Soldiers Joking in Photo Around Casket Spark Rage
Source: NBC News
First published February 19th 2014, 12:30 am
The Wisconsin National Guard announced Tuesday that it had suspended a member from honor guard duties after she apparently posted to social media a photograph of soldiers mugging around an empty, flag-draped casket.
The group photograph taken at a National Guard training facility in Arkansas sparked a furor on Facebook, in military chat rooms and other social media, where people saw it as disrespectful of veterans and those killed in action. The National Guard said it was taking steps to protect the soldier who posted the photograph after she received death threats.
The photograph originally posted on Instagram shows about a dozen soldiers clowning around a casket draped in a flag. Several hug playfully. One flashes a peace sign. Another has his back turned and is pointing off in the distance.
The caption reads, "We put the FUN in funeral -- your fearless honor guard from various states."
Read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/soldiers-joking-photo-around-casket-spark-rage-n33306
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merrily
(45,251 posts)the one who took the photo?
Interesting.
DFW
(59,709 posts)Funerals are such fun after all.
LuvNewcastle
(17,650 posts)Con los terrorista!
AngryOldDem
(14,180 posts)They have perhaps the most solemn and sacred job of all in the military. How dare they mock that. If it's some kind of dark humor to relieve the stress of their job...then they need to find another way to cope with it.
Right up there with the Abu Graib photos.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)Really?
marble falls
(70,656 posts)Android3.14
(5,402 posts)However, equating a show of disrespect for dead service people is incomparable to photographing the humiliation, torture and murder of living people.
AngryOldDem
(14,180 posts)That was my point.
Both pictures are disgusting and disrespectful.
Hope that clarifies my position.
Android3.14
(5,402 posts)That's a good point.
uppityperson
(115,993 posts)
Orsino
(37,428 posts)I've done military funerals, and I hope I wouldn't tell soldiers that they can *never* smoke 'n' joke on the job (the job includes much downtime not in the public eye).
The problem comes when a photo including a casket is publicized. That was a boneheaded mistake for which someone is going to pay dearly--even though no one's funeral was interrupted. Dumbass.
grahamhgreen
(15,741 posts)Keep it off the web is all.
In my view, the people who fill those coffins with bad policy choices are the ones that should be suspended.
uppityperson
(115,993 posts)
hedgehog
(36,286 posts)demwing
(16,916 posts)I'm glad you said what you said
MADem
(135,425 posts)memorializing their private moments with photographs, though.
They aren't desecrating a corpse, they aren't disrespecting any person. They aren't disrupting or disrespecting a ceremony. They are in a training environment, learning the "how to" of a gruesome, shitty, emotionally laden job.
I couldn't get the link to work (probably me) so I went to BBC and got this link, it's the same story, essentially:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-26252546
They do a job that is fucking DEPRESSING. What this is, is "blowing off steam," aka "gallows humor." This is a team-building "we're all in the same boat" moment for this crew. If you've never had to work funeral details it's rather difficult to understand. If you have, you get what they're doing. Their mistake--and it WAS a mistake--was to memorialize their goofing around on film.
IMO, anyway.
Twenty years ago no one would have seen a photo like this. Thirty or forty years ago, no one would have wasted the film on this sort of picture.
There's a real learning curve happening with regard to social media, and for some, like this group, it is terribly steep and terribly consequential. The individual who posted the picture to frigging Instagram had a MAJOR brain fart. This isn't the kind of thing that should be distributed electronically--it really shouldn't be memorialized or distributed at all. But to suggest that people working funeral details/honor guards don't EVER muck around, in private, during times when they aren't actively supporting the mission is just wishful thinking. It's a way to process/distance oneself from the gloom and sadness surrounding the duty.
Arkansas Granny
(32,264 posts)
marble falls
(70,656 posts)thanks for kiboshing the needless outrage!
MADem
(135,425 posts)I was chosen because at the time, in my careless youth, I cut a fine figure in a well-pressed uniform. I managed to ditch the pallbearer duties quickly, moved on to flag presentations, and finished up in the 21 gun salute brigade (I liked that best, particularly because we didn't have to clean our own weapons--we just handed them off to some schmuck at the armory...the only downside is that you needed lots and lots of white gloves--they got very dirty, quickly). We were a VERY cohesive group and we took our duties very seriously, even though we only did the job one day a week (the rest of the week we did our regular jobs). On a typical day we'd do six to ten funerals. That's a lot of sobbing relatives to confront.
That said, there were times when we'd engage in generic snarking about how short life was or other "funeral-related" topics. This wasn't done to "mock" anyone, it was a way of processing the grief before us.
The bugler in our group was a very sensitive fellow -- he was also a full-on drunkard (this was many years ago, he wouldn't have lasted a minute in the more modern military) who would have a few beers for breakfast. Nonetheless, his taps never failed to bring a tear. Nowadays, owing to the shortage of buglers, they use a fake bugle that has a pre-recorded taps that is accessed by pushing a button.
The methods are more modern, the uniforms are wash-n-wear, but the emotional response, I'm betting, is not all that different from 'back in the day.' It's tough for young kids to be burying people--strangers, usually, with a shared element, that of military service--day in, day out, and seeing the devastation on the faces of the family members left behind. They're gonna need to find a way to bond and to shake off that distress that accrues. They just need to not take pictures and post 'em on social media--it's not the kind of thing you can share with the world and expect them to understand....as this situation clearly shows!
TwilightGardener
(46,416 posts)(and we ALL use bad judgment from time to time) is going to be on display. I am glad I didn't have that stuff around as a young person.
colorado_ufo
(6,197 posts)This is true in medical circles, as well. Sometimes dark humor is the only thing that keeps the soul from breaking.
Biggest problem here is the limit to life experience that these kids have: Some things you should NEVER put in pictures, and you definitely need to consider the consequences if you put those pictures into a medium that can be seen by the world.
MADem
(135,425 posts)learn that all-important lesson much sooner than their parents did!
Maeve
(43,330 posts)Your last paragraph says it very well.
Blue_Tires
(57,596 posts)Scuba
(53,475 posts)... the duty consisted largely of funeral flag bearer or rifle team, with the occasional parade thrown in.
As a result, I served at perhaps 150 military funerals during this period, all VietNam casualties. The funerals themselves were solemn occasions.
After the funerals, however, alcohol flowed freely, and I do mean freely. Typically once the 21-gun salute had sounded and the flag was folded and given to the next-of-kin, an older veteran would invite us to the local VFW or American Legion where we were given all the free booze we could drink. As you can imagine, there were more than a few moments that could be described as disrespectful.
Having been there, done that, I forgive these service men and women their transgression. Everyone else can go pound sand.
marble falls
(70,656 posts)service.
the poutrage is unnecessary, pound is correct.