When you're heading off to war, you need all of the support you can get. At times when a soldier goes off to fight it can feel like there is noone else looking out for him, and when that soldier returns it can feel the same way. Sending a message like "F**k the Troops!" to an audience that may consist of soldiers, brothers and sisters of soldiers, mothers and fathers of soldiers, sons and daughters of soldiers, and loved ones of soldiers is like leaning your head back and spitting in their faces.

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It is easy for people to dehumanize and objectify large groups of people, whether it is "them", "the government", "the man", "foreigners", "liberals", "conservatives", "hippies", "jarheads", "towelheads", "extremists", or "the enemy". It is not as easy for a person to forget that his or her loved ones and people he or she cares about are dying or suffering for reasons that are difficult, if not impossible, to understand. Some things don't seem justifiable no matter what.

War is one of those things.

When a nation's government sends its sons and daughters out to kill and to die, there better be a damn good reason for doing so.

If you are serious about going off to Iraq, and I don't doubt that you are, then I hope that you believe in what you are doing, and I hope that you believe it is a good reason -- to help people and not to harm people.

However, this group with the stupid name, I'm sure that they have a reason for existing too. Just as you may want to go off to Iraq, fight in a war, and do good, there are many people who believe that it is wrong to go off to Iraq, fight in a war, and think that it is doing good. Those types of people believe that they are doing good by protesting the war and by showing that they do not support any part of it, including the people who choose to go out there and fight.

I don't have the right to judge your heart and soul, or anyone else's, for that matter, because I've made mistakes, and there are beliefs I hold that are contrary to the beliefs of others. There are some beliefs and values that I am willing to die for, and there are some beliefs and values that I am also willing to kill for. My family and the people I love and who love me and may depend on me are worth dying, and sometimes, killing for, if it ever came down to it.

The way that I prefer to live my life, that not everyone agrees with, is to live in balance. You can never see the light if it weren't for the darkness, and you may never see the good in a person if you didn't see the evil in that very same person, or in someone else.

I wish you well in whatever it is that you are facing, but you can never escape the reality that this world is more complex than what is good and what is evil.

This "war on terror", as it is called by the politicians and the media whores, is not about fighting "the enemies of freedom". This war is about self-fulfilling prophecy, my friend.

This war is about creating and worsening the conditions that lead to social breakdown, poverty, depression, and what?

Anger. Hatred. Aggression. These are the very emotions that people have great difficulty controlling when they get to a certain point.

How far can you push people before they snap? How far? How much can YOU take before you snap? Why do you think that violence in Iraq is increasing if this war is really "helping" the people of Iraq?

I don't believe in pissing, spitting, and shitting on people by sending out messages of hate, even for people whose behavior is reprehensible. However, I also don't believe that our brothers and sisters out in Iraq are killing and dying for the freedoms that you are concerned with.

Freedom of speech is a luxury that we have here in America, but it's not a luxury that is shared all over the world. Is that "freedom" worth killing people for? Is it worth dying for? Is it worth the lives of our mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, brothers, sisters, and all of our loved ones? That question is worth thinking really hard about before an action is taken to put lives in jeopardy.

Beliefs are man-made constructions. They seem harmless when they sit there in the mind and they merely influence emotions and thoughts. Then, as people feel more passionate about their beliefs, those beliefs start to motivate people and influence their actions. These actions can lead to habits. When habits become legacy the future has arrived, and we can all look back in retrospect and we can decide for ourselves if history was good enough, or if we could have made it better.