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Hate Mail of the Week: My “Stop-Loss” Review
By Kyle | April 6, 2008
Hate mail often catches me by surprise; it’s not that people hate, which I enjoy, but the reasoning that is so unpredictable. This week brings a sackful of letters saying my review of the latest leftist Hollywood flop “Stop-Loss” is trash–because I (supposedly) am a chickenhawk who never served in the military or in a war.
This is to put the cart before the horse. In fact I was something of a pacifist, and a nearly 100% doctrinaire liberal, before I accepted a commission in the U.S. Army in 1989 and went off to serve in Germany and, for four and a half months, in Saudi Arabia in Operation Desert Shield/Storm. So began a reconsideration of every assumption I’d been taught growing up in the northeast, attending an Ivy League school, being an English major, etc. You might say that being surrounded by extremely conservative, Reaganite, pro-military, God-fearing Georgians and Texans (not to mention having a Mormon commander) taught me a lesson in tolerance, of the importance of being open to different points of view held by people from an entirely different background. So open was I that I eventually came to share their outlook.
In other words, I received my B.A. from Yale and my education from the United States Army.
My service does not make me a hero or an expert on the military. But to argue that my review is automatically wrong because I didn’t serve is to leave yourself open to the retort that I must be automatically right if, by some prank of fortune, I did serve. Writ large, this argument claims that the current commander in chief lacks moral authority to prosecute war in Iraq but of course leaves the Left, having placed all its chips on an ad-hominem attack, wide open to a counteroffensive that one might call ad heroem. What will the Left say about a presidential candidate whose money and mouth have been located at the same grid coordinates for decades and who even now has a son serving his country?
One notices that the more vitriolic reviews tend to be anonymous, but I have taken the liberty of copying people’s email addresses below each letter so that the debate may continue. Let’s go to the CBS Mailbag! (Profanity removed; otherwise spelling and punctuation sic.)
As to the charge of patriotism leveled by some correspondents: guilty as charged.
“A writer for the Post who is a conservative douche. Knock me over with a feather. You know exactly jack s**t about this subject, boy. These men and women served their time and deserve to go home and start a new life. The soldier who wanted to re-enlist was not portrayed as an enemy because of that. He was one of the people who were essentially calling King a coward for wanting to stay home and live a life. Sound familiar? Until you serve in a military unit and go to war, shut your f**king trap. This is a film that needs to be told, because very few people are aware that it is actually going on. So please, sput your political patriotic agenda somewhere else.”– Brian Lowery, loweryk1@yahoo.com
“Spoken by a true republican critic. I’m sure your time in iraq prepared you for your return to the states afterwards. Oh wait..you didnt serve, did you? When you review movies try to keep your political views out of it and do your job; review the movie. Because you didnt do your job correctly, I found the review unhelpful at best. Thank god for all the other critics who actually watched it; they gave it B’s and above. Don’t you feel silly?”–mstymndy@aol.com.
“Dear Mr. Smith:
“I want to thank you for your review of “Stop Loss”. I was NOT planning on seeing the film, anyway, but I believe your review accurately reflects the unrealistic aspects of the film, which requires far too much suspension of disbelief to enjoy, and is unfortunately laden with boilerplate nonsense.
“However, as you are a non-military man (if you had served you would have mentioned it in the review), you should not be stating that ‘[the] stop-loss program is disturbing but it’s also an unfortunate necessity when there is neither a draft nor a volunteer spirit’. As a non-military man you are in no danger yourself.
“There is a reason why there is no ‘volunteer spirit’ regarding this war, which was based on lies from draft dodgers like Bush, Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz, and pushed through Congress using McCarthyistic and jingoistic tactics, not least by your boss, Rupert Murdoch, and his jingoistic empire, which includes yourself.
“Why wouldn’t Bush call for a draft if he really believed in the war? And why aren’t Jenna and Barbara doing their service in Iraq or Afghanistan like the children of poorer people? I guess Jenna and Babs don’t need money for college tuition.”
–R.M. Sieger, rms125a@hotmail.com
“Oh go figure the New York Post has given a film condemning the mindless Iraq war and its the liars that perpertrated it one star! My God! What a surprise!
“Stop writing film reviews Kyle. You are a soulless slave to Murdochs c**k and you know it. Maybe one day he will remove the microchip in your head and you might actually think for yourself and stop advocating his evil agenda but until then I hope you rot in the same hell as that piece of human garbage along with Roger Ales and Bill OReilly two of Murdochs other henchman.
“Die Fascist!”–dgstrman@aim.com
Topics: Iraq, Movies, Politics |
April 6th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
[...] funny stuff comes after the review, when the hate mail starts rolling in. Most of it went right to the “you can’t speak about the military until you’ve [...]
April 6th, 2008 at 9:50 pm
“Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel.” - Samuel Johnson.
April 6th, 2008 at 10:08 pm
“But let it be considered, that he did not mean a real and generous love of our country, but that pretended patriotism which so many, in all ages and countries, have made a cloak of self-interest.” - James Boswell
April 6th, 2008 at 10:17 pm
“However, as you are a non-military man (if you had served you would have mentioned it in the review)”
That’s hilarious. Of course, if you *had* mentioned your service, you would have been accused of using it to bully everyone else into agreeing with you. Which coincidentally answers your question about how the left are going to deal with McCain…
April 7th, 2008 at 2:48 am
Ah yes. The “anti-war” flicks continue to tank. Must be the influence of those dreaded Republican critics who take their marching orders from secret Rove decoder rings.
April 7th, 2008 at 10:29 am
“Patriotism is the never-sought refuge of the Left.” - Teflon
April 7th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
In the early 70’s I had a GySgt with a chest full of medals, Recon, three tours in Vietnam. I asked him in a moment of casual conversation why he never spoke of his copious combat experience. His reply was as concise as the man. “How can I talk to someone about something they don’t understand?”
April 7th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
Kyle just isn’t a likable guy. It has nothing to do with him constantly rattling off his list of accomplishments at any time, hes the king of shoe-horning.
April 7th, 2008 at 6:07 pm
What on earth are you talking about?
April 8th, 2008 at 5:26 pm
So, KS, I guess you’re the young guy whose pic is next to the column in the Post, not the older fellow at the top of this blog. Thanks, that’s something I’ve been wanting to know.
Movie-wise, you’re right 98.6% of the time and especially about these Hollywood war-flops which keep gathering dust at Best Buy.
Thanks for all you do.
April 8th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Kyle, you rock. Thank you for your service, for your insight, and for your writing. Keep it up.
April 8th, 2008 at 7:40 pm
@Richard, the photo on this blog is a bit of an inside joke. It’s HL Mencken.