Sweetheart of the Song Tra Bong

In Response to: The Things They Carried


What happened to Mary Anne is a perfect example of war changing people. Back during WWII, sexism was prevalent in American culture. Women were expected to stay at home and take up factory jobs while simultaneously taking care of the house and kids. They were expected to stay innocent and oblivious to the real problems and dangers of the time. I think it was very important that Mary Anne was a girl because there was the expectation that once she arrived, she would stay the same innocent sweet girl that she was before. At first, she was merely curious as to what was what and how to do things but when she began learning how to shoot and assemble weapons and started getting serious with helping around the camp with wounds and such, the men were surprised. They expected her to stay a sweet innocent 17 year old. The war began to desensitize her, Rat Kiley claimed he could see her eyes growing duller and duller as the days went on. This eventually led her to pursue missions with the green berets.  When Fossie found out, he freaked. He assumed his girlfriend would remain unchanged and continue to be the sweet high school girl he knew before but when people are put out into foreign places and don't know what to do, their ID comes out and primal instincts kick in. Fossie tries to tie her down with an engagement but not even that could keep her docile because once the war had gotten to her, she was changed. We see that there is no way Mary Anne is coming back to how she was before when Fossie and Kiley stumble in on a strange pagan ritual in the green berets tent and she is there chanting with a necklace of human tongues around her neck and the severed head of a black leopard stuck on a post at the end of the tent. If Rat Kileys story about Mary Anne doesn't prove the point that war changes people, i'm not sure what will.