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PLEASE NOTE: The Reality TV World Message Boards are filled with desperate
attention-seekers pretending to be one big happy PG/PG13-rated family. Don't
be fooled. Trying to get everyone to agree with you is like herding cats,
but intolerance for other viewpoints is NOT welcome and respect for other
posters IS required at all times. Jump in and play, and you'll soon find out
how easy it is to fit in, but save your drama for your mama. All members are
encouraged to read the
complete guidelines.
As entertainment critic Roger
Ebert once said, "If you disagree with something I write, tell me so, argue
with me, correct me--but don't tell me to shut up. That's not the American way."
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"Ian the vet"
Rosewood 479 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Daytime Soap Guest Star"
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12-12-02, 10:03 AM (EST)
 
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"Ian the vet" |
First off, I want to say how much I respect American Vietnam war veterans. I'm a Canadian, and luckily none of my family was ever affected by the war. But as a generation x-er, I have been bombarded my whole life with vietnam stories in movies and TV, and feel that I've come to understand to some degree what a horror it must have been to serve in that war, and to return home unable to truly resolve that horror.No doubt,Ian's visit to Vietnam was emotionally charged, particularly since he seems to internalize all his emotions (except for anger, of course)- even his own wife can only imagine what he went through. That being said, I must say how chilling it was to see him interact with the locals. Anytime he would say "didi mao", I could just picture him standing with a flame thrower, shouting to a terrified family running out of their burning hut. And his repetition of "numbah wan" (which along with the didi mao, seemed his only forms of communication with the locals)seemed like the worse form of American condescension. Despite the fact that he felt renewed and healed from his time in Vietnam, it seemed to me that he only reverted to the reptilian soldier-creature he once was, and it made me at best insulted, and at worst afraid for the vietnamese people that he interacted with.
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JabbaTheHutt 10 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Got Milk? Spokesperson"
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12-12-02, 11:29 AM (EST)
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1. "RE: Ian the vet" |
Prehaps the phrases he used were the only ones he could remember (it has been thirty years after all)American condescension? That sounds like a Canadian phrase if I ever heard one. Flame thrower to a hut? Come on. The producers could have made the whole thing a lot more political. I'm glad they didn't.
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Rosewood 479 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Daytime Soap Guest Star"
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12-12-02, 03:50 PM (EST)
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5. "RE: Ian the vet" |
"American condescension? That sounds like a Canadian phrase if I ever heard one."You say Canadian like it's a bad thing.... Perhaps the flame-thrower images are from having watched too many movies and television shows on the subject, but it was Ian's officious (dare I say rude) WAY of saying it that triggered something in me. And his use of the outdated pigdin really demonstrated to me that he still thinks of the Vietnamese as children. Just because they don't speak his language. Of course, when you look at the bigger picture, he treats all "foreigners" as though they are children. Now we know why- when the Vietnam war is your first international experience, you learn: 1)Yelling at the villagers is the only way to get them to do what you want (unless you have a gun).
2)These people don't know anything- you must save them from themselves.
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Cole 409 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Daytime Soap Guest Star"
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12-12-02, 12:08 PM (EST)
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2. "RE: Ian the vet" |
I have no doubt that "di di mao" and "numbah one" were the only phrases he could remember. However, the way he incessantly repeated them with that pidgeon-English Asian accent, was the height of condescension. What an ass.
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AMAI 1254 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Beef Jerky Spokesperson"
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12-12-02, 12:57 PM (EST)
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3. "RE: Ian the vet" |
LAST EDITED ON 12-12-02 AT 12:59 PM (EST)Ian is an ass - so why are we surprised about what he says & does? I am sickened to hear him spouting the same ole line about 'saving the Vietnamese' Since learning some of the truth about the nature of that absolutely despicable war, I find it to be one of the ugliest things to hear anyone continue to maintain that the Vietnamese were being "saved". They didn't even know what any of those political labels meant - "capitalism" "communism" "democracy". A nation of villagers was slaughtered in the millions, their country and people violated in a dreadful way, all in the name of feeding the goddamn "war machine." What does surprise me is that TAR showed him saying it. That is what surprised and angered me.
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boateng 28 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Beauty Pageant Celebrity Judge"
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12-12-02, 01:44 PM (EST)
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4. "RE: Ian the vet" |
Leave Ian alone. The Vietnam war was without doubt a disastrous quagmire, but, as has been pointed out for 30+ years, the ordinary soldier should in no way be held accountable for what happened over there. I have no idea what Ian did in Vietnam, but as far as I care he can think and say whatever he wants. The show last nite did make me wonder about how ordinary Vietnamese feel about Americans in general; are we disliked or respected or neither?
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IceCat 17415 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Playboy Centerfold"
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12-12-02, 06:33 PM (EST)
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7. "As an ex-service member..." |
... I was moved by one thing on last night's show. It was the haunted look on Ian's face when he was quiet and he was just taking things in. You could tell that there was a lot of stuff going on is his head and in his heart.Some very good friends of mine spent long tours in Bosnia being shot at and witnessing the death of children and other innocents on an almost daily basis. When they returned they were not the same people that they were before they left. Some measure of the essential joy in living that is so important to us as human beings had been robbed from them. The last thing I ever wanted to do with them was to judge them or to suppose that, in any possible way, I could understand what they had gone through or how it had wounded their souls. The only thing that I had to offer and really the only thing that they wanted from me was that I listen when they wanted to express something. Sometimes that expression was not in a verbal form. I guess what I am trying to say is that Ian may not have used the most politically correct mode of speech as he was speaking in the episode last night but the true measure of what he was expressing was in his eyes when he was not speaking. I choose to acknowledge that this former-soldier expressed something very true last night and I freely admit that I have no right to comment any further than that.
