Opening up my internet browser this morning, I was unaware that today marked the anniversary of the start of a somewhat recent American event. After seven years, this date has been pushed aside by so many other events in my country that it has been all but forgotten by people such as myself. When I read the one-line Yahoo! News headline that read “Little fanfare for 7th anniversary of war in Iraq” this morning, I was overtaken by so many thoughts and emotions that I could not help but cry. The article text was unimportant for me because as an American, I have seen what the article spoke about live on television in my living room. The “shock and awe”, the fall of the statue, and the explosions of IEDs. I have also seen the hundreds of news stories over the years about soldiers and their families who have been affected so greatly because of physical/mental injuries or death. Now that it is the year 2010 and this war is heading into its 8th year, the images of the war that were once so controversial and talked about have completely faded away into the background of American life.

Toward the end of 2009, there were over 100,000 troops still stationed in Iraq as the issues in Afghanistan were escalating. 100,000 men and women is a lot of people who have to be away from their homes and families for such a substantial amount of time. However, that was irrelevant to the American news media. I remember going to my physical therapist’s office several times a week from October to December, and in the therapy room they had CNN on for general news headlines. One day there was a small headline at the bottom of the screen that scrolled by and said that the number of troops station in Iraq would begin to drop below 100,000 in 2010. This was never actually mentioned on the air by the news anchors or reporters. Instead, almost the entire newscast for days – if not weeks – was about pro-golfer Tiger Woods and his marital issues¹. I was absolutely infuriated. I didn’t care that there were other people in the therapy room so I simply started to rant about how offended and disgusted I was about Tiger Woods’ personal life getting more attention and reporting than the war in Iraq. I must have gone on for 15 minutes – all while CNN happily continued to show a video reel of Tiger Woods and his career – before I was so frustrated that I had to stop what I was saying just to finish my therapy session. However, all of the other patients in the therapy room, as well as the therapy workers, spoke up and agreed with me as they added their 2 cents worth. Even the people who didn’t verbally speak up nodded in agreement to the words myself and the other patients said. Even though we were all vastly different in age and background, we all agreed that it was a genuine disservice and insult to the over 100,000 troops still stationed over in Iraq and their families.

When, how, and why did America become more interested with moral scandal and celebrity gossip versus our own soldiers? After September 11th, 2001, our nation was brought together in such patriotism and unity because our country and all it stands for was viciously attacked. People put aside politics for a while and just became Americans. We honored each other as American citizens whether we were 1st generation citizens or 100th generation citizens. We came together and honored our country, what it stands for, and what it was created for. Students don’t learn about American history – including history before our country was even formed – for absolutely nothing. That history is vital to reminding us, the modern day American citizens, of where we came from as a country and what it really means when you say “I am American.” America is a huge “melting pot” with every nationality represented. Our citizens have heritage and ancestry from across the globe, including myself. Yet a whole lot of us associate ourselves with the term “American” regardless of our heritage. That single word doesn’t represent the color of our skin, our cultural traditions, or our language. It represents our entire history and why the country exists today, including the fact that our citizens have differing skin colors, traditions, and languages. We are a country of many, and the term “American” has always meant that. So when I see these national news headlines splattered across websites and my television that are completely concerned with trivial and shallow topics like celebrity drug abuse and scandal, how popular Twitter has become, and how David Beckham can’t play in the 2010 World Cup, I am pretty damn disgusted. What happened to the news on our own citizens fighting and dying over in Iraq and Afghanistan? I could have sworn that was a little more important.

People say they support the troops these days, and some of them I believe. You see people driving around with the “Support the Troops” ribbons stuck to their cars, and sometimes I wonder, “Do they really think about that often enough?” People who haven’t had a family member go into battle somewhere probably cannot understand what it is genuinely like to have war brought into your own home. My immediate family does not include any past or present service men or women, but both sides of my family have extremely strong roots in serving America in warfare. My father’s side of the family currently has Iraq war veterans and Vietnam veterans, as well as veterans past from long ago such as the American Civil War (1861-1865), the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783), and the French and Indian War (1754-1763). My mother’s father² who I had the chance to know for several years before his passing, served in Word War II. He was awarded four Bronze Stars³ during his time in Europe in the US Army, and is by all means an American hero for things he did in that war to help his army comrades and foreign strangers alike. So, even though I do not have any immediate family members to relate to the Iraq war, I understand greatly the emotional sacrifices the soldiers and their families go through because it’s their duty. Right now I believe America is so caught up in the politics of the war itself – such as why we went there in the first place – that we forget entirely about the people who are still over there. Our politicians and leaders somehow feel the need to justify why we went, or why we shouldn’t have went, and so many other things; after 7 years, that is all kind of irrelevant. We are there, we made a mess, our troops are there by the thousands, and we need to take responsibility regardless of why we went over there to begin with.

From all that I have seen in the past 7 years, people that are my age and younger do not understand what war really consists of. It has been so glorified by movies, video games, comic books, tv shows, and other junk that young adults and adolescents think it’s “cool” or something similar. There is no way war is “cool” in any situation. You don’t think people just go to war to have fun, do you? I don’t think the families of all the people buried at Arlington National Cemetery would say that. I don’t think any surviving veterans of any war – regardless of country – would say that, either. War isn’t just a word with one singular definition that explains every aspect of it. That is utterly impossible and always will be. War can be about anything in the world. From religion, to land ownership, to racial rights, to absolutely anything you can imagine. Why a war is started is nothing in compared to what goes on during a war. People think seeing men blown up by rockets and grenades is entertaining when they are playing a video game or watching some action film; I don’t think it would be very entertaining if you were in that situation where it could be you that is wiped off the face of the earth at any second.

