By John M.

The Ethics in Action club is a community service club at SPC’s Gibbs campus, and our mission statement is that we are the voice of the voiceless. One of our campaigns this semester is to serve our veterans in the rehabilitation facility at Bay Pines by playing games and spending time with them. Tuesday, April 5, 2016 marked the 50th anniversary of the Vietnam War, and Ethics in Action was there on this day to help bring veterans from the rehabilitation facility outside to the ceremony and back. The ceremony at Bay Pines was not so much to commemorate the war as to properly welcome home the soldiers that fought in it. The Master of Ceremonies was Steve Jerve, Channel 8’s meteorologist, and a few speakers attributed Jerve’s involvement with the ceremony for the fantastic weather of the day. The color guard came out, we pledged our allegiance, and the ceremony began.

The Keynote Speaker, who was one of three soldiers invited to the White House to meet President Nixon after the war, was U.S. Army Command Sgt. Maj. (Ret.) Gary L. Littrell. He talked about how the original homecoming that most of our Vietnam soldiers received was one of the most disrespectful and disgraceful things our nation has seen to date, and I could not agree more. They were welcomed home with verbal abuse, physical violence, blame and being spit at. After doing the duty that our county asked but really told them to do, this is the way they were treated. It saddens me to hear how these soldiers were treated by the same people that they defended, and this is something that should never be repeated. The closing of the ceremony brought a gun salute, the playing of Taps, and the color guard retired the colors.

I thought that the apology, the thanks, and the welcome home that was delivered to these brave men and women will not take away the pain of the original one; however I think for some it might ease it a little. We must do everything we can to make sure that future generations are educated about what happened to these soldiers, so we as a nation never forget, nor repeat, these offensive acts ever again.

If you enjoy helping people and our community, then Ethics in Action is the club for you.