Assault on Context

On a particularly tense October day a small group of armed, white Americans gathered together in common cause. They were going to kill. 

They were resolved to subjugate foreigners. They would take these culturally different people into custody or kill them outright. So, armed and ready, they walked toward their intended targets, guns in hand.

The foreign people saw them and desperately attempted to defend themselves against the armed horde. They did so to their own peril. One of the armed militants (we will call him Al) shot and killed twenty of these non-Americans without mercy. For years, those who support such violence hailed Al as an American Hero.

…And that is because he was.

Alvin C. York was a devout Christian and a soldier of the 82nd Infantry in the 1st World War. He was a Corporal at the time of the incident. This meant he had some leadership responsibilities over a squad of men. Being a man of character, Corporal York followed his commanding officer into battle that day, obeying orders and expecting his men to do the same. The orders were to take out an German machine gun emplacement. 

The Germans feared that they would find death an unpleasant circumstance. For this and other reasons, they fired upon the American soldiers with the very machine gun that York’s detachment was sent out to silence. Nine of the 82nd fell that day. Death came flying toward them without mercy. Still, York lifted his M1917 “American Enfield” and took out twenty German soldiers in the battle. He did not drop, leap or seek cover. He fired back with a boldness that springs from a love of fellow soldiers and a singular will to save them from what must surely come in defeat. He would accept the surrender of the German commanding officer at the machine gun emplacement and lead 90 prisoners away. More German P.O.W.’s would be added on the way back to American lines.

The first story sounds pretty awful. It sounds as if violence was perpetrated for its own ends. The protagonists of the first are victims hounded by bloodthirsty Americans hefting guns for the joy of their murderous power. We might recognize the sound of that story, today.

The second tells a different story, altogether. It tells of an offensive strike for defensive purposes. It speaks of two powerful forces meeting in a battle. It tells of overwhelming fire power failing to conquer the will of men sent to secure a deadly situation.

The two stories are as opposite to one another as words will allow. The first is as devoid of context as one may ever witness…Unless you read anything the mainstream media publishes. 

As we hear liberal media talking heads spew propaganda, perhaps we could think about just how much words are being used to assault the ever weakening truth in story lines. We could think about those pinned down by vicious, politically motivated media weapons. Maybe we could consider the media’s covering fire offered to radicals that are tearing our nation apart. 

If we can, if it is still possible, we ought to gather, not unlike the men of the 82nd Infantry, more that one hundred years ago and face this situation with bravery, leadership, and a realization that words will be fired at us from the weapons of mass media malice. Despite the hail storm of hateful language aimed at us, could we simply take ground by getting in the streets, the stores, our churches, etc. and speaking the truth? Could we carry signs? Could we peacefully stand before the liars and live the truth? Maybe we should take the moral high ground without apologies to those who feel that certain language is excessive or somehow secretly racist.

Our couches are familiar with our presence. Our computer screens are well versed in our frustrated speeches to no one in particular. Our steering wheels and car radios have absorbed our derision for far too long. These are shots fired across No-Man’s Land. They are wasted rounds in a war of words that we are losing.

Where is the TEA Party? Where are the motivated Conservative Americans? 

We are not marching into machine gun fire (yet). We would be walking down the streets of our country. We would be peacefully, logically communicating the truth. Is that really so frightening in the land of the free and the home of the brave?

Alvin York said that he didn’t really want to kill those German soldiers. He was a man that enjoyed peace. So are we. We do not have to bring escalation with us. We do not have to be what the socialists are but we do have to act soon. Without our voices, the world will only hear the sound of a nation dying in a torrent of media salvos.