4 ms·

What would motivate one to join, besides pure material gain? Who still thinks the US military protects their interests? The left considers it a tool of imperial

What would motivate one to join, besides pure material gain? Who still thinks the US military protects their interests? The left considers it a tool of imperialism, and the right sees it as openly hostile to them. They're both correct.

bell-cot 4y ago
Patriotic feelings or values? (Admitting that both the left- and right-wing sides of America's culture wars have been doing their best to stamp those out for quite a while now. Ditto the "Greed is the One and Only God" capitalists.)
- car_analogy 4y ago
  > Patriotic feelings or values? But that's exactly my point. Few people believe the military advances those values. Edit: To clarify, when I wrote "their interests", I meant including collective interests, i.e. those of the group or nation, whose defense is usually lumped under "patriotism".
- croes 4y ago
  "Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious"
pjc50 4y ago
> the right sees it as openly hostile to them This seems surprising given how much I associate all the "support our troops" rhetoric with the right. And actual military funding, although that's more a function of campaign contributions from defense contractors and otherwise unprofitable states.
- quantified 4y ago
  Rhetoric is one thing, actual treatment is another.
- car_analogy 4y ago
  > This seems surprising given how much I associate all the "support our troops" rhetoric with the right. Yes, the right does support the military more than the left. But they're starting to realize this support is one-sided. The number of people on the right that still believe bombing the middle east is vital to America's security is shrinking [1], while at the same time the military is demonizing its support base with training calling whites inherently evil [2]. [1] Trump to West Point grads: 'We are ending the era of endless wars' - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-wars-idUSKBN23K0PR https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-wars-idUSKBN23K... - While he did try to start a war by assassinating Soleimani, his boasting is proof that ending foreign wars is gaining popularity on the right. [2] https://nypost.com/2021/05/17/ex-space-force-commander-dod-videos-claimed-white-people-evil/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/17/ex-space-force-commander-dod-v...
  - antifa 4y ago
    > while at the same time the military is demonizing its support base with training calling whites inherently evil That is an article where a guy is certainly trying to sell a book that's alleging a generic far right conspiracy theory about "neo-marxism". I doubt there's any evidence.
    - car_analogy 4y ago
      In a congressional hearing, Sen. Cotton cited several whistleblower reports he received regarding CRT in the military, such as: “One Marine told us that military history training session was replaced with mandatory training on police brutality, white privilege, and systemic racism. [..] Another servicemember told us that their unit was required to read White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo which claims, and this is a quote, ‘white people raised in Western society are conditioned into a white supremacist world view,'” Cotton added. - https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2021/06/10/whistleblowers-explain-how-bidens-woke-extremism-training-is-tearing-the-military-apart-n1453672 https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2021/06/1... The defense secretary being questioned did not deny these assertions. But the truly motivated will find ways to call this "not evidence" as well. Only 100% incontrovertible proof counts as evidence for assertions they don't like. The bar is, of course, much lower for things they'd like to believe.
mc32 4y ago
It was one thing when we had the specter of the "red menace". It was real and the consequences pretty grave. And there was a lot of goodwill from WWII for the military… But then we lost the plot somewhere along the way and got into forever wars and optional wars and wars that were seemingly based on interests other than those of Joe and Jill six pack. The USG and the military see their recruits less as people resources that are used as a last resort and more as a tool to project some interest.
- rnk 4y ago
  We have a new menace, China. They really do want to control the world (through soft economic power they say - but: they are trying to pick off small countries in the Pacific to build "relationships" with and later bases. They have money, organization, power, determined leadership that will have at least some successes.
  - mc32 4y ago
    I mean, yeah, that's a slow moving adversary who is slowly building hard and soft power. Unfortunately, people in government and in industry since the 90's, except for Ross Perot, ONLY saw $$ in their eyes. Of course, the seed was planted in '72 when Kissinger and Nixon tried wooing them as a counter-balance to Moscow as they experienced something of a falling-out. But now, completely integrated into our economy as well as everyone else's it will be extremely hard to de-couple economies and they will kind of remain a necessary thorn and perhaps adversary. Look, the Russia thing is pretty serious for the time being and all stops were pulled and still they are doing business with 2/3 of the rest of the world who could not care any less. Now, let's consider China and its larger clout and what effectives any measures against them would have. And then we have the military who spent the Goodwill they had accumulated during WWII and the Cold war and squandered it with "nation building" and plain economic interest of industry. Fewer people will want to take up arms against an enemy given the last 30 years of continuous "elective" war.
refurb 4y ago
This comment is a great example of the internet bubble. There are massive swaths of Americans that don’t even use the internet for political news and have a strong affinity for the military. But you’d never know that reading HN.
- car_analogy 4y ago
  Not everyone has to be affected for recruitment to suffer. And information from the internet seeps into the "real world" - FOX News is already reporting on "wokeness" in the military.

