- Joined
- Jul 25, 2005
- Messages
- 3,237
Here's my take on what all those screamin' broads who protest against �naked people movies� should scream about instead.
This is much less an indictment of Women's performance under fire (whole seperate subject, don't get me started! )
than it is an "editorial" on a grotesquely toxic environment and its possible impact on future generations.
Being a Gulf War Vet I've experienced Uncle Sam's medical care, both active and veteran, at its very finest-not too impressed.
I've also seen about a half-dozen of my buddies and colleagues die or damn near die from liver cancer over the past few years.
What's all this got to do with women in combat? I'll sum it all up in 3 words, one of which is the most critical:
1. Carcinogenic- capable of producing cancer
2. Mutagenic- producing permanent DNA changes
3. Teratogenic- producing defects in an embryo or fetus
And it is #3 that's the reason for this post:
Just about everyone's familiar, to one extent or another, with 1 & 2.
Cancer is the modern day plague, and there's growing evidence of more and more of our modern day products and lifestyles themselves being carcinogenic found every day.
Genetic mutations sound like the things sci-fi movies and comic books are built upon, but they're very real and, unfortunately, hereditary. Once a mutation is induced it is very difficult, if not impossible to counterract or eliminate.
The respective lists of causes for each of the above are extensive and growing. The study of Teratology, however, can still be considered to be in its infancy.
As the role of women in the military and their presence on the combat field grows so does the risk of exposure to environments which are not only recognizably hazardous, lethal-in the extreme, in and of themselves; but contain vast amounts of chemical, biological and radiological poisons. The overwhelming majority of which have had little to no definitive examination as to their individual toxicity, let alone a cumulative or additive effect. Many, if not most, remain unidentified.
Meaning: even if any of these recognized hazards have been identified and studied as to their individual potential for harm, the interactions of the various hazards have not. And as simple math will tell you, as the number of identied individual risk factors rises, the permutations of combining them soon reaches the point of incalculability. Add to that our fundamental scarcity of knowledge concerning biological processes in general and our ability to predict just what may or may not constitute a definite hazard soon becomes obviously pathetic.
From the innoculations meant to prevent infection which contain heavy metal toxins and destructive substances known as adjuvants (meant to render a body less susceptible to treat the innoculant as a foreign substance and more readily accept same) to bug repellant, to such seemingly innocuous substances as anti-perspirant, to exposure to Depleted Uranium aerosols; the potential for death remains long after the direct threats of gunfire and explosion have been removed.
These substances, injected, inhaled or absorbed, are the potentiall lethal threats we Veterans constantly bring home with us from the battlefield.
And to my knowledge there have never been done any studies whatsoever as to the potential teratogenic harm being done to an entire generation of Veteran's children.
There are many types of birth defects which are not readily visible nor apparent at birth; many only surface as behavioral or emotional problems well into childhood, adolescence or even adulthood.
Many might never be recognized as birth defects because they may only manifest as developmental or sociological disorders: a propensity for or predisposition to, Alcoholism, drug addiction, violence or any of countless self-destructive behaviors.
Many affect the sufferers ability to reproduce.
Worse: we have not a shred of data concerning the possibility that any harm done to a developing fetus in response to the exposure to these toxins is not mutagenic.
The pre-natal environment is found to be increasingly delicate and more easily corrupted than previously conceived.
Ours is the first generation to send potential mothers, including many who are already pregnant unaware, into such a recognizably and acknowledged toxic environment.
With our continued, and many will argue-shameful, presence in Iraq pretty much a foregone conclusion, should we be treating the possibility of our voluntarily creating an entire generation of potentially sick, deformed, defective, perhaps terminally ill children in such a cavalier manner?
Personally, I don't think so.
And this is where I truly, sincerely believe most of those protester's energies would be better spent.
Thanks for listenin'.
This is much less an indictment of Women's performance under fire (whole seperate subject, don't get me started! )
than it is an "editorial" on a grotesquely toxic environment and its possible impact on future generations.
Being a Gulf War Vet I've experienced Uncle Sam's medical care, both active and veteran, at its very finest-not too impressed.
I've also seen about a half-dozen of my buddies and colleagues die or damn near die from liver cancer over the past few years.
What's all this got to do with women in combat? I'll sum it all up in 3 words, one of which is the most critical:
1. Carcinogenic- capable of producing cancer
2. Mutagenic- producing permanent DNA changes
3. Teratogenic- producing defects in an embryo or fetus
And it is #3 that's the reason for this post:
Just about everyone's familiar, to one extent or another, with 1 & 2.
Cancer is the modern day plague, and there's growing evidence of more and more of our modern day products and lifestyles themselves being carcinogenic found every day.
Genetic mutations sound like the things sci-fi movies and comic books are built upon, but they're very real and, unfortunately, hereditary. Once a mutation is induced it is very difficult, if not impossible to counterract or eliminate.
The respective lists of causes for each of the above are extensive and growing. The study of Teratology, however, can still be considered to be in its infancy.
As the role of women in the military and their presence on the combat field grows so does the risk of exposure to environments which are not only recognizably hazardous, lethal-in the extreme, in and of themselves; but contain vast amounts of chemical, biological and radiological poisons. The overwhelming majority of which have had little to no definitive examination as to their individual toxicity, let alone a cumulative or additive effect. Many, if not most, remain unidentified.
Meaning: even if any of these recognized hazards have been identified and studied as to their individual potential for harm, the interactions of the various hazards have not. And as simple math will tell you, as the number of identied individual risk factors rises, the permutations of combining them soon reaches the point of incalculability. Add to that our fundamental scarcity of knowledge concerning biological processes in general and our ability to predict just what may or may not constitute a definite hazard soon becomes obviously pathetic.
From the innoculations meant to prevent infection which contain heavy metal toxins and destructive substances known as adjuvants (meant to render a body less susceptible to treat the innoculant as a foreign substance and more readily accept same) to bug repellant, to such seemingly innocuous substances as anti-perspirant, to exposure to Depleted Uranium aerosols; the potential for death remains long after the direct threats of gunfire and explosion have been removed.
These substances, injected, inhaled or absorbed, are the potentiall lethal threats we Veterans constantly bring home with us from the battlefield.
And to my knowledge there have never been done any studies whatsoever as to the potential teratogenic harm being done to an entire generation of Veteran's children.
There are many types of birth defects which are not readily visible nor apparent at birth; many only surface as behavioral or emotional problems well into childhood, adolescence or even adulthood.
Many might never be recognized as birth defects because they may only manifest as developmental or sociological disorders: a propensity for or predisposition to, Alcoholism, drug addiction, violence or any of countless self-destructive behaviors.
Many affect the sufferers ability to reproduce.
Worse: we have not a shred of data concerning the possibility that any harm done to a developing fetus in response to the exposure to these toxins is not mutagenic.
The pre-natal environment is found to be increasingly delicate and more easily corrupted than previously conceived.
Ours is the first generation to send potential mothers, including many who are already pregnant unaware, into such a recognizably and acknowledged toxic environment.
With our continued, and many will argue-shameful, presence in Iraq pretty much a foregone conclusion, should we be treating the possibility of our voluntarily creating an entire generation of potentially sick, deformed, defective, perhaps terminally ill children in such a cavalier manner?
Personally, I don't think so.
And this is where I truly, sincerely believe most of those protester's energies would be better spent.
Thanks for listenin'.
