1 post tagged “warfare”

What television show stands the test of time?

I have a great deal of respect for the TV show M.A.S.H.  The writers used stories from the Korean War to create this show, and because the themes and events are more fact than fiction this show has an incredible emotional impact.  Humor and human tragedy walk side by side in this show, one making the grief of the other more bearable, more palatable, more profound.  And there is truth here, the truth that war is (and has always been) a travesty against humanity.  There is good and evil, but it isn’t found in the expected “us and them” categories.  Although we’d like to believe the “us” is always good and the “them” is always evil, the truth is that good and evil reside in expected places; no matter what side of a conflict you are on, no matter how much power or opportunism is present or absent.  It has to do with moment by moment choices for death or life.  War is hell and makes heroes out of some and villains out of others.  M.A.S.H. put a human face on the experience.  And I think it should be required viewing for every soldier or civilian who has to choose whether or not a conflict is worth putting lives in harms way.  I don’t know what happened that compassion became a so rarified, but we need more compassion and less arrogance.  And much much much less war.