A Symbolic Interactionist Perspective on the Divide within the Veteran Self

Moral injury: understanding Swedish veterans who are assessed but not diagnosed with PTSD

“…This means that the overseas military context is clearly dominated by men, although it is not an entirely single-sex context. It can therefore be said that the social interaction is based on the interaction between men, and that there is a high degree of homosociality ( 49 , 60 ). It was not until 1989 that women were allowed to work in the armed forces on equal terms with men, and the Swedish Armed Forces is still one of the most gender-segregated workplaces in Swedish society ( 61 ).…”

“…Anyone who was not of a male gender, or deviated from the given culture in any other way, was therefore at risk of being particularly vulnerable and singled out. Uniformed women's experiences of being "the other" (i.e., the other gender) in a male-dominated military context where the male eye observes and defines have been clearly illustrated in both international (51,(73)(74)(75)(76) and Swedish research (14,26,46,49,77) in recent decades. There was thus a breeding ground for various types of moral conflict and injury that were related to different views of what was perceived as morally right, proper and desirable from a socialization and identity perspective.…”

“…An important perspective for understanding why moral injury may occur among veterans in particular is the strong moral charge that me has in such groups. For many veterans, a strongly morally charged me emerges during service and international deployment that embraces obedience, loyalty, task focus, discipline, community, camaraderie, renunciation of what stems from life at home, and self-sacrifice of one’s own life and the lives of others if things get really bad ( 49 ). A strong me is needed to be able to perform extreme tasks that are taboo (i.e., harm, kill) or morally transgressive in a peacetime society when the circumstances are life-threatening ( 50–55 ).…”

Evil, Constructed: A Salient Part of an Emerging Spiritual Veteran Identity

“…A working definition of evil in this article encompasses the existence of evil that is necessary-given that the world consists of the presences of good and evil-for informed and meaningful action and spiritual growth to occur. This understanding and definition is privileged over the others because veterans in general tend to change after deployments (Grimell, 2023a(Grimell, , 2023bLifton, 1992). The change revolves around new insights and deeper understandings about the conditions and complexities of life, good and evil included.…”

“…Such a gap between the veteran and the civilian has been illustrated in research at both societal and individual levels (Grimell, 2022(Grimell, , 2020a(Grimell, , 2019(Grimell, , 2018a(Grimell, , 2016. At the micro-or individual level, it can be said to create a kind of gap within the self where experiences from deployments stand in sharp contrast to the civilian lifeworld that also exists within the self (Grimell, 2023a). It can be complicated for veterans to engage in dialogue with an identity shaped by war zone deployment(s) and identities formed from their experiences the civilian life-world (Grimell, 2022).…”