This question was inspired by a post on lemmy.zip about lowering the minimum age to purchase firearms in the US, and a lot of commeters brought up military service and training as a benchmark to normal civilians, and how if guns would be prevalent, then firearm training should be more common.
For reference, I live in the USA, where the minimum age to join the military is 18, but joining is, for the most part, optional. I also know some friends that have gone through the military, mostly for college benefits, and it has really messed them up. However, I have also met some friends from south korea, where I understand military service is mandatory before starting a more normal career. From what I’ve heard, military service was treated more as a trade school, because they were never deployed, in comparison to American troops.
I just wanted to know what the broader Lemmy community thought about mandatory military service is, especially from viewpoints outside the US.
Colombian here. Mandatory military service is morally indistinguishable from slavery. I only was spared from it because I used a loophole that lets you skip it if you’re already in college.
Just imagine if instead of millitary service, it was compulsary public service that actually benefitted society. Nursing, construction/infrastructure, farming, teaching/childcare, etc.
Its astrounding how much money is pumped into the military industrial complex when it could be used to fund to many other programs for public good.
But that would be sOciALiSm.
More hilarious when considering the US Military is an inherently socialist institution.
My sister and brother-in-law will go to the commissary, stay on base housing, get their paycheck from the US Govt., receive public Healthcare, and the GI Bill, then promptly go home and post on Facebook about how socialism bad.
I am for it only because it helps avoid politicization of the armed forces. When the military self-selects recruits, you risk the organization biasing towards people with a particular worldview. It intrinsicially also leads to a military comprised of people who love the idea of being a “military person”.
It’s much more reassuring knowing your armed forces, the people with the big guns, are your neighbors, rather than strangers with a particular ideology or biased loyalties.
It’s much more reassuring knowing your armed forces, the people with the big guns, are your neighbors, rather than strangers with a particular ideology or biased loyalties.
How about compulsory national guard service?
Do you think the national guard isn’t a component of the military?
That is correct. The National Guard is (part of) the militia, not the military. 10 USC 246.
The Military consists of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, and now the Space Force. The “Armed Services” includes the above, plus the Coast Guard and the National Guard.
The National Guard consists of state-level units operating under the authority of the state’s governor. They can be called forth to federal service. They could, arguably, be considered part of the military when called forth. But generally speaking, no, the National Guard is not a component of the military.
The problem with your reasoning is that you can (and many people have) been given duty outside the United States of America when directed by the Federal Government (POTUS). So while I can appreciate you making the distinction, for the purposes of this discussion I’m not sure just how relevant that distinction is.
Joining the military, you would expect to be living separate and apart from the local communities. You’ll spend a year or two at one posting, before being transferred to another, and another, and another. You won’t expect to set down roots in the local community. The people you are serving with will be constantly rotating in and out of your current unit on similar schedules; you can expect any friendships you form to last a few months, before you or they are transferred again.
Joining the National Guard, you will be serving primarily in your home state, at the call of your own governor. You’ll spend your entire career in your own community, serving with other people in that same community. Even when you deploy, you are deploying with people you’ve known your whole career, if not your whole life: your friends and neighbors.
The militia is not the military.
Joining the military, you would expect to be living separate and apart from the local communities.<<
As someone who joined the military, that’s not really how that works and if you’re getting your information from memes and content creators, perhaps it might be a better idea not to continue this conversation because I really don’t want to have to go into detail about how flawed that first sentence is, let alone the rest of it.
I served in the military from '99 through '05.
In California, the only military members I knew of who had California drivers licenses were people who had grown up in California. Nobody else in considered themselves a “resident” of California.
We were briefed on how to obtain absentee ballots from our home states, because most of us didn’t qualify as residents at our post.
We were advised to file taxes in our home states, not the states where we were living and working.
The parking lots on base had more out-of-state license plates than in-state.
Military members and their dependents are guests of the local community. Visitors. Tourists. Not locals. We aren’t in their communities long enough to become locals.
It is abuse and violation of person’s freedom and dignity. It (and people supporting it) should be fought by any means necessary.
How about taxes going to a military? Or is it just being forced to directly do morally abhorrent things?
Or is it just being forced to directly do morally abhorrent things?
Not just “morally abhorrent things”, any forced labor is wrong.
Taxation isn’t because there’s a middle man between your labor and the government?
Well, you raise a valid point, it’s also bad of course.
It’s just that “forcing you to do a thing (a physical labor) you do not want to do” and “forcing you to give up a part of your salary” are different things.
