Checking up on an old slogan

[nancylebov]

What do you think of

A Purple Heart means you were smart enough to think of a plan, stupid enough to try it, and lucky enough to survive

?

A non-combat vet told me the slogan was deeply offensive-- possibly appropriate for vets to say to each other, but a wrong thing for civilians (especially when there's a war) because it implied that people with Purple Hearts were stupid. I don't think that's a reasonable reading of the slogan, but I'm not going to step on people's toes for no reason.

On the other hand, to some extent she's being indignant for other people, and that's less likely to be accurate than being indignant for oneself.

In re "Some people just like feeling insulted": As far as I can tell, sometimes I'm genuinely outraged, and sometimes I'm looking for trouble. The whole thing is subtle and messy and I'm not going to start by assuming that inconvenient outrage is always something to be ignored.

Comments

[madfilkentist]

"Lucky" implies survival by chance rather than preparation.

You may think people are "uptight" when they object to being called stupid; I think it's a reasonable objection.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

The inability to differentiate between a joke and an insult is one of the definitions of uptightness so far as I can tell.

If we were talking about groups with a large power difference, there would be a whole 'nother layer of meaning there. But we aren't. And so far as I can tell, we're not even talking about groups; we're talking about one person who, if I read the OP correctly, isn't even in the class of people that she is "defending."

That last clause, BTW, is one of the main reasons I'm blowing off her objection and brushing her off as "uptight" rather than considering what she has to say. If I hear this from people that the comment is actually aimed at, or if I hear it from a significant number of interested parties, I'll consider taking the objection seriously.

[interactiveleaf.livejournal.com]

I'm keeping these conversations separate because it's easier for me to do it that way.

"Lucky" implies survival by chance rather than preparation.

So what? There's always an element of chance in life (triple in an active combat zone), and I've never, ever seen or heard anyone use "lucky" as a derogatory comment. Envious, probably, but derogatory, never.