Guilt and Change
When I read The Things They Carried, and discussed the book in class, I have thought about the topic of guilt. I found this video blog of Soldiers that come back from Iraq which is on the spike TV website, its called “Back From Iraq”. It is video blogs of soldiers that return from Iraq and they talk about their experiences, and there feelings, it seems that most of these soldiers in these blogs carry some sort of guilt with them.
This video blog is about a Deuce Four soldier who recalls a tramautic experience in Iraq he’ll carry with him the rest of his life. The soldier talked about his guilt of one of his friends almost being killed who took shrapnel through the head in a car bombing incident. His friend will never be the same because there was so much damage done to the brain, and he blames himself. This soldier talks about another incident about a drive by that was supposed to be aimed at the American troops but this young boy was caught in the cross fire and was killed. It seemed that the soldier felt guilty for that also. This video blog reminds me so much Tim O’Brien and the The Things They carried. O’Brien carries so much guilt with him in this book. He carries the death of his friend Kiowa and the death of the little girl Linda. This is considered survivors guilt which we discussed in class. The same soldier that carries the guilt about his friend almost being killed in Iraq talks about in another video blog entry, about how he had wondered how they hell did he get into this situation of being in Iraq. The soldier found himself in a building, by himself at 2am, pitch black with a dead body in the room. Just like how Obrien felt about going to Vietnam. Tim O’Brien did not want to go to Nam in the first place.
Another soldier talked about change. After being part of a body recovery in Iraq after a major attack. The soldier described the incident as ice skating in blood. He remembered walking over body parts and such. He also seemed to feel guilt because there was nothing he could really do for the men. This soldier stated in his blog that he can’t stop thinking about Iraq even though hes not there. It is the first thing he thinks about when he gets up and it is the last thing he thinks about before he goes to bed. He stated that the war in Iraq has changed him. He looks at everything different, even the stupid things like paying your bills on the internet, going to an appointment. He stated after living with something like that he realized how much he changed.
http://www.spike.com/video/survivor-guilt-back/2782110
2 Comments
I have never “seen” anything like that before. I am a bit naïve when it comes to the war and I can admit that, but something about seeing that video and I watched a few others absolutely brought me to tears. It was so real. More real than a pop-up on my google reader, or the article in a newspaper, it was a person telling his story – the real story. Thank you for providing the link. I definitely see the connection with the O’Brien book and the guilt. I am beginning to see a lot of different connections with O’Brien. I am wondering if possible the class was designed like that because his book has maybe the most connections. O’Brien has a way of ending his book with the notion that this particular book is possible his means of coping and dealing. The man in the video blog may have the same feeling as expressing what happened and telling the story. Everyone deals with guilt differently and on different levels (some unrecognizable until too late) I think it was a strong connection in understanding soldiers need to vent and cope. It is almost a circle of guilt. He feels guilty, we feel guilty for possibly not doing out part, or being brave..the circle just continues.
It seems to me that the guilt of surviving is a constant theme in all war novels and stories. I think that is because when a man goes to hell, with a group of guys, and when all of them do not come back it his hard on those who lived to see the light at the end of the tunnel. I think it is such a consistent theme because so often the men who die in war die so suddenly. Like in The Things They Carried when Ted Lavender dies suddenly. He seems to die so quickly and just falls like a great stone onto the ground. His death fits into the theme of the book because now his death, which came so suddenly, would be added to the things that they carried, except there is no way to weight out this burden. Also unlike the solders guns and rations and field dress kits their guilt is not something that is going to go away anytime soon or ever. In a similar way Vonnegut talks about survivor’s guilt, it is what drove him to write Slaughter House Five. Except he feels guilty that he should have been so near to so many people that had no idea their ends were going to be so horrific.