about the lost Confederate treasury and how the Yankees marched across my native Georgia doing unspeakable things. To this day it's not at all unusual for kids in Murfreesboro or Richmond or at other battle sites in the South to find Confederate or Union bullets while playing in the dirt. And I was told, over and over again, in class and in textbooks that the war was not about slavery, but about state’s rights. Which is half the truth, but also half a big fat lie.

But I half believe it still.

There’s an arrogance and morally superior attitude to New Englanders sometimes that grates on my very soul. I love this place, but wounds 160 years deep seem genetically imprinted inside me for no good reason. I like to think of myself as not prejudiced and open minded and terribly liberal (I co-founded a 3rd wave feminist magazine!), but dig deep enough and there’s this big ‘ol southern Georgia white girl who thinks the North only won because they cheated.

Was the South wrong? Hell Yes! Totally, absolutely wrong! So very, very wrong!

But does Atlanta burning still piss me off? You bet your ass it does.

I think about Afghanistan and what we’re doing there, and I know it’ll never end. 160 years from now someone like me will be saying:

“Was the Taliban wrong? Hell Yes! Totally, absolutely wrong! So very, very wrong!

But does Kabul being bombed still piss me off? You bet your ass it does.”