This is, of course, inconsistent with the massive military presence of the North Vietnamese army of the indispensable military assitance of the Peoples Republic of China. This is not art, this is cynical manipulation of American opinion as the Communists of Vietnam demand aid from the American tax payer. The ArtCentre becomes a precipitant in this propaganda. You may also have guessed that I am a Vietnam veteran. The fact that this show begins May 18 and the City of Plano will hold its Memorial Day Observance on May 25 goes beyond irony and is but one more hippie spiiting in the face of returning Vietnam vet.
Most vets have a silent Memorial Day conversation with their buddies, dead now for so many years.
There has been much to explain to them in recent years, but I never dreamed I would have to explian an insult delivered less that 1,000 feet from the war memorial at the Plano Municipal Center. Finally, and most grievously, this showing is the apogee of insensitivity to a refugee community that suffered hardships and dangers beyond our knowing to escape the killing fields and prisons of Communist Vietnam. What splendid irony it would be, if the next time the ArtCentre approached the city for more tax money, they would see on the committee a couple of people with service lapel pins and a few other members with surnames like Nguyen and Trong. But the freedom to express those views does not demand that those in opposition be required to subsidize that effort by providing the venue for their exposure. It does not require an embrace of culture and a masking over that Communist Vietnam is governed by the same despots, who as a matter of official policy, tortured and murdered our soldiers who became prisoner of war.