FLOBOTS

I wanted to post a few thoughts/notes about the current story. There had been a lot of misconceptions out there that the Flobots don’t support the troops because they speak out against an unjust war. Every now and then, we’d get an angry letter or comment from a soldier that we didn’t care or understand what it was like. This could be further from the truth. I’ve had long conversations with Jonny5 and Brer Rabbit on how to approach this issue. How do we let the soldiers know we love them and care about them, and respect them and what they do? We all know and have heard from many soldiers with many different stories, some want to immediately oppose the war, many want to go back over and over again. While I had plans to go onto other chapters, we decided that this issue was too important to put off and I ditched my other plans to make Chapter two about our soldiers.

In doing my research and referencing, I listened to a lot of Veterans and current soldiers stationed in IRAQ and Afghanistan. I took 2 days to absorb myself in the reference I had amassed, and tried like hell to put myself in their shoes, talk like them, think like a soldier. It was gut wrenching, and the first time I’d ever REALLY worked that way. When I first thought of doing a story about soldiers or IRAQ, I didn’t want to be pretending or making things up, so the events are an amalgamation of about 4 different REAL stories I was told from men and women stationed in IRAQ or Afghanistan.  Really heart wrenching tales. I also didn’t want to be preachy. Soldiers don’t talk about politics, they do their job. They talk like those characters talk, to pass the time. (although they use much more colorful language!)

I, as well as the Flobots, have a profound respect for men and women in uniform, and I’m trying to tell their story and I hope in the coming weeks I can really put the readers out there who don’t know, into that soldier’s mind and shoes. It gives you a whole other perspective on the things we take for granted every day, every minute/second here in the States. If you see a man or woman in uniform, or hear someone is a vet, or see an oldtimer wearing a military ballcap…. tell them THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE! It doesn’t matter what they did, or what they saw… they did it for all of us.