"Highway of Heroes"

I really want to comment on this highway renaming business. For those who haven't heard, a bunch of people have created a petition to rename a portion of highway 401 to "Highway of Heroes" to commemorate the men & women who've died overseas who's flag-draped coffins make the procession down that very stretch of asphalt when their bodies return home.

Maybe I'm being irrational, but this kind of thing makes me absolutely furious. For starters, the term "hero" is thrown around far too much and (at least in my opinion) should not be assigned to just anyone who dies in the line of duty.

These soldiers are Our Honoured Dead, people who died because they chose to fight for Canada and Canada sent them into a warzone. That's both respectable and honourable, even remarkable... but is this heroism? No. This sort of renaming campaign just supports a propaganda machine that works to convince people that war is glorious, even righteous -- a lie so far from the truth it makes me ill.

And if that doesn't piss you off, how 'bout the thought that of all the things in this country we could attribute to our soldiers, we choose a stretch of grey pavement. What a terrible way to honour these people.