blasted

March 21, 2005 3:42 AM

see! Having your body blasted to pieces during an illegal and immoral war isn't so bad. You can end up smiling on an innocuous magazine cover! Life's great!
posted by milkwood (35 comments total)

I'd like to apologize in advance to all the usual people appalled by this post but I can't help it. I think it is wrong. Everything about this started badly and is rapidly going downhill. And after that it is going to get worse.
posted by milkwood at 3:47 AM on March 21, 2005

Go to heck, milkwood...this is so not worthy of FPP-status. Be prepared to have it deleted.
posted by davidmsc at 4:06 AM on March 21, 2005

Yeah sure, milkwood. Your incredulity, horror and all the incoming "get your own fucking blog" comments aside, that picture is not a permalink. I want to argue the minutiae of posting a link that will change in a month, not the illegality and immorality.

Sure. We have wars and people being killed on all sides, but this is Metafilter, no matter how many people are maimed and then posted as examples of courage we still have to honor the link.

Now, on your own weblog you could post this as a permalink entry and post that here -- then get banned.

Or, grab the image and host it on your own site -- then get banned.

Or, find a permalink on that site for the full article. Oh for shame, please let out your general frustrations via some other outlet, just like me.
posted by gsb at 4:11 AM on March 21, 2005

milkwood : " I'd like to apologize in advance to all the usual people appalled by this post but I can't help it."

Apology accepted. If you can't help it, you might want to send matt an email requesting that your account be deleted.
posted by Bugbread at 4:12 AM on March 21, 2005

Thanks davidmsc. Sadly it won't be the first time And lets face it. Heck is where I belong. Wherever the hell that might be. And thank you for your unfailing courtesy. Anyway, back to that poor sap with the limp...
posted by milkwood at 4:12 AM on March 21, 2005

Everything about this started badly and is rapidly going downhill. And after that it is going to get worse.

Yah, this post is doomed.
posted by nj_subgenius at 4:14 AM on March 21, 2005

What? No one has mentioned trolling yet?...
posted by milkwood at 4:15 AM on March 21, 2005

rapidly going downhill.

On a monoski?
posted by sohcahtoa at 4:17 AM on March 21, 2005

I guess you did, mw. I call bullshit.
posted by nj_subgenius at 4:20 AM on March 21, 2005

OK Matt I think I'm all done here. You can delete now.
posted by milkwood at 4:24 AM on March 21, 2005

Aw, man.
posted by bdave at 4:28 AM on March 21, 2005

But before I go I'd like to say how disappointed I am at your lack of indignation and righteousness. You are normally so full of it.
posted by milkwood at 4:39 AM on March 21, 2005

Inflammatory.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 4:43 AM on March 21, 2005

Creme.
posted by WolfDaddy at 5:12 AM on March 21, 2005

Will the VA treat him when he hurts himself on their PR ski adventure? No, non-service related injury.
posted by buzzman at 5:19 AM on March 21, 2005

This link is terrible, but I think we can save it. Is Popular Mechanics really a trifling magazine that demeans the subject of wounded war veterans by showing them in anything other than a miserable demeanor?

While looking for the cover that caused milkwood to speak truth to power, I ended up finding a lot of 9/11 conspiracy coverage. What gives?
posted by rcade at 5:21 AM on March 21, 2005

rcade : "I ended up finding a lot of 9/11 conspiracy coverage. What gives?"

They put it well themselves:

Popular Mechanics : "POPULAR MECHANICS has a long history of reporting on science, technology, engineering, aviation and military affairs. Virtually every alternative theory involving 9/11 includes claims regarding hard facts in these areas. In order to help our readers understand this complex and controversial issue, we chose to focus strictly on specific claims that can be checked against the facts. These include areas such as the structural integrity of steel girders exposed to fire, the radar system employed by NORAD in 2001 and the nature of the wreckage found in the weeks after the attacks.

We didn't attempt to speculate on broad political issues, or to reconstruct all the events of September 11. Our goal was simply to look at the evidence that conspiracy theorists themselves cite most frequently in attacking the mainstream view of 9/11."
posted by Bugbread at 5:32 AM on March 21, 2005

actually, i am wholly opposed to this war, but as npr noted in a recent series in morning edition, the nature of war injuries have totally changed due to extensive body armour. More and more soldiers are coming home, alive but with lost limbs. And once home, the facilities are incredible to get these men and women moving again with prosthetics of amazing quality.

