Do you mind if I ask you - I’ve always been curious how anyone could join the military and not bother with politics. Don’t they want to know what they might be sent to fight for? Is it just blind trust that the government will use the military wisely, or is it being young and dumb and possibly poor, or is it the appeal of the GI bill? Or - you’ve mentioned Bush and I assume you mean W, not HW, and if so you must be roughly my age. Did they mostly join in response to 9/11?
Either Bush, really. The kids I knew joined right before 9-11.
They are literally children. Some sign up at 16 even. It’s a mix of poor education and propaganda. “The military defends the rights of the people” etc. Since you can’t openly shit talk your superior officers or question their orders, it makes political propaganda more effective. I tried telling people we were going to murder brown people so corpos could get more money and they said, “ no, we are bringing freedom and stopping terrorists.”
A huge component was that it’s standard practice for Republican administrations to give better raises for service members.
It was honestly a nightmare of ignorant psychopaths. But tbf, there were quite a few people like me who just wanted to get away from shitty homes, get an education etc and joined before the large “wars.” We tried to teach, complained, and got out asap.
If you were in the military then you know it’s full of maga chuds
It was certainly full of people that supported Bush.
It was mostly just kids that didn’t know anything. Most of them never even bothered with politics.
Do you mind if I ask you - I’ve always been curious how anyone could join the military and not bother with politics. Don’t they want to know what they might be sent to fight for? Is it just blind trust that the government will use the military wisely, or is it being young and dumb and possibly poor, or is it the appeal of the GI bill? Or - you’ve mentioned Bush and I assume you mean W, not HW, and if so you must be roughly my age. Did they mostly join in response to 9/11?
Either Bush, really. The kids I knew joined right before 9-11.
They are literally children. Some sign up at 16 even. It’s a mix of poor education and propaganda. “The military defends the rights of the people” etc. Since you can’t openly shit talk your superior officers or question their orders, it makes political propaganda more effective. I tried telling people we were going to murder brown people so corpos could get more money and they said, “ no, we are bringing freedom and stopping terrorists.”
A huge component was that it’s standard practice for Republican administrations to give better raises for service members.
It was honestly a nightmare of ignorant psychopaths. But tbf, there were quite a few people like me who just wanted to get away from shitty homes, get an education etc and joined before the large “wars.” We tried to teach, complained, and got out asap.