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Soldiers takes orders and donot have the luxury of questioning them.
That's why mostly people of a subhuman mentality sign up.
Quote:
A common and natural result of an undue respect for law is, that you may see a file of soldiers, colonel, captain, corporal, privates, powder-monkeys, and all, marching in admirable order over hill and dale to the wars, against their wills, ay, against their common sense and consciences, which makes it very steep marching indeed, and produces a palpitation of the heart. They have no doubt that it is a damnable business in which they are concerned; they are all peaceably inclined. Now, what are they? Men at all? or small movable forts and magazines, at the service of some unscrupulous man in power? Visit the Navy Yard, and behold a marine, such a man as an American government can make, or such as it can make a man with its black arts — a mere shadow and reminiscence of humanity, a man laid out alive and standing....[the] mass of men serve the state thus, not as men mainly, but as machines, with their bodies. They are the standing army, and the militia, jailers, constables, posse comitatus, etc. In most cases there is no free exercise whatever of the judgment or of the moral sense; but they put themselves on a level with wood and earth and stones; and wooden men can perhaps be manufactured that will serve the purpose as well. Such command no more respect than men of straw or a lump of dirt. They have the same sort of worth only as horses and dogs. Yet such as these even are commonly esteemed good citizens.
Henry David Thoreau, "Civil Disobedience", 1849
Quote:
Young men: The lowest aim in your life is to become a soldier. The good soldier never tries to distinguish right from wrong. He never thinks; never reasons; he only obeys. If he is ordered to fire on his fellow citizens, on his friends, on his neighbors, on his relatives, he obeys without hesitation. If he is ordered to fire down a crowded street when the poor are clamoring for bread, he obeys and sees the gray hairs of age stained with red and the life tide gushing from the breasts of women, feeling neither remorse nor sympathy. If he is ordered off as a firing squad to execute a hero or benefactor, he fires without hesitation, though he knows the bullet will pierce the noblest heart that ever beat in human breast.
A good soldier is a blind, heartless, soulless, murderous machine. He is not a man. He is not a brute, for brutes only kill in self defense. All that is human in him, all that is divine in him, all that constitutes the man has been sworn away when he took the enlistment roll. His mind, his conscience, aye, his very soul, are in the keeping of his officer.
No man can fall lower than the soldier—it is a depth beneath which we cannot go.
Yes it does. For example, all Mafias are from Italy is a generalization.
Hence, it is intellectual dishonesty to generalize a whole group of people based SOLELY on their career choice. (assuming you consider Mafia a career choice)
Yes it does. For example, all Mafias are from Italy is a generalization.....
But all made men in the mafia are criminals. So your theory about career choice is disproved.
(When attempting to verify a theory, you don't test it against situations known to work. That is true intellectual dishonesty. If you are being honest, you attempt to disprove the theory by testing it against situations that may not work as in my case. )
Gotta disagree with old Henry there. I think a propensity toward violence, control, and conquest is more or less the natural state of being, at least for males of the species.
Gotta disagree with old Henry there. I think a propensity toward violence, control, and conquest is more or less the natural state of being, at least for males of the species.
Crapping in the street would be a "natural state of being" if you were not born into a civilization. I don't think Thoreau really needed to qualify his statement to clarify that he was talking only about (supposedly) civilized men.
The invasion of Iraq was the most unjustified act of aggression since Hitler went into Poland. Anyone who participated in it is worse than subhuman.
Wow, too bad you missed the opportunity to spit on returning veterans at airports or carry signs saying "baby killer". Maybe you will have a chance with returning Afhiganistan troops.
Maybe you can join those nutcases that call to harangue families with sons and husbands killed in Iraq.
Moore is an idiot. To give him any credibility , especially on a subject like this, is an over reach. I'm going to see this movie this week, and I'll form an opinion on it after, but, as to the tactic of sniping , I already have a strong one. It is a fieldcraft, requiring extreme discipline and conditioning, and the men who take on the task are highly regarded.
Precision marksmanship has been key in the American military since our Nation was forged. Many lives have been saved, all because of ONE , well placed, shot, all through history. Denegrating the sniper, as somehow ..morally bankrupt, or cowardly is wrong headed. The same goes for running down soldiers, in general. War is an ugly business. The people who have to fight, are not the polite people, who live in poems. But, that does not make them evil.
Moore is just jealous of Eastwoods success, and is attacking the subject matter , trying to blight that success. Wahhhhh! Seeing some of the posts here, jumping on Moore's bandwagon, truly amaze me, in their ignorance. The leftist, intellectual elitism card, is a bit foxed about the edges.
To these types, I would recommend a bit of study, on the history of the sniper. Without the tactic, and the skills of the men who employ it, this nation would not exist. Many of our people are still alive, because the snipers are on watch.
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Seeing some of the posts here, jumping on Moore's bandwagon, truly amaze me, in their ignorance. The leftist, intellectual elitism card, is a bit foxed about the edges.
