"Born in the U.S.A." - American Pride or Protest?
Laura Schadt
My
parents have always been big fans of Bruce Springsteen, so growing up I can
remember them playing his music all through the house on various occasions. One
of their favorites was "Born in the U.S.A.", a song that I remember
my mom singing as she danced through the kitchen making dinner. I always thought
"Born in the U.S.A." was this powerful, patriotic song about
Springsteen's pride in America and how lucky he was to have been born in such a
country. It really wasn't until I was much older and in my senior year of high
school that I finally listened to the words and realized there was a much more
powerful message to the song.
This is a music video of Bruce Springsteen performing "Born in the U.S.A."
"Born in the U.S.A." is quite simply a protest song. It protests the Vietnam War and the way America treated it's veterans in the aftermath of the war mostly by highlighting all the problems that Vietnam veterans faced upon returning from the war. There are also other lyrics that seem to have a bit of protest in them, however. For example:
Got
in a little hometown jam
So
they put a rifle in my hand
Sent
me off to a foreign land
To
go and kill the yellow man
In this part
of the song, Springsteen is protesting to the draft process and how young men
were forced to go fight in the war against their will. While some men were
forced against their will, other young men were also considered “‘draft-motivated
volunteers’ who enlisted to avoid induction under less favorable circumstances”
(Angrist 585).
One of the biggest problems highlighted was
the fact that veterans would come back and wouldn't be able to find a job to
support themselves. This is discussed in the lyrics:
Come
back home to the refinery
Hiring
man said son if it was up to me
Went
down to see my V.A. man
He
said son, don't you understand
These
difficulties resulted for many different reasons, including a prevalence of
PTSD in the veterans and just a lack of available jobs. Modell and Haggerty
write in their article "The Social Impact of War" that "...the
path from trauma in Vietnam leads to adverse psychological reactions
independently, through material readjustment difficulties, and through the
perception of an unwelcome return" (213). Springsteen is showing through
his lyrics that the veterans were dismissed as candidates for jobs simply
because of the fact that they had been involved in the war, whether it was
their own choice or not. Something should have been done to accommodate these people and help them after their service to the country, rather than just forgetting about them.
This is a student's history project about the Vietnam War set to "Born in the U.S.A." It does an excellent job of showing how the effects of the war on the veterans.
I
had a brother at Khe Sahn
Fighting
off the Viet Cong
They're
still there, he's all gone
He
had a woman he loved in Saigon
I got a picture of him in her arms now
These lyrics
illustrate the pointlessness of the war. Especially the line “They’re still
there, he’s all gone”. Springsteen is saying that America is losing soldiers
and they may be saying it’s worth it if they’re going to win the war, however, “they’re
still there”. He’s saying that the war is not worth it.
Finally,
Springsteen comes back to the idea that America is not treating their veterans
with the respect they deserve. He again draws attention to the fact that
because of “the “veteran” role and the infliction of war wounds, physical,
psychological, and “hidden”’, many men were unable to find a life after the war
and were left with nothing (Modell and Haggerty 220):
Down
in the shadow of the penitentiary
Out
by the gas fires of the refinery
I'm
ten years burning down the road
Nowhere to run aint got nowhere to go
After having a good listen to the song, it is blatantly obvious that "Born in the U.S.A." is not a song about American pride, but actually a song looking down upon America and protesting the way they treated their own veterans after the Vietnam War. It is different from other songs of its kind because while it sounds very patriotic, it really isn't and it is a call to action to change the way things were in America at the time. Another example of protest music from the Vietnam War is the song "War" by Edwinn Starr. This song is more "in your face" with it's content. There is no question about what it is saying, unlike "Born in the U.S.A." which, as discussed earlier, was perceived by some as a song about American pride.
"War" by Edwin Starr
Works Cited:
Angrist, Joshua. "." Journal of the American Statistical Association. 86.415 (1991): 584-595. Web. 16 Nov. 2012.
Haggerty, Timothy, and John Modell. "The Social Impact of War." Annual Review of Sociology. 17. (1991): 205-224. Web. 16 Nov. 2012.
