There was a Veterans Day observation last Sunday at a church I attend. Attendees were encouraged to mention names of veterans to the rest of the congregation, and I cited a conscientious objector (my former spouse). He was “legit” – got his number (this was in 1970) and went before his parole board (no, that’s not right! Make that DRAFT board) in the Deep South. It was suggested that he sign up (Army) and become a medic. He refused, and instead served two years at minimum wage in a mental health ward for children at a local hospital where we were living (Chicago). Of course, he got no military benefits.
I should mention that his father was also a CO during World War II. He was both a Reverend and an MD, so maybe he didn’t HAVE to serve. Were/are there automatic exceptions to the draft back then?
Dopers, was I right or wrong to give my ex credit, where I think credit is due?
That’s an interesting question; Conscientious Objectors didn’t always have an easy go of it (in spite of being assured by the Canadian government that they would have their religious objection to military service respected, some Canadian Mennonites were put in jail during World War II for not wanting to serve, and I can only imagine the same happened in the US at times), but going to jail for your religious beliefs is not the same as serving in the military.
I would say no, I wouldn’t note the name of a Conscientious Objector when talking about Veterans.
So the US military had to send some other bloke to dodge bullets in your ex-husband’s place. I vote heck no, you shouldn’t have mentioned him.
How many people had to make sacrifices during WWII? Families had to do without husbands, brothers, fathers. Everyone had to make do with less, either due to rationing or lack of manpower. But veteran’s day isn’t about them, it’s about the people who had to go get shot at.
I’m curious as to why mentioning him even popped into your head.
doctors got drafted and they had a different set of standards for exemptions that would keep them out. they were badly needed and fewer things would keep them out.
you ex fulfilled his military service obligation, he could no longer be drafted. he certainly should be given credit for doing that, though many will say he is not a veteran.
I would agree that a CO would not be appropriately considered as a veteran. However, your definition of a veteran is also not correct. Not everyone who served got shot at. A veteran is defined as anybody who honorably served on active duty. A war veteran is someone who honorably served during time of war. That includes REMFs who never saw combat.
My inclination, honestly, is to say that our opinions don’t matter, your ex’s do. Did he see his actions as being somehow equivalent to military service? Would he have wanted to be counted?
In a general discussion of the costs of war, it strikes me as being entirely appropriate to discuss COs and give them credit where due (and names or faces when that is appropriate as well).
But in a discussion of veterans, to credit a CO as being a veteran, especially if there was no opportunity to qualify it ( I can’t tell from the OP if it was qualified/clarified or not), strikes me as awkward at best, and misleading at worst.
This is true; technically, if you count the ongoing activities in the middle east as “wars”, I’m a war veteran as well. But knowing the capacity in which I served, I think the notion that I need to be recognized with a federal holiday is laughable at best, and insulting at worst.
That didn’t stop me from enjoying a free meal that day, of course.
No, actually, they didn’t. Nobody was holding a gun to their head.
And that goes all the way up the line. Anyone (in the US, that is–not so much in Vietnam) could have chosen to be a CO instead of participating in the war.
The folks who sent some other bloke to dodge bullets chose to send some other bloke. They could’ve chosen differently. And that other bloke? He could’ve chosen differently, too.
That said, it’d never occur to me to count a CO as a vet. I think military service is overrated, and I think our culture’s attitude toward soldiers is not a good one, but a vet and a CO are different approaches to the problem.
I don’t see how this is even a discussion. A veteran is a veteran of the military. Your ex got out of being in the military. Therefore not a veteran. That’s not a value judgement. Whether or not you feel what he did instead had more value or if it took courage to stand up for his beliefs. Still doesn’t make him a veteran. Some COs join the military in a non-combat role. Lew Ayers would be the most famous example. They of course are veterans.
Whether you support a war or oppose it, you have no business claiming credit where it isn’t due.
If you wanted to salute conscientious objectors or to honor peace activists, you should have talked to the pastor at the church, explained the situation, and told why THOSE people deserved to be honored. Perhaps he/she would have agreed, and would have addressed the issue in a future sermon. Or perhaps he/she would have let you write your feelings on war in a future church newsletter.
There are MANY ways you could have saluted your ex-spouse or other COs without lying.
In England C.O.s were given the opportunity to serve in non lethal units like the medics, some, who I totally admire,volunteered for bomb disposal, in the Blitz when many thousands were dying from the bombing, some did non risk military service as in burying bodies
.We had others,who because the whole population had been called up, women for working in war factories (Wasn’t quite the thing for women to attack the barbed wire) .
I’ll stop here,have a very minor bug which moves characters around.
They often are, as in the case of the National Guard after a disaster. The Army standing on street corners after the Anchorage earthquake kept the looting to almost nil and freed up the police to take care of other problems.
When “Civil Substitutory Service” was introduced in Spain, it was in lieu of and equivalent to Military Service. Whether that service meant shoving munitions around (Middlebro, draftee) or helping care for people with brain damage (Littlebro, objector), it provided a service to society - for low pay in the case of those doing their mili, and nothing in the case of those who chose the Civil Service, and it was a service they wouldn’t have undertaken if it hadn’t been requested and required of them. Both served.