Deep Thought: This is Your Captain Speaking
Created | Updated Sep 16, 2023
Trigger Warning: This is an Op/Ed piece. The 'Op' part stands for 'Opinion'. The opinions expressed are those of the Post Editor, which can be unconventional at times. Read at your own risk.
Deep Thought: This is Your Captain Speaking
 |
We got people doing poems on aircraft carriers over a loudspeaker. It is absolutely insane the direction we are headed in our military – and we're headed downhill, not uphill.
US Senator Tommy Tuberville
Senator Tuberville was on a rant the other day. He keeps accusing the military of being 'woke'. The military are angry because the Alabama senator is holding up their leadership appointments. The rest of us are scratching our heads about what he's saying. For one thing, he pronounces 'poems' the way my relatives in the Appalachians did, as 'poyms', which happens to be good Scots but confusing English.
I shared this fact with Scots scholar Dr Michael Dempster, who said what puzzled him was the idea of an aircraft carrier going up- or downhill. As Franz Werfel said in 1940, the situation is hopeless but not serious.
I wanted to see if any journalists had background on the assertion that they were reading 'poytry' on aircraft carriers. So I did a silly thing. I googled 'aircraft carrier poem'. (Do not do this.)
A website proudly announced, 'We have the best aircraft carrier poems!'
'Say what?' I replied and checked it out. Indeed, this website had many poems involving aircraft carriers. The poems were written by members of the website. I will not quote them here. I have reason to doubt their grandiose claims, though.
Yet another site featured what I considered to be a better aircraft carrier poem. It began:
The old gal hailed from Newport News,
And boy, did she get around.
This poem, titled 'Big Ben', was written in honour of a Second World War aircraft carrier. The poem is also not 'woke'. The author has a note defending his use of contemporary ethnic slurs as intended to promote authenticity.
Anyway, I think Senator Tuberville is full of it. In the first place, the US military is in no danger of being enfeebled by 'wokeness'. In the second place, as much as the former football coach may deplore the practice, military types have been committing verse since the dawn of time.
In fact, the first thing Twitter said to this was, 'This is Iliad erasure!' Homeric scholars are proud of that list of ships headed for Troy.
Twitter, in fact, has gone sea-poem mad. It was immediately pointed out that the US national anthem – you know, the one nobody can sing because you have to be either drunk or an opera singer to hit all those notes? – was composed aboard a cartel boat during a naval bombardment. Take that, Senator.
With enormous glee, writer Jennifer Gladd put in this request,
No matter where you are today or what you're doing, especially if you're on an aircraft carrier, especially if you've ever had a high school coach, like this guy, sub in your English class, "do" a poem today.
It turns out I'm not the only educator to bemoan the number of coaches in charge of high school English and civics class. They've got to do something with them, but the wrestling coach taught my 10th grade US History class by embracing every possible conspiracy theory, while my 12th grade European History teacher, who coached Track and Field, simply retailed the plots of movies like The Lion in Winter. So yeah: poetry in this context is sweet revenge.
Verse and the navy? An old tradition. There's 'Hearts of Oak' and 'The Boy Stood on the Burning Deck' and so many others. 'O Captain! My Captain!', anyone1? And 'In the Navy', whose video was shot on board a frigate (sorry, no carrier) with the help of the US Navy, which originally considered using it for a recruiting song. We will pause to let that sink in.
Several hours later. Twitter has not let up on Senator Tuberville. This is a good thing, of course. He is an obstructionist. I expect there to be more poems with the words 'aircraft carrier' in them. Good thing, too.
One thing we can learn from the reaction to this: yes, there are silly people in the world. Unfortunately, sometimes they achieve positions of responsibility, where they proceed to behave irresponsibly. And there's a lot of foolishness and ignorance in the world. But you know what? There is also intelligence, and common sense, and humour. It's up to us to nurture it where we find it.
Even if it's reciting poems on the flight deck.
