At what point does military worship become dangerous?

[Lydia Leftcoast]

161. See what happens?

People express a distaste for the whole glorification of militarism that has steadily intensified since the end of World War II, and all of a sudden, they're accused of hating the individual soldiers.

There's this whole, "I'm patriotic and you're not, because I was in the military and you weren't" mindset.

Or, "I served my country, and you didn't."

Well, news flash, anybody who does any useful job, paid or volunteer, is serving their country. Teachers are serving their country by educating the next generation of citizens. Farmers are serving their country by producing food. Medical personnel are serving their country by saving lives.

You could in fact argue that anyone who voluntarily signs up up with an establishment (and I realize that it's civilian controlled, but it wouldn't be able to do half of what it does if there weren't so many people who buy the whole "serve your country" propaganda) is inadvertently damaging the country. That's not what they intend, of course, but the acts that they participate in--such as invading a country that never attacked us or even threatened to--are certainly helping to ruin America's reputation overseas.

We have an all-volunteer army. If people really understood the System, and if there were more and better paying civilian jobs and opportunities for education, we wouldn't have very many volunteers.