The war might be wrong (which ones aren't?), but kudos to the people who are doing their best to provide the best care to soldiers who have been injured.
posted by ba3r at 5:33 AM on March 21, 2005

If I could be so bold as to go beyond the surface here, I feel a bit conflicted when I see stories such as this one. (Heard one similar on NPR recently, but can't find it at the moment). On the one hand, I am a big believer in the "it's not what happens to you, it's what you do with it" school of philosophy. So from that standpoint, I think the tone of milkwood's post is insulting and disrespectful.

But there is a little voice in the back of my head that says that most severely injured soldiers probably don't get the amount of personal attention that this guy does - and why? Because he makes such a great story. I can't help but have the sneaking feeling that the public is being manipulated by such stories. There is probably a department somewhere in the military promoting (if not creating) stories such as this knowing how much the media "eats this shit up" in a time of war. It does make great propaganda, doesn't it? I mean anybody who says anything negative about it is gonna get a ton of bricks dumped on him.
posted by spock at 5:35 AM on March 21, 2005

milkwood- The link has already changed; I saw no "cover photo" of some wounded smiling guy.

gsb- Thanks for posting to the article so at least I could see what the heck milkwood was posting about.
posted by Doohickie at 5:37 AM on March 21, 2005

I liked Popular Science when I was up until I was nine or ten. When I got older than that I realized that there was no actual science in Popular Science. This article is kind of typical of what I remember of the magazine. There'd always be an article or two to move them off the newsstand followed by the regular columns such as What's New and about 1/4 of the pages devoted to ads and money making opportunities.

As far as a popular science magazine goes Omni Magazine was the best up until Bob Guccione's wife, Kathy Keeton, took over and drove it into the ground with her life extension bullshit. Discover was alright but the articles were much shorter.
posted by substrate at 5:40 AM on March 21, 2005

This bloke is probably a real inspiration to all the people he helped to maim.
posted by biffa at 5:44 AM on March 21, 2005

Yeah. Not a lot of mechanics in Popular Mechanics either.
I miss the great cartoons in Omni. (Where are those guys getting published now?)

Favorite: An executive office. In the desk chair, a pillar of fire with an arm reaching out of it pushing the button on the inter com: "Miss Smith, get me everything we have on spontaneous combustion."
posted by spock at 5:44 AM on March 21, 2005

Doohickie : " milkwood- The link has already changed; I saw no 'cover photo' of some wounded smiling guy."

Hmm...It still shows for me (and I tried refreshing just in case).
posted by Bugbread at 5:51 AM on March 21, 2005

Just in case, here's the direct link, doohickie: linkomatic!
posted by Bugbread at 5:52 AM on March 21, 2005

.
posted by matteo at 6:14 AM on March 21, 2005

I'm against the war, but milkwood's filching of the image of someone who paid dearly for his participation in it just to make some point against the war, that's immoral.
He's not your poster boy. If he wants to be the poster boy for rehabilitation, it's his right. And in smiling through his losses, he shows courage.
Milkwood, don't drag those who are against the war down to your level.
posted by dances_with_sneetches at 6:18 AM on March 21, 2005

biffa: best comment of a thread which is otherwise taking the very predictable course.
posted by Decani at 6:24 AM on March 21, 2005

Interesting. I followed a link to a brief summary article about a soldier who went and did what he thought what was right, got his legs blown off, came back home and didn't let his disability ruin his life. Nothing if not inspiring.
Then... I came to this discussion to find nothing but bad vibes all around.

And in smiling through his losses, he shows courage.

Regardless of the poster's intentions, that is what I will take away from this article.
posted by boymilo at 6:38 AM on March 21, 2005

Par for the course.

Can we get a "Milkwood" flag?

And in smiling through his losses, he shows courage.
Regardless of the poster's intentions, that is what I will take away from this article.

Agreed.
posted by dhoyt at 6:48 AM on March 21, 2005

this post is still here? well, just to chime in, i'd like to add that it's not too difficult to find simple-minded illustrations like this to support whatever agenda you support. business as usual i suppose.
posted by poopy at 6:51 AM on March 21, 2005

Delete.
posted by recurve at 7:07 AM on March 21, 2005

so, the guy's managing to have fun with his life anyway ... good for him ... i don't think he should be sitting in a wheelchair on the streetcorner scowling with a 40 in his hand just so we can point to him and say, "oh, how awful" ...
posted by pyramid termite at 7:20 AM on March 21, 2005

The war is disgusting and people are not always perfectly rational when opposing it. I'm pretty angry at the nitpicking, sarcastic jerkiness in the responses to the post. Milkwood is mad, and I'm mad too.
posted by By The Grace of God at 7:51 AM on March 21, 2005

So this steaming three-coiler still exists? Matt must still be in bed.

And what Boymilo said.
posted by KevinSkomsvold at 7:52 AM on March 21, 2005