White Noise, Media, and Our Soldiers

As you have seen in so many of my posts this year, and particularly in the last two posts, I have a huge interest (and junior research paper) in the topic of the military, but specifically in the battles that troops fight at home upon returning from war. As I was glancing through White Noise, this particular passage stuck out at me (DeLillo 92).

"Where's the media?" she said. 

"There is no media in Iron City." 

"They went through all that for nothing?"  

This passage is referring back to the incident that is described to Jack about the plane that almost went down but didn't. Apparently, no media was there to cover the story, therefore making it less important and less of a miracle. 

via this link

Now, as the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq carried on for eleven (and counting) and eight years respectively, the media coverage of the wars has also lessened. It's no longer always on the front page. It's as if, like in Iron City, there is no media there. But what does this mean? It means that the troubles and conflicts our troops go through go untold in America. It means that soldiers fight for their country and get little support upon returning. It means that the pride of serving your country barely leaves your platoon and family. It means that since the media doesn't cover the daily personal battles going on in Afghanistan and Iraq, those things almost cease to exist to the general American population. It's almost as if that same question from White Noise needs to be asked: 

"They went through all that for nothing?"