Two Kinds of People...

There are those who always think in terms of what everyone should do, and how to force them.  They think this is the best way of things for everyone, because they know best.

And there are those who do not think in those terms.

I saw something which quoted Jon Stewart asserting that everyone of draft-able age should serve a year of military or community service or whatever kind of government thing.

Jon was not subjected to the draft.  He never had the government threatening to conscript him to fight a war which may have been conducted under false pretense.  Certainly most of America seemed confused about the situation.   The hawks were still thinking in terms of the clear cut goals which marked WWII.  So it was knee jerk patriotism to support the Vietnam war and draft.

The protestor side was blaming us for being awful people etc., as if we were the ones violating every war crime taboo in the book.  As a matter of course.  I am sure we did at times.  I probably would have either melted into a puddle or violated all those things in some manic state of hysteria.  Properly directed though, that kind of thing can win the day.

But, I was never there.  Just threatened, blackmailed, baffled and horrified by the draft.  I was horrified because I was under the belief that our country was much freer and less oppressive than others. Yet they could force me to meet their plans and goals, not mine.  And their goals are a bit gray in most skirmishes since WWII.

 I had been to Latin America as a kid and they had a different feel.  Bureaucratic abuse.  Lines.  Unnecessary delays, seemingly just to affirm to the citizen that he/she is a subject under power of the state.

Back then, that seemed a contrast.  Not so much anymore.  So, really, all you need do is hang around long enough in many parts of the USA, and old fashioned third world problems will come to you.  It is like a free vacation!   TB!  Lines!  Total absence of reason within public agencies.  Something for everyone.

It always gets me when someone makes these pronouncements upon groups of which they do not belong.  And in some cases, even if they do belong, by what right do they suggest all their fellow whatevers "serve" as they see fit?  Is it OK because everyone is or was young?  OK because that is the most powerless, but most physically fit age group.

When only men were drafted, I believed it was the result of a long history in which middle aged men found ways to get rid of young men so they could chase the younger women.  Now, I don't know.  I was probably right, but the stupid plan has now backfired big time.