But he should be on the street because some lefty who grew up in the whitest, most safest, lacrosse-team havingest area read a book once.

The most virulently “fuck the troops” people in this community are non-USians and you know this. This is demonstrated in this very post with OP who’s not from the US.

I get such a major disconnect because it seems like some people don’t understand what growing up in some places is like. Selling drugs is not a better alternative to joining the military, being in gangs and that life is scary but also fucking pathetic and miserable. You’re a detriment to your family and only incur more trauma to everyone you know.

I’ve rubbed shoulders with vets before, and when you did deep into why they’ve enlisted, it’s never just “I joined the military because I’m dirt poor.” If you dig deep enough, there’s always “I want a sense of adventure,” “I want to prove myself as a man,” “I found school too boring and wanted something more exciting,” and other bullshit. I also knew people who enlisted to get US citizenship, which I think is at least more sympathetic than just repeatedly harping about people joining for purely economic reasons.

Like think about it too, somehow we can propagandize a good portion of the nation to believe in capitalist class dynamics, the duopoly and a lot of the other idiotic hog shit but tricking people to fight bad guy is something you have to somehow be above. But I mean why not? I, rich white kid with options knew better, why can’t the rest of society?

One thing people seem to always ignore is that you have a choice of what branch you want to enlist in. Even if we buy them being completely brainwashed and don’t understand the military’s direct role in furthering US imperialism, then my question is “why did you enlist in the Marines or the Air Force instead of the Navy or the Coast Guard?” Even by the standards of being brainwashed by US propaganda, surely they would understand that you shoot people in the Army and Marines and bomb people in the Air Force. Meanwhile, you’re just stuck on a boat in the Navy and don’t even leave the country in the Coast Guard (not true, but we’re going off by US propaganda). It’s common US pop culture knowledge that the Marines are the toughest branch, so someone’s who doing the bare minimum in order to get their GI Bill wouldn’t even think of enlisting in the Marines. People join the Marines because they want to “be a man” and “fuck shit up” (ie commit war crimes). Otherwise, they would simply join the Navy or the Coast Guard or the Army or even the Air Force.