Dear Jokesters, keep your insensitivity to yourself

Normally I write about pretty light-hearted things that involve dating, food, or my cat. However, something occurred today that I HAD to write about.

This week at my high school was Spirit Week for Homecoming on this week’s Saturday, so today was red day meaning students dress in red. Many went extreme and dressed from head to toe in all of their red attire while some just threw on a t-shirt and called it a day. But then, there were some kids who went extreme, in the offensive way.

They decided it was appropriate to adorn themselves with the Communist flag. And no, I was not hallucinating nor did I make a mistake. It was a red flag with a gold sickle and mallet.

So I’m sitting in a cafe after school and I see an offender sit down in the outside seating area with a friend of his. His friend had walked away when I decided to confront him on the reason why he wore it.

ME: Hey, I was wondering why you are wearing a communist flag?

OFFENDER: Well, because it’s red day and the Soviets are ‘the Reds’ and it’s also a cape.

Personally, I was shocked then grew quite angry in disbelief that their parents would even let their children leave the house and quite possibly get beaten up for such an offense. And I’d be a hypocrite if said that I’ve never made a joke or two about Communism, however it’s just joking to a small group of friends who know that these are harmless jokes that mean nothing. These kids probably thought the same as well and thought it would give their friends a good laugh and forgot that they could come off as insensitive to people who were affected by events cause by communism like myself or worse, a war veteran.

In my case, I have an uncle who served in the Vietnam War and died serving. I’ve heard my grandma talk about having to live through the deaths of her children and he left behind his wife and young son to grow up without a father figure. My other grandma has only a few photos of the times before then, even birth certificates were burned.

Do they know how many unmarked  graves lie in Vietnam with no one to claim those men because of how badly their bodies were disfigured or because their families were already dead? Do they know how many died from the effects of Agent Orange? Do they know how many mothers cried when their sons were forced to serve?

They know but yet, they decide to walk proudly down the halls, laughing with their friends while I am thinking about how my family has suffered. I want to cry thinking about the tears people have wept for their loved ones.

Communism was not a war we wanted to fight, but one we had to.

This is a service announcement to the kids who thought it was funny and ok to wear the communist flag, it’s not.