Obligatory imperial troop copypasta:

You see american choppers in the bright blue sky, hundreds and hundreds of screaming american soldiers drop from it, you look across the field and see the tanks rolling in. You hear a loud explosion and realise that the shrine you have protected for thousands of years with tooth and nail is destroyed by the empire, you come to the realisation that this is very probably the end of your people who’ve struggled to survive all these centuries.You realise that very soon there is going to be a river of blood of your people here; white phosphorus and depleted uranium will be shot very soon, deforming babies for decades to come, and millions of your people are gonna be killed. Your millennia old language and religion will be wiped out, you’re very likely the last of your kind.

Suddenly, an American soldier kicks you down, puts his foot on your neck and aims his standard ar-15 on the side of your head all while screaming; you realise you’re gonna die, and you won’t have to see the destruction of your community that you fostered so carefully all these centuries for.

Just before he pulls the trigger, you think to yourself, “To be fair to him, he probably had a low GPA in highschool and didnt have a health-care, those are notoriously hard to get in America”.

I see military service just like i do credit card debt. You got yourself into that situation, but you WERE mislead the entire time

Yeah, I see our veterans and fallen as victims rather than heroes, at least since Vietnam, when it was no longer clear we weren’t the baddies.

By the time of the Gulf war and the Iraq war, it was clear we were poking our guns into places they didn’t belong at costs the US couldn’t afford, and we did anyway. And PMCs and torture made it super clear the US was the baddies.

I got closely acquainted with vets with TBIs (being a civilian TBI victim, myself) and the DVI did fuck-all for them, which was a disappointment since solders were coming home IED victims often with TBIs by the tens of thousands (but they survived, which means they weren’t counted among our dead). The hope was the military was going to lead the way when it came to treatment and we civvies would ride on the coat-tails. Nope.

And that’s how counter-recruitment writes itself.

We’re asked to remember them. There’s lots of young people who were swindled into enlisting and died for a country that doesn’t give a shit about them over a war for nothing.

Can we at least have a moment of silence for them?

Or for the ones who survived, but disillusioned, and struggling to readjust to life back home? Not every vet is a chud. Not every vet is pro war. Not every vet is pro America.

I’ve met four different people involved in the military and also have met four questionable people.

My dad, never got deployed, was in prison for fencing items, also owned businesses that in retrospect were suspiciously ideal for money laundering. o7

Then my childhood friend, sprayed nazi graffiti around town, went to juvie, now serves the troops. o7

Then a coworker, former military (allegedly), has a psychosis (which isn’t bad!), and was harassing his ex at her work based on delusions (which is bad). o7

Then a different coworker at a different place, active military, very authoritarian despite not knowing much and not being our supervisor. Made everyone uncomfortable and frustrated including our actual supervisor. Now he’s becoming a National Guard. o7