bell-cot 4y ago

Patriotic feelings or values? (Admitting that both the left- and right-wing sides of America's culture wars have been doing their best to stamp those out for quite a while now. Ditto the "Greed is the One and Only God" capitalists.)

car_analogy 4y ago
> Patriotic feelings or values? But that's exactly my point. Few people believe the military advances those values. Edit: To clarify, when I wrote "their interests", I meant including collective interests, i.e. those of the group or nation, whose defense is usually lumped under "patriotism".
croes 4y ago
"Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious"

pjc50 4y ago

> the right sees it as openly hostile to them This seems surprising given how much I associate all the "support our troops" rhetoric with the right. And actual military funding, although that's more a function of campaign contributions from defense contractors and otherwise unprofitable states.

quantified 4y ago
Rhetoric is one thing, actual treatment is another.
car_analogy 4y ago
> This seems surprising given how much I associate all the "support our troops" rhetoric with the right. Yes, the right does support the military more than the left. But they're starting to realize this support is one-sided. The number of people on the right that still believe bombing the middle east is vital to America's security is shrinking [1], while at the same time the military is demonizing its support base with training calling whites inherently evil [2]. [1] Trump to West Point grads: 'We are ending the era of endless wars' - https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-wars-idUSKBN23K0PR https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-wars-idUSKBN23K... - While he did try to start a war by assassinating Soleimani, his boasting is proof that ending foreign wars is gaining popularity on the right. [2] https://nypost.com/2021/05/17/ex-space-force-commander-dod-videos-claimed-white-people-evil/ https://nypost.com/2021/05/17/ex-space-force-commander-dod-v...
- antifa 4y ago
  > while at the same time the military is demonizing its support base with training calling whites inherently evil That is an article where a guy is certainly trying to sell a book that's alleging a generic far right conspiracy theory about "neo-marxism". I doubt there's any evidence.
  - car_analogy 4y ago
    In a congressional hearing, Sen. Cotton cited several whistleblower reports he received regarding CRT in the military, such as: “One Marine told us that military history training session was replaced with mandatory training on police brutality, white privilege, and systemic racism. [..] Another servicemember told us that their unit was required to read White Fragility by Robin DiAngelo which claims, and this is a quote, ‘white people raised in Western society are conditioned into a white supremacist world view,'” Cotton added. - https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2021/06/10/whistleblowers-explain-how-bidens-woke-extremism-training-is-tearing-the-military-apart-n1453672 https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/tyler-o-neil/2021/06/1... The defense secretary being questioned did not deny these assertions. But the truly motivated will find ways to call this "not evidence" as well. Only 100% incontrovertible proof counts as evidence for assertions they don't like. The bar is, of course, much lower for things they'd like to believe.

mc32 4y ago

It was one thing when we had the specter of the "red menace". It was real and the consequences pretty grave. And there was a lot of goodwill from WWII for the military… But then we lost the plot somewhere along the way and got into forever wars and optional wars and wars that were seemingly based on interests other than those of Joe and Jill six pack. The USG and the military see their recruits less as people resources that are used as a last resort and more as a tool to project some interest.

rnk 4y ago
We have a new menace, China. They really do want to control the world (through soft economic power they say - but: they are trying to pick off small countries in the Pacific to build "relationships" with and later bases. They have money, organization, power, determined leadership that will have at least some successes.
- mc32 4y ago
  I mean, yeah, that's a slow moving adversary who is slowly building hard and soft power. Unfortunately, people in government and in industry since the 90's, except for Ross Perot, ONLY saw $$ in their eyes. Of course, the seed was planted in '72 when Kissinger and Nixon tried wooing them as a counter-balance to Moscow as they experienced something of a falling-out. But now, completely integrated into our economy as well as everyone else's it will be extremely hard to de-couple economies and they will kind of remain a necessary thorn and perhaps adversary. Look, the Russia thing is pretty serious for the time being and all stops were pulled and still they are doing business with 2/3 of the rest of the world who could not care any less. Now, let's consider China and its larger clout and what effectives any measures against them would have. And then we have the military who spent the Goodwill they had accumulated during WWII and the Cold war and squandered it with "nation building" and plain economic interest of industry. Fewer people will want to take up arms against an enemy given the last 30 years of continuous "elective" war.

refurb 4y ago

This comment is a great example of the internet bubble. There are massive swaths of Americans that don’t even use the internet for political news and have a strong affinity for the military. But you’d never know that reading HN.

car_analogy 4y ago
Not everyone has to be affected for recruitment to suffer. And information from the internet seeps into the "real world" - FOX News is already reporting on "wokeness" in the military.