Why would one choose to be a soldier?

[Catwoman]

Oh come on, someone give me a decent argument, please. Yes I am simple. Yes I care about other people. 'Productivity' means creating more than we need (hello! can someone please do their homework - the industrial revolution caused overproduction hence advertising hence people buying things they don't need hence time and money being spent on SHIT instead of saving lives). Jesus you people are difficult to get through to.

A lot of American's work hard all day? Doing what?!! Is it anything useful? Can you honestly say the world is a better place because of YOU? What do you do?

Originally Posted by lookout123

you will never understand, because you don't want to understand

Well that's possible the most ridiculous thing I've heard. What do you think I'm doing here?

Originally Posted by lookout123

i have yet to meet anyone in the military who says "i want to kill someone as soon as i get a chance."

Well I have, and they DO. They are excited by big guns and loud noises and battlegrounds. Lets not forget these are KIDS. They don't know what they're getting into until their mates brains splatter their armour. It's not bloodlust it's curiosity - but it's stupidity to want to realise this curiosity.

Originally Posted by lookout123

you live in a pipe dream where you think world peace is achievable if only the nasty capitalists would share whatever they create with everyone without regard for profit and military force is pointless because we can all just talk through our disagreements until we all come to a common understanding what is in the best interest of all.

Of course it's a pipe dream. I doubt things will ever change. But what's the point of discussions like these if we can't say what we think is RIGHT. Such fear of peace that leads us to war. We can't settle on sharing and happiness and sameness because it's boring. War is exciting!

Originally Posted by Undertoad

Cures for cancer is what we work on when we're not farming all day. Almost all cures have come in the last 100 years when productivity became important. Almost all cures have come from productive nations even though the VAST majority of humans still live in UNproductive ones.

And then GlaxoSmithKline sell them to developing countries for more than the cost of a year's labour - so most of them don't see these cures anyway. Then they DIE. Does that bother you as much as the mass graves? We can stop it now!

[Undertoad]

A lot of American's work hard all day? Doing what?!! Is it anything useful? Can you honestly say the world is a better place because of YOU? What do you do?

Well nothing at this moment, but two weeks ago I was part of a development team working on a device to increase Internet security. You may have heard of the Internet, it's a new thing that lets everyone in the world exchange knowledge and information. Some people find it useful, but I'm sure since you spend all day just arguing over it, it's not an advance in humanity. Oh well!

And then GlaxoSmithKline sell them to developing countries for more than the cost of a year's labour - so most of them don't see these cures anyway. Then they DIE. Does that bother you as much as the mass graves? We can stop it now!

Sure, you could steal the drugs to solve today's problems. But then who'll you steal the drugs from for the problems they encounter in 20 years?

Because the phrase "developing countries" is polite speak for "not able to feed their own citizens" and that some of these "developing countries" have been "developing" for a century now.

[lookout123]

Can you honestly say the world is a better place because of YOU? What do you do?

uh yep. i help people live a happy retirement. i help them send their kids to college. i help people save for their home. i help people with their estate planning so that their families will be less burdened upon their death. i help people to have peace of mind.

your question is sort of like one part of the body asking another who is more important to the whole. stupid and pointless.

They are excited by big guns and loud noises and battlegrounds. Lets not forget these are KIDS. They don't know what they're getting into until their mates brains splatter their armour.

did you get that from the movies or from your time in the military. you don't get it. you don't spend time with the people in order to get it. you are so condescending that when you do meet them you probably just filter everything they say through your idea of what they really mean.

Well that's possible the most ridiculous thing I've heard. What do you think I'm doing here?

the pedestal you're used to standing on has slipped. it is jammed so far up your ass that you can't see that there is a difference between loving your job, or calling - and being a bloodthirsty thug. you use the same line of reasoning that marichiko did before her implosion. you think the government is criminal, the military is bumbling, and you talk to one or two soldiers who surprise, surprise, fit your expectations, so therefore the military is a ship of fools eagerly seeking death and destruction.

[richlevy]

Originally Posted by Undertoad

We don't make the chart. I suppose we have to try harder.

Well then, I guess they weren't counting native Americans and slaves.