Today is March 19th, 2010 and the Iraq war has been going on for 7 years. Even though we don’t hear about it at all, it’s still there. Our men and women are still there. Our money and investments are still there. Yet right now, America is not paying attention to it. More so, Americans are not paying attention to America. How did that become the norm here? More importantly, when will people realize that we have to think of our country first before ourselves? Ultimately, everything that this country does as a whole affects every person who lives here. If Americans are living in some state of delusion about that, it’s time for them to wake up and snap out of it. So America, are you listening?

The 82nd annual Academy Awards  just finished being aired on television around the world. It has been tradition in the USA to televise the ceremony since 1953, thus making the Oscars an important night for not only the international acting/film making community, but for the international viewing public as well. For quite a long time, winning an Oscar statuette meant the recipient(s) were the best of the best in areas of film making; years after winning an Oscar, though, many winners have continued to gain benefits from getting that gold statue. Having the term “Academy Award winner” in front of an actor or film maker’s name has never created negative associations, but frankly I think that might become the case in the future if the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences doesn’t clean up its act.

The first telecast of the Academy Awards I ever watched was the 68th Academy Awards in 1996. I remember specific things my parents told me about the people that came on stage, such as actor Christopher Reeve who made his first public appearance at the awards since a horrific throw from a horse in 1995. I recall seeing Kirk Douglas receive his Academy Honorary Award even though he was recovering from a stroke. I also remember asking how Mel Gibson won an Academy Award for Best Director when I only knew him to be an actor. Even though I was only about 7 years old, I knew I had to keep watching this award show for years to come and I have. Seeing great achievements in film rewarded properly is spectacular, but recently additions at the telecast and behind the scenes have definitely changed the real purpose of the ceremony itself.

Over the past several years, I – and many others – have noticed that the entire tone and look of the Oscars has drastically changed from what it once was. Years ago, the Oscars were a serious event meant to acknowledge outstanding skill, artistry, and achievements in film. Now, the entire thing seems to be much more of a spectacle for television ratings and talk versus the films and film makers being honored. The telecast has been completely revised to cater to a younger audience, an audience that is more concerned with who their favorite actor is with or what their favorite actress is wearing. I would have no reservation in assuming the demographic the Oscars are targeting has only seen the most popular, highest-grossing film(s) of the year such as this year’s Best Picture nominee, Avatar. I honestly do not believe that the majority of people watching right now have seen other Best Picture nominees such as Crazy Heart and Up in the Air; both films are rated R in the USA and deal with more “mature” or “adult” concepts/scenes besides being vastly cheaper to produce than other box-office hits. The biggest thing to stand out to me is who is on the guest list to attend the show and even present awards. Miley Cyrus was asked to attend the Oscars first in 2008 simply because she had reached mega-stardom at the time. Was she in an Oscar-nominated film? No. Was she nominated for something? Nope. Was she relevant to the Oscars at all? Not really. She was there to boost ratings and encourage younger viewers. This trend has become the driving force behind the Oscars nowadays, and frankly it is rather depressing.

As I mentioned previously, things in front of the cameras as well as behind have affected the way the Oscars are seen these days. For me, I could tolerate the irrelevant, inexperienced mega-celebrities being invited to the ceremony and being analyzed on the red carpet. However, the last straw was the modification of the Best Picture category this year to include five more nominees, raising the total to 10. The Academy previously had 10 Best Picture nominees for the last time in 1943, but that practice was ended the following year. Why did the Academy change the category? AMPAS President Sid Ganis stated that by having 10 Best Picture nominees, it would “allow Academy voters to recognize and include some of the fantastic movies that often show up in the other Oscar categories but have been squeezed out of the race for the top prize.¹” In all honesty, AMPAS should have had someone a little smarter come up with a better excuse than the one given by Ganis to make their justification a little more believable. With 10 Best Picture nominees, the word “best” doesn’t really fit the category anymore. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the first definition of the word best (adjective) is “excelling all others”. When something or someone is going to be the best and excel above the rest, shouldn’t it be logical to have a small amount of things/people to decide between? Not for the Academy! The more the merrier. In my eyes, that makes the Best Picture category look more like an episode of The Bachelor or some other reality TV show. Throw in all the really amazing, “excelling” movies into the same category with some almost “excelling” films and see what you get.

I honestly hope the Academy is more so going through a “transitional” phase with the categories and setup in preparation to modernize the awards to match up with super advanced technology and new ways of film making. Everyone says the future of film is 3D, but I don’t really want that to happen. I would feel quite uncomfortable and disturbed if someone took a film like Black Hawk Down (2002) or Apocalypse Now (1979) and turned it into a 3D movie. That said, I am really hoping the Academy makes some new categories as time goes on versus adding more nominees to categories or lumping things together.

Not watching the Academy Awards this year was sort of weird since it has been a yearly fay of excitement for me since 1996. However, I would rather miss all the bad years of the Oscars and start watching again when they get their act together so I won’t be reminded of all the crap they are doing now. See you in a few years, Oscar.