Does Marketing Nomenclature Undermine Historical Figures & Events

According to internet lore when asked if the Storm Troopers were good or bad George Lucas answered, “They are good guys who follow orders from a really bad guy.” While George Lucas' assessment of the cinematic Storm Troopers motives may eventually play out in scripts, the original “Storm Troopers” were actual agents for Hitler to hold his power and reign of terror. Hitler instigated the death of a total of 16 million people, using Storm Troopers to carry out his directives. They had been indoctrinated for years as youth in school and camps with no moral clarity outside what Hitler and his council defined as truth.

Another actual military reference within Star Wars is "Grand Army of the Republic", which some interpretations indicate the clones were actually created to infiltrate the Republic. However, this twist does a disservice to the actual organization composed of any Veteran who had fought for the Union during the four years of the Civil War. It was dissolved in 1956 when the last Veteran, Albert Woolson of Duluth, MN, passed away. A museum in Philadelphia on Griscom Street exists to preserve the memory of the organization and those Veterans.

General John A. Logan made a General Order from the Civil War Veterans group, the Grand Army of the Republic, in Washington, D.C., May 5, 1868. This became the foundation for what was originally called “Decoration Day” and we now call “Memorial Day”.

Here are two important paragraphs from the “General Order”:

“We are organized, comrades, as our regulations tell us, for the purpose, among other things, "of preserving and strengthening those kind and fraternal feelings which have bound together the soldiers, sailors and marines who united to suppress the late rebellion."

Digest the severity of this statement:

“What can aid more to assure this result than by cherishing tenderly the memory of our heroic dead who made their breasts a barricade between our country and its foes?”

and the solemn words of this directive:

“Let us, then, at the time appointed, gather around their sacred remains and garland the passionless mounds above them with choicest flowers of springtime; let us raise above them the dear old flag they saved from dishonor; let us in this solemn presence renew our pledges to aid and assist those whom they have left among us as sacred charges upon the nation's gratitude—the soldier's and sailor's widow and orphan.”