Dear Editor,
Hey, thanks again for not covering the Veterans Day events for Thursday, Veterans Day, in the Torch. At first we thought it was just an oversight that you didn’t cover our Veterans event on 9/11, but I can see that the lip service given in your editorial comments were just that, lip service.
I feel that your avoidance of Veteran activities on campus is shameful. Everyone one of us here on campus, students and faculty, sacrificed so much for our country and for your everyday liberties. Each faculty Veteran and student Veteran here on campus has a story, yet you didn’t even attempt to talk to any of us, or even mention that we are here. How about the things we do for the community?
It’s great that you at least mentioned the Military support group who has spouses in the Military. Those support students are not in the Military, and their spouses that are serving in the military are not Ferris students. We are both military and students at Ferris. The Veterans Association supports them as well. They can and have talked with those of us who have already been through the long lonely deployments and made it back home. We give them insight to what they’re going through, their training and what is going to change.
The Concert is a great event and we, the Veterans Association, participated in that event as well. We performed the POW-MIA ceremony for the crowd. The big thing going around campus now is the game “Call of Duty”; well, we played the game for real. No extra lives, no restarts. Who else would willingly sacrifice their life in the name of freedom for a complete stranger, even newspaper editors?
If you would have been at the Veterans breakfast, you would have seen the many faces of men and women who dedicated portions of their lives to keeping the freedoms that are all too often taken for granted. I feel bad that you choose to ignore the very source of the Veterans Day celebration. It is your loss. We will continue to support and defend the freedoms that you enjoy, even if you choose to ignore the reasons that allow you to have them.
Michael A. Milford
President, Ferris State University Veterans Association