4 ms·

Anecdotally, I know and speak to dozens of Veterans a week and multiples more of young people in the target range, and the general consensus is "what are we fig

Anecdotally, I know and speak to dozens of Veterans a week and multiples more of young people in the target range, and the general consensus is "what are we fighting/training for, and why would I want to risk anything for an evil/corrupt/racist country". The idea that "America Bad" (however true or not) has permeated nearly everywhere in some form or another.

autoexec 3y ago
In fairness, America has earned a lot of it's "America Bad" reputation by acting in deplorable ways and failing to protect and care for its people. When I was young I was fed a lot of stories about what America was, mostly in contrast to the USSR and other communist countries. I was told about horrible things those evil other nations did to their people or failed to do for them which would never happen in the USA and how proud I should be that we were better than that, but over the course of my life I've seen more and more of those very same things happening right here. It's even worse for the folks looking at how our military has been used. I've met people who told me they were more than willing to defend their country, but were not at all willing to go to the other side of the planet and defend an oil field, or topple a democratically elected leader so that we could install someone more favorable to being exploited. I don't think there's been a single year of my life where we haven't had US servicemen overseas killing people for one reason or another, but damned if I could even tell you what it was for or where it took place for all but the ones most widely reported/televised. The US absolutely could do with better PR, and sometimes people are unfairly critical, but it's hard to blame folks feeling disillusioned given our record and even our current/recent behavior leaves a lot of room for improvement.

4 ms·

Anecdotally, I know and speak to dozens of Veterans a week and multiples more of young people in the target range, and the general consensus is "what are we fig

by jimmygrapes 3y ago

autoexec 3y ago
In fairness, America has earned a lot of it's "America Bad" reputation by acting in deplorable ways and failing to protect and care for its people. When I was young I was fed a lot of stories about what America was, mostly in contrast to the USSR and other communist countries. I was told about horrible things those evil other nations did to their people or failed to do for them which would never happen in the USA and how proud I should be that we were better than that, but over the course of my life I've seen more and more of those very same things happening right here. It's even worse for the folks looking at how our military has been used. I've met people who told me they were more than willing to defend their country, but were not at all willing to go to the other side of the planet and defend an oil field, or topple a democratically elected leader so that we could install someone more favorable to being exploited. I don't think there's been a single year of my life where we haven't had US servicemen overseas killing people for one reason or another, but damned if I could even tell you what it was for or where it took place for all but the ones most widely reported/televised. The US absolutely could do with better PR, and sometimes people are unfairly critical, but it's hard to blame folks feeling disillusioned given our record and even our current/recent behavior leaves a lot of room for improvement.