Code Name Verity and Insensitivity Regarding WWII

Takes a deep breath before exploding

Code Name Verity is a trivial, insensitive, shallow, silly WWII story. Such a stupid 10-year-old “girl power” story has no place in the gritty, horrifying history of WWII. But the worst of it was that the fantastic plot is INCREDIBLY disrespectful
I mentioned the disrespect to my sister, and I meant disrespect to the real heroes, the men and women who self-sacrificed to save others in what compared to this ludicrous book would seem a “hum drum” way. My sister thought I meant disrespect to victims. That is true too, for many of the same reasons and more. WWII is not some sort of freak show to watch. *
I don’t think people really understand or take WWII seriously enough. I am not well-versed in it; I’m not a historical scholar (nor is anyone who does summary “research” for a “historical” novel). I took a lower level class but most of what I remembered was first-hand accounts of American soldiers. The textbook focused on war strategies and battles. I don’t have a good grasp of what happened on the Continent to the civilians, to the prisoners, etc. I don’t know Gestapo methods. I do know much more about the Eastern Front, the history of the horror there that led up to the war because of my graduate level Stalinism class. I know how Stalin and Hitler destroyed people between them. I know some nightmarish stories that are censured from popular history books. I don’t appreciate the gung-ho American attitude. The greatest generation attitude. The mighty heroes. How about we understand the devastation first? War isn’t so clear cut, especially on motivation. People, we weren’t fighting to stop the Holocaust. And yes, people did know it was happening (and I’m skeptical about the lack of knowledge of what Stalin did too; I feel like we should’ve, could’ve seen through the sham tours and show trials). I’m reading a history of Israel now, and the Allies don’t appear like such heroes. Antisemitism is an insidious sin.

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