Let’s Play Make Believe
I guess when the boys want to play war games the girls are sometimes allowed to join in the fun. And sometimes if a girl is good looking enough, she may be able to play the war hero when the game is being told to the audience for their “infotainment” and credibility.
Jessica Lynch had it all. She was in the wrong place at the right time to inadvertently become the American darling war hero who, after being captured by the retreating Iraqi army, was tortured, raped and sodomised, and was then dramatically rescued by equally heroic special forces armed with all the paraphernalia Hollywood need to make a true make believe. After all, Jessica’s story was designed to make America “love the war” and shore up support for the pack of lies that initiated it.
What does it take to make a hero? What with 135,000 GI Joes and GI Jessies sent over to invade Iraq on the back of rank deception, the nation would be entitled to at least one hero; one heroic incident of genuine valour to hold onto and justify home town flag waving. What was called for was a snippet, a sound byte that was true and up-held all that America always said it believed in. For a while Jessica Lynch took the American mind off the deception of the invasion of Iraq and put it back onto another form of non-reality.
So, now we hear that Jessica is not a hero after all. She has admitted as much. Like everything else in this crazy war the whole story was a beat-up from the start. Contrary to the telemovie and the biography and the million-dollar royalty offer, she admits, to the contrary, that she was treated with nothing but kindness by the Iraqi medical staff and soldiers. What a let down! Why, with everything going for her, did Jessica turn chicken?
I guess she had never heard the old expression about never letting the truth get in the way of a good story. She has apparently decided that the truth is nobler than fiction and living in the shadow of a lie, in the land of make believe, for the rest of her life knowing that she would be known for what she had not done. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, Jessica, when asked if the Pentagon’s portrayal of her rescue bothered her, she replied, “Yeah, it does. It bothers me that they used me as a way to symbolise this stuff. Yeah, it’s all wrong.”
Dear reader, I invite you to take a step back a moment and consider the concept of heroism. I ask you to put yourself in the shoes of the 20-year-old girl at the centre of this example of typical American hype and bullshit. Ask yourself if you would have the courage to stand up and say that it is hype and bullshit and that you want out of the game.
To me Jessica Lynch is an example of a real hero (in her case a shero) for standing up for the truth. It takes a lot of guts to face up to reality after all the make believe.
Good on you. We love you Jessica. God bless you.
6:05:52 PM 
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