MB Hair

[Original Message]

Date: Sat, 27 May 2006 09:04:52 -0400
From: “richard haase” hotprojects@nyc.rr.com>
Subject: [Mb-hair] do i wish anyone a happy memorial day>?
To: mb-hair@islandlists.com>

eg given that were all hippies and totally anti war?
im confused as to what to do

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Hey HAIR-Heads,

Okay, so I’m a day late and a dollar short on replying to this query posting on the old MB-Hair List (but, as you can see, at least I’ve registered to be a user of the new MB-Hair Blog site), but I felt a duty to reply to this valid and probably common query from professed anti-warriors, peaceniks, and [particularly] HAIR-heads.

With LBJ out of office and with Tricky Dick effectively spinning his American troop withdrawal and peace negotiations with the North Vietnamese, the force of the Anti-War/Peace movement of the Vietnam Era suffered decline – that is until a new and strongly credible voice joined the movement — the voice of personal experience IN the Vietnam War, the voice of the Vietnam veteran — Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW), Inc. — a voice brought dramatically to the forefront of America’s imagination by such actions as the Operation RAW (Rapid American Withdrawal) march by VVAWers to Valley Forge, during which they reenacted (street theatre) the horrors of warfare, and Operation Dewey Canyon III in Wasington, DC, when veterans broke replica M-16 rifles and tossed their medals back to the government, and when future Senator and Presidential candidate and combat veteran of the Vietnam War John Kerry spoke before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on behalf and in honor of his fellow GIs while speaking against the war (and its resultant horrors) that they’d been forced to participate in.Â

Members of the VVAW at the time were most certainly counter-culture. And they looked like it — long hair, beards. And according to some (and hinted at by Kerry at the time), it was the Nixon administration itself that fueled what would become the negative stereotype about Vietnam veterans. The administration needed to explain why these former soldiers were now protesting their government (and looking like hippies) — they were crazy, suffering from “Vietnam Syndrome.” Thanks to our warmongering government, dear children, Vietnam war veterans became despised by both the older generation that sent them off to war in the first place, as well as by many of their own younger generation whose fortune had enabled them to avoid war service.Â

But the voice of experience (the veterans’) gave a certain power to the call to stop war, and the Anti-War movement was regenerated.Â

Remember, the VVAW chanted “Hate the War / Honor the Warrior.” Our service men and women do not create the wars they are sent to. Often their valuable services, though, are wasted thanks to the designs of their Commanders-in-Chief, who, themselves have no direct experience in nor (and therefore) appreciation for the realities, the horrors of … war.

I’ve a bumper sticker that reads “Anti-War / Pro-Veteran.”Â

HAIR’s Claude Hooper Bukowski (or George Berger, if you’ve only seen the movie) was a Vietnam War Combat Veteran, KIA (Killed-In-Action). His name would appear along with 58,000 others on The Wall, the national Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Wasington, DC.

When I say “Thank You” to a veteran or “Welcome Home” to one who’s served overseas (sentiments most Vietnam veterans never received), I like to imagine that by so doing, I am also honoring one of their warrior brothers, and one of the chief elders of my Tribe, our dear Claudio.

IMHO, this attitude/perspective would be the ideal to promote among new HAIR tribes. It is my thesis that this was the main point Claude made by his giving his life in military service in that war. When one dishonors a GI or veteran, simply for being a GI or veteran, then that one likewise dishonors Claude Hooper Bukowski … and his Zen of Hair.

IMHO

Joseph Lee deTioga Livingstone, Ouachita (Washitaw) Tribe