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Olive 5 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "American Cancer Society Spokesperson"
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12-13-02, 03:15 AM (EST)
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9. "RE: As an ex-service member..." |
"... I was moved by one thing on last night's show. It was the haunted look on Ian's face when he was quiet and he was just taking things in. You could tell that there was a lot of stuff going on is his head and in his heart.I guess what I am trying to say is that Ian may not have used the most politically correct mode of speech as he was speaking in the episode last night but the true measure of what he was expressing was in his eyes when he was not speaking." As I read some of the earlier posts, I wanted very much to respond. Then I saw your response and you phrased it so much better than I could. My long-time love was drafted and sent to Vietnam just after he turned 18. He, like Ian, is unable to/does not want to discuss what it was like over there, except that it was horrible. He would never voluntarily return to that country. I imagine that it was very difficult for Ian to return, but I think it healed a little part of him. Ian's repetition of "numba one" and the other phrase - well, that seems to me Ian being Ian. I don't like to hear Vietnam vets being bashed - most, if not all, of them had no idea what they were getting into, or why they were really there, and just wanted to get back home. Let Ian come to terms with it whatever way he can, and hopefully find some peace about it in his heart.
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Chrissy gal 1413 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Beef Jerky Spokesperson"
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12-13-02, 10:05 PM (EST)
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11. "RE: As an ex-service member..." |
Cole, I am only speaking for myself here, but I have no problem with you hating Ian (I think "ass" was the word you used in your other post). He is clearly not a person I would want to spend any time with. I object to someone attacking him BECAUSE he is a Vietnam veteran. Otherwise, I think he deserves what he gets.
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Swami 5885 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Playboy Centerfold"
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12-14-02, 05:35 PM (EST)
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12. "RE: As an ex-service member..." |
One of the luckiest days of my husband's life was the day his draft lottery number came up as 366, and he did not have to go to Vietnam. Of the people I know who went, not one talks about their experience. Never. I'm sure they rarely or never think about it.When Ian made TAR he had to apply for dozens of visas, as part of the process. I doubt if he thought the show would actually bring him there. Then, bam, he was on his way to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon) as part of a crazy game, with no time to get mentally prepared, or to learn what he could about Vietnam today. I'm no Ian fan, but I thought he did okay. I agree that the most telling moments were when he was silent, just taking it all in, remembering & wiping his eyes. I thought when he was driving his cyclo and taking the ferry ride he seemed as friendly and happy as he has ever been in this race. Did he act like a jerk, with his "didi mao" and "numbah one taxi driver" schtick? Well, sure--this is Ian after all. I wasn't sure what to make of his comment "incoming, Phil" as he & Teri raced into the pit stop, but I wasn't offended by it. I hope no Vietnamese were. I also hope he has time during his 18 hour mandatory rest to think about whatever he needs to think about.
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PepeLePew13 26134 desperate attention whore postings
DAW Level: "Playboy Centerfold"
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12-16-02, 07:07 AM (EST)
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15. "RE: As an ex-service member..." |
>... I was moved by one thing on last night's show.
>It was the haunted look on Ian's face when
>he was quiet and he was just taking things in.
>You could tell that there was a lot of
>stuff going on is his head and in his heart.
>>The last thing I ever wanted to do with them was
>to judge them or to suppose that, in any possible
>way, I could understand what they had gone through or
>how it had wounded their souls. The only thing
>that I had to offer and really the only thing
>that they wanted from me was that I listen when
>they wanted to express something.
>
>but the true measure of
>what he was expressing was
>in his eyes when he
>was not speaking.
>
>I choose to acknowledge that this
>former-soldier expressed something very true
>last night and I freely admit that I have no
>right to comment any further than that. I'm in total agreement with your words above, Mr. Cat... we can't ever assume to understand what someone in Ian's position is going through or to be in the position of someone who was a victim of any war without actually being a part of it. My stepfather is Hungarian and has only a small amount of Jewish blood in him -- but that was enough for him to become a Holocaust victim where he spent a year in a concentration camp and watch his parents be taken away to their deaths before he and his brother escaped to safety. He did not talk about his experience in the Holocaust at all for 45 years before we all went over to Slovakia for my brother's wedding -- Bratislava was only a hour-plus from the Budapest area so we decided to go down for the day and explore his hometown. He didn't talk much but you could see it in his face as he relived many experiences through his head, and it wasn't until after we got back home that he finally started talking about it. He's now been back to Hungary several times since then and even went to see the Auschwitz memorial. I can only imagine what it must have been like for Ian to enter Vietnam for the first time in thirty years and yet, still have to focus on the TAR game. All in all, I think he held himself together quite well (finishing first at the pitstop).
 
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