"It's never quite worth what you give up to get it"

This post is going to be brutally honest, but this is my makeshift confessional.


So I just watch Born On the Fourth of July, a movie about an All-American teen who goes to fight in Vietnam, gets paralyzed, and then goes through all the aftermath. It's part of Oliver Stone's Vietnam trilogy and I liked it a lot more than Platoon. Platoon seemed to focus on the horror and evil that man is capable of in the face of war, whereas BOtFoJ focused on the loss of Tom Cruise's character's loss of innocence. It's this loss of innocence that really struck a chord with me. At the beginning of the film, there is a scene of Tom Cruise's character as a kid playing a war game with his friends. From there until the end of the film, the main character slowly watches his innocence and idealism deteriorate through battles, death, paralysis, hatred, empty sex, drunkenness, and the culture clash over the Vietnam War. It's a pretty sobering film and while I didn't love it and will probably take it to Ed McKay's, it was worth the watch.


Now, for the brutal honesty part. I'd really like to write a song about the loss of innocence because for years I've felt a similar deterioration by way of my sinful heart and today I felt it even more. There was a part of the film where Tom Cruise's character goes to stay in Mexico with a bunch of other vets. Here, they drunk, gamble, fight, and have sex with prostitutes. Because the main guy is paralyzed from the chest down, he's unable to feel anything, so sex offers nothing for him. However, because he was recently rejected by his family, his loneliness and desire for connection lead him to paying for a prostitute to have sex with him. The scene in question was not overly sexual but there was explicit nudity and while I knew I should fast forward or close my eyes or something, I chose to keep my eyes focused on what was not mine. For a while I've known that if I ever have a son, I'm not going to be all "porn is bad!!!!" but I'm going to explain a variation of that and say that when you see something, you can't unsee it. You can't forget it. After seeing that scene, my mind started to think horrible, sick, awful things about people I know and care about. I hate(d) myself for thinking those thoughts and I cursed myself and those thoughts but they can't be undone or unthought. In my heart, I've sinned against people in awful ways. This is my loss of innocence. I don't know how to put into words the shame and hatred I feel towards this sickness in my mind. I've thought the most vile thoughts about people I claim to care about. I am the villain of the story.

Purify me, God. Purge me of myself. Destroy me.