"Why They Love to Hate Her", by Carol Burke
The Nation, March 22, 2004
Before going to bed at the US Naval Academy, a plebe shouts "Good night!" to the senior midshipman in the company, and the company commander answers "Good night!" in reply. A litany of good nights then passes down the chain of the company's command. At the end of this ritual courtesy, the plebe yells the final good night: "Good night, Jane Fonda!" and the entire company shouts its enthusiastic retort: "Good night, bitch!" ... The ritual has been practiced by some but not all companies over the years, although in the past two years a few company officers have discouraged it.
... [E]ven as a grandmother in her mid-60s [Jane Fonda] continues to attract a seemingly endless stream of abuse. More than thirty years after her trip to North Vietnam, veterans fill cyberspace with their resentment, and new recruits learn that being a real warrior and hating Jane Fonda are synonymous...
... Some of the more vitriolic veterans' websites provide forums in which contributors vent their anger toward the actress... They rail at "Hanoi Jane," belittle "Jane Fondle" and castigate her as a "pinko slut" who "appeared nude in movies, smoked pot, smuggled drugs, used profanity publicly, and now, worst of all, was aiding and abetting the enemy during wartime." Most recently, hate-Fonda sites have displayed Photoshopped images designed to undermine the campaign of John Kerry by presenting the two side by side (along with real photos showing them several rows apart at an antiwar rally).
... [F]ictionalized accounts of Fonda's 1972 visit with American POWs in North Vietnam charge her with conspiracy. In these word-of-mouth and Internet stories, which circulate widely among active-duty soldiers and veterans, the punishment inflicted on uncooperative POWs is linked to Fonda's presence. An oft-told variant of the torture legend depicts a single prisoner (generally considered to be POW Jerry Driscoll) who is forced to meet with Fonda and registers his defiance by spitting on the star:
Dragged from a stinking cesspit of a cell, cleaned, fed, and dressed in clean PJs, he was ordered to describe for a visiting American "Peace Activist" the "lenient and humane treatment" he'd received. He spat at Ms. Fonda, was clubbed and dragged away. During the subsequent beating, he fell forward upon the camp Commandant's feet, which sent that officer berserk. In 1978, the AF Col. still suffered from double vision (which permanently ended his flying days) from the Vietnamese Col.'s frenzied application of a wooden baton.
This story is pure fiction...
The most popular of all these legends is by far the most dramatic. As recounted on another anti-Fonda site:
He [Larry Carrigan] spent 6 years in the "Hilton"--the first three of which he was "missing in action." His wife lived on faith that he was still alive. His group, too, got the cleaned/fed/clothed routine in preparation for a "peace delegation" visit. They, however, had time and devised a plan to get word to the world that they still survived. Each man secreted a tiny piece of paper, with his [social security number] on it, in the palm of his hand. When paraded before Ms. Fonda and a cameraman, she walked the line, shaking each man's hand and asking little encouraging snippets like: "Aren't you sorry you bombed babies?" and "Are you grateful for the humane treatment from your benevolent captors?"
Believing this HAD to be an act, they each palmed her their sliver of paper. She took them all without missing a beat. At the end of the line and once the camera stopped rolling, to the shocked disbelief of the POWs, she turned to the officer in charge...and handed him the little pile of papers. Three men died from the subsequent beatings. Col Carrigan was almost number four.
Vietnam POWs have tried to debunk the stories falsely attributed to them. Mike McGrath, the president of NAM-POWs and a prisoner from 1967 to 1973, has denounced them. Speaking for specific POWs named in the stories, McGrath has tried to set the record straight:
"They had nothing to do with the article attributed to them. They ask that we get their names off that bunch of crap. Tonight I talked with Larry Carrigan. He asked that we get his name off all that crap as well. He never left a room to talk to anyone like that. No torture or beatings to see Fonda. He was living with Bud Day, John McCain and a bunch of hard-nosed resisters during the Fonda visit...lots of witnesses if you want to question him (or them). Larry was never near Jane. There were never any POWs killed on account of Jane. (Did anyone ever provide a name of one of these tortured fellows?) That story about the notes has a nice theatric touch, but no such thing ever happened. The only ones who met with Jane willingly, to my knowledge, were CDR Gene Wilber and LCOL Ed Miller. One NAM-POW was forced to go before the Fonda delegation. And I think that was only to sit at a table for a photo opportunity. I doubt he ever got a chance to talk to her, let alone slip her a note. To my knowledge, the worst that happened to the rest of us was that we had to listen to the camp radio (Radio Hanoi and Hanoi Hannah) with the Fonda propaganda. It pissed us off, but I doubt you can call that 'torture.' So, if you get a chance to SHUT THIS STORY DOWN to the groups who are forwarding it, PLEASE DO SO. "
Despite the efforts of McGrath and others to stanch the flow of such legends, they continue to circulate...
