"Thank you for your service"

pleasure

 

only t has the power

 

I too have VERY mixed feelings about that phrase, but I grew up in a period when people were spitting on uniformed servicemembers in airports, and sailors were wearing wigs and parking locally licensed cars without base stickers---off base, to avoid being easily identified as a squid.
I grew up also in a time when PTSD awareness was 'avoiding Crazy Nam Vets.'

Now is better....especially when the people suffering the crippling indignities of PTSD don't have the added insult of not having a choice about their "senior vacation.'

I don't think that the phrase is diluted from overuse, because one of the UNIVERSAL attributes of real heros lies in the fact that they are very very......ordinary.
I was reading a book recently that described some Dubbaya Dubbaya Too servicemen that contained a line that went something like:
"yeah....they were all heros....but some were a$$holes too...."
AN indelicate turn of phrase, but having met several MOH holders, I can assert that almost ALL of the holders of this most extraordinary medal were quite humble people struggling to meet people's expectations from being a "hero."

There ARE exceptions to every rule, but in the end.....SERVICE is heroic in and of itself, and I would submitt that a lifetime of service as a volunteer in a soup kitchen or cleaning cages in an animal shelter is QUITE heroic!

A family member who was a "professional" firefighter (I was a volunteer) once told me that it was the closest thing to not having a job at all....but hey.....


.......Thanks for your service, Steve!

 

I recently watched "They Shall Not Grow Old" an IMO excellent story framed documentary on WW !. Extra notable for the usage of restored, enhanced footage from WW !, that makes you feel like you are looking in on events that happened yesterday, not 100 years ago. So well worth viewing.

But what I learned among other things, was that WW ! for the soldiers ended in a nearly eerily quiet and abrupt manner. November 11th 1918 at 11:00 AM, according to the accounts in the documentary, and the artillery, and hostilities just stopped, leaving the surviving soldiers suddenly thrust into a oddly quiet environment.
The war had ended. But what I didn't know, was that there was little support or transitional support. These usually very young surviving soldiers were just expected to return back to England. And according to the documentary, it seems there was a lack of understanding or support for these returning soldiers.
There wasn't a lot of jobs available, and in fact evidently some businesses would post signs outside saying that returning service men need not apply.
And whether this changed with the passage of time I don't know,but it also seems the general civilian population of England just didn't have a real comprehensive understanding of the real HELL these men had lived through.
It's presented as being very Vietnam war like, in that these men were not supported in re-integration to civilian life, and generally were welcomed back, with a very subdued level of support.

I haven't been a huge scholar of the realities of WW 1, and I know there is danger in embracing one viewpoint in historical retrospect as being the ultimate definition. But I was surprised to hear at least some accounts that made the end of WW 1 and the return to civilian life, in 1918, seem unfortunately very much akin to the experience of soldiers returning from the Vietnam War.

I guess the point being, Thank You For Your Service....is really never a given.

 

I think, " Thank You For Your Service" has become a bit of an automatic thing to say. However, I wouldn't necessarily think because historically returning soldiers from Vietnam were not thanked, that means you personally shouldn't be thanked. Or anyone else in a "Service" position shouldn't be thanked or deserving of thanks. I had a friend/co-worker who worked in forestry fire fighting, and he described it as very harrowing, and very dangerous work, where lives do get lost.

Step back objectively? I guess I feel there is no need to feel guilty or worry too much about whether we personally are deserving of being thanked for service.
It's usually a pretty casual exchange. And when someone says Thank You, I'd just accept it. If you want? You could use the moment to perhaps expand the conversation and illuminate your personal experiences.

But automatic, maybe becoming somewhat trite, I guess I'd rather a general population thanking those in service, for their service, than a population ignoring those sacrifices.
If you're going to error...error saying thank you.
And if you're a fire fighter or were a fire fighter? I don't think there is anything wrong with just accepting the Thanks, no need to put it into historical perspective, in comparison to other service and sacrifice situations.
The person offering the Thanks, intentions are good, regardless if whether we might feel the thanks unwarranted. And I kind of believe, any honest service that does potentially put you in harms way, is deserving of thanks.