Propaganda-style heroism narratives left recruits psychologically unprepared for real war.

Evidence

However, the war heroes Wayne played left recruits ill-prepared for the realities of war. Onscreen, good triumphed over evil, and the lines between the two were clearly drawn. War was a place where boys became men and men became heroes, where America was a force for good, and where American ends justified any means. Shipped overseas, new recruits soon learned that real war fell far short of this ideal. Reared on a false narrative of wartime heroism, many men were haunted by the sense that they somehow failed to measure up. As for making boys into men, Kovic reflected bitterly that the war robbed him of his manhood: “I gave my dead dick for John Wayne.” Wayne himself had secured a deferment in order to avoid serving in a war with a far more clear-cut division between good and evil. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 131

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The irony runs deep: the masculinity icon pushed young men toward a war that emasculated them, fleeing it himself. The fabricated-manhood-as-identity engine the whole book rests on is compactly dramatized here.
• XREF: Parallels the ‘Complaints About Immodesty’ and ‘On Sacrifice’ pattern of cultural ideals producing bodily consequences; also connects to how manufactured narratives (like Tamarisk trees as infrastructure) shape real lives.