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Yeah, all of that makes sense. I don't at all disagree with the concept of military discipline. But then we come to the question of why this one thing is diffe
by throwaway22032 5y ago
Yeah, all of that makes sense. I don't at all disagree with the concept of military discipline.
But then we come to the question of why this one thing is different. Because that's how you're going to solve it right?
And the article just doesn't seem to expound on it. It's observed, and that's just it, there's paragraphs of waffle. There's not even like, an anonymous quote from the guy asking one of the other recruits/OC's/whatever (I'm slightly more au fait with UK military terms as you might be able to tell) why they're not doing it.
There's an implicit extrapolation that slippage on this particular point implies slippage across the board. But that isn't explored either - it's kind of just stated as if it's a physical consequence which doesn't seem clear at all to me.
As an absurd example - if you suddenly turned up, in theatre, with the soldiers' wives, and asked them to shoot them, I'd imagine a lot of them would refuse. But that wouldn't in any way imply that you now have some increased subordination risk in the future. It would imply that your order was absurd. Obviously, in this wholly artificial and constructed case, we know that because we've constructed it to be so, but you get my point.
In the article there appears to be zero thought given to the concept that if a huge group of people, people who, as you well describe, have been drilled and moulded into accepting almost any order without question, are refusing to do what you're asking them to do, that there might be some fundamental issue with what you're asking them to do.
I don't really know what the actual answer is, I mean obviously the act of putting a thing on your face is trivial when described in those terms, but something else is going on here.
- wpietri 5y ago> In the article there appears to be zero thought given to the concept that [...] there might be some fundamental issue with what you're asking them to do. [...] something else is going on here. The simplest explanation is that there isn't a fundamental issue. For civilians, you might claim that there is some sort of deep principle of freedom at stake, however ridiculous it might be given that those same people are all happy enough to comply with the laws most places have about covering up their naughty bits. But this is the military. They signed up for a job where many of their freedoms go out the window. This very clearly among them. If you look at who's wearing masks and who isn't, [1] it's obvious that this is a political. And if you read the news, it has been deeply politicized. Soldiers refusing to wear masks is a political statement: they in practice view allegiance to party (and/or news channel) above allegiance to the chain of command. The "something else" going on here is the same sort of propaganda-driven undermining of belief in rule of law that has been going on for years, and has resulted in the attempt to sack Congress and a majority of Republicans believing that the last presidential election wasn't legitimate. [2] This is all pretty much in line with how democracies slide into autocracies. Given that the Trump administration considered using the military to seize voting machines in Dcember 2020, [3] people should be very nervous about signs that the military has become this deeply politicized. [1] https://www.roanoke.edu/about/news/rc_poll_political_anxiety_mask_vax https://www.roanoke.edu/about/news/rc_poll_political_anxiety... [2] https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/one-year-on-republicans-still-dont-consider-biden-the-rightful-winner-506702/ https://www.rochester.edu/newscenter/one-year-on-republicans... [3] https://www.vox.com/2022/2/1/22912394/trump-giuliani-seize-voting-machines-military https://www.vox.com/2022/2/1/22912394/trump-giuliani-seize-v...
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- not2b 5y agoIt's different because masks and vaccines to prevent Covid have become political. But they author is trying to remain nonpolitical, the way military people are supposed to behave in a democracy, and I think this is why he's waffling a bit. Yes, a soldier is supposed to push back against an illegal order (say, to slaughter a bunch of civilians). But wearing a mask doesn't meet that standard. Neither does accepting a vaccine when the soldier already accepted many far more risky vaccines (like for anthrax) against much more unlikely risks (no one is attacking American troops or their allies with anthrax, but Covid is actively attacking).