Between 100,000 and 1,000,000
United States, eradication of the American Indians (1775-1890)
Russel Thornton, American Indian Holocaust and Survival (1987)
Overall decline
From 600,000 (in 1800) to 250,000 (in 1890s)
Indian Wars, from a 1894 report by US Census, cited by Thornton. Includes men, woman and children killed, 1775-1890:
Individual conflicts:
Whites: 5,000
Indians: 8,500
Wars under the gov't:
Whites: 14,000
Indians: 30-45,000
TOTAL:
Whites: 19,000
Indians: 38,500 to 53,500
TOTAL: 65,000 ± 7,500
William Osborn: The Wild Frontier: atrocities during the American-Indian War from Jamestown Colony to Wounded Knee (2000)
Deaths caused by specific settler atrocities: 7,193 (1623-1890)
Deaths caused by specific Indian atrocities: 9,156 (1511-1879. Incl. Indian vs. Indian)
Osborne basically defines an atrocity as murder or torture of civilians and prisoners. Most of your outright massacres are counted, but the Trail of Tears, for example, isn't.
Trail of Tears (1838-39)
Traeger, The People's Chronology: 4,000 out of 14,000 Cherokee die on route.
Osborne: anywhere between 1,846 and 18,000 Indians died, in total.

For their cargoes of human flesh, the traders brought iron and copper bars, brass pans and kettles, cowrey shells, old guns, gun powder, cloth, and alcohol. In return, ships might load on anywhere from 200 to over 600 African slaves, stacking them like cord wood and allowing almost no breathing room. The crowding was so severe, the ventilation so bad, and the food so poor during the "Middle Passage" of between five weeks and three months that a loss of around 14 to 20% of their "cargo" was considered the normal price of doing business. This slave trade is thought to have transported at least 10 million, and perhaps as many as 20 million, Africans to the American shore.

I guess you're right Tony, since the 1 to 2 million slaves bound for the US who died probably died outside the 12 mile limit, they probably don't technically count as American deaths. However, the death toll among slaves in the US was about %5 per year. I don't know what the death toll was among free citizens in the same areas, but the US was responsibile for the difference since we condoned slavery for a few hundred years.

I don't see the US listed at all on your chart, since it is post-1900. If you were to group native Americans and African slaves together, we would problably look like the Congo and Nigeria, with a steady number of deaths from 1700 through the Civil War.

Yes, we did finally address the cause of our shame. And the thanks for the task go to the servicemen who fought. But we also have to remember the Confederate soldier, 3/4 of whom did not own slaves. In their eyes they were not fighting for slavery but for 'states rights'.

Soliders take an oath the the Constitution, not the President, Congress, or the Supreme Court. They have to trust their civilian leaders to fit their missions to that oath, and to give them the support that they need to do their jobs.

For the uber-patriotic who have stars-and-stripes in their eyes, this is always sufficient, the wars are always just, and their treatment is always fair. The rest can take comfort in Kipling , who had a more cynical appreciation for the relationship between soldiers and their superiors (in name only).

Tommy

I went into a public-'ouse to get a pint o' beer,
The publican 'e up an' sez, "We serve no red-coats here."
The girls be'ind the bar they laughed an' giggled fit to die,
I outs into the street again an' to myself sez I:
O it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, go away";
But it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play,
The band begins to play, my boys, the band begins to play,
O it's "Thank you, Mister Atkins", when the band begins to play.

[mrnoodle]

So far, all the points I would've liked to have made on this issue have been made. Except one:

Originally Posted by John Stuart Mill

War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse.

[Happy Monkey]

Worse than that is the feeling that, once a war has been started, even people who know better must pretend that it is worth it, "for the troops".

[mrnoodle]

Still worse, to nullify the sacrifice of those who have already died by returning to a policy of appeasement and circle-jerking.

[Happy Monkey]

There's an example. Once lives have been sacrificed, we have to pretend that the war is justified, or their sacrifice is "nullified".

[mrnoodle]

nonono. it's either justified or not. i think it is, you think it isn't. once lives have been lost, however, we do the dead a disservice by not finishing the job they started. i guess i kind of play into your idea, but that's not how I see it.

[Undertoad]

It was subject to a vote of our elected representatives and represents the will of the people. What would be ill-advised "for the troops" would be a rapidly-changing policy subject to the whim of political winds.

[Happy Monkey]

That's how Vietnam happened. The fact that soldiers have died in support of a cause doesn't add any additional justification to the cause. The soldiers didn't start the war, and the people who did start the war didn't sacrifice.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by richlevy

I guess you're right Tony, since the 1 to 2 million slaves bound for the US who died probably died outside the 12 mile limit, they probably don't technically count as American deaths.

Point of order, most of the ships were not American ships and most of the slaves were destined for the Caribbean Islands to work the sugar plantations, not the US.

Yes, we did finally address the cause of our shame.

Not my shame. I had nothing to do with it.

[mrnoodle]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

Not my shame. I had nothing to do with it.

Sorry, if the rest of us have to carry generations of bloodguilt for the sins of our great great great grandparents, so do you. There will be no equality until everyone who has an oppressed ancestor gets their moment of outrage. I can't wait until they get to the Irish, I'm gonna let loose.

If I ever figure out the rest of my ethnic background (tough when you're adopted), I'm getting on those bandwagons too. This fight's not over, boyo.

[Catwoman]

Originally Posted by UT

Sure, you could steal the drugs to solve today's problems. But then who'll you steal the drugs from for the problems they encounter in 20 years?...Because the phrase "developing countries" is polite speak for "not able to feed their own citizens" and that some of these "developing countries" have been "developing" for a century now.

What can you say to that? Deep ignorance, adamant opinion, stubbornness. I don't stand a chance. It doesn't matter if I'm right, you are too deeply conditioned, too proud, too caught up in your and your country's identity to be able to listen with any clarity. There are too many emotions bouncing around to enable proper discussion.

The internet? You do a fine job here UT, I must say, one of the best sites on the web. But if you look at the wider perspective - do we really need the internet? All a person needs is food water shelter. The internet is a bonus (and in some cases, an obstruction). We are too reliant on technology as it is - what happened to real human contact? What happened to visiting your mother instead of e-mailing her? Why can't I talk to a real person at my bank instead of an automated digital voice. Yes, I reap the benefits of the internet age, it makes my life... convenient. But give me a field a cow and some chickens any day, I don't mind doing the hard work, especially if it means as a consequence the rest of the world can enjoy (enjoy?) clean water.

Originally Posted by lookout123

uh yep. i help people live a happy retirement. i help them send their kids to college. i help people save for their home. i help people with their estate planning so that their families will be less burdened upon their death. i help people to have peace of mind.

Accountant? Life assurance salesman? Ugh.

Originally Posted by lookout123

did you get that from the movies or from your time in the military. you don't get it. you don't spend time with the people in order to get it. you are so condescending that when you do meet them you probably just filter everything they say through your idea of what they really mean.

I've thought about that, but these people I speak of (probably only about 2 or 3, to be fair) have been very nice, polite and gentlemanly. They are not bloodthirsty, as I've already said, just curious about themselves and life. They go into the army for something to be good at, to assert their manhood, feel better about themselves... the same reason anyone does anything. They are not evil or cruel or 'baddies' - they just lack the intelligence to realise the reality or consequence of their actions. They see themselves as one man, made larger by common interest, but do not (and cannot) truly understand the weight of that decision. I hope you can read this without prejudice, without replying with something like 'well how do you know, you've only spoken to three soldiers'. Just listen and see if it makes sense to you.

Originally Posted by lookout123

the pedestal you're used to standing on has slipped. it is jammed so far up your ass that you can't see that there is a difference between loving your job, or calling - and being a bloodthirsty thug.

I think I've answered that one. But I don't see why you've put me on a pedestal. I'm just a young person trying to make sense of the world.

Originally Posted by HM

There's an example. Once lives have been sacrificed, we have to pretend that the war is justified, or their sacrifice is "nullified".

Bang on. This is the eternal problem with these kind of debates. If one adopts an anti-war stance the predictable response is 'oh, so you're saying they died for nothing eh? Tell that to their parents you heartless son of a ....'

[Undertoad]

It would appear we have some pretty deep disagreements about what makes an advance in the human condition.

Let me see if I understand your positions so we can continue to talk about this:

- There are few true improvements in the world, and we were just as well off in caves.

- Nations become powerful by chance - or worse.

- Commerce is meaningless by definition.

- Most modern human activity is a waste of time and most human choices incorrect.

- If people want to kill you, you can convince them not to by establishing a caring and non-violent society.

Help me out here by clarifying. thx