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Comment by _8j50 | Hacker News Reader

Unpopular opinion: there should either be mandatory military service (or physically intensive alternatives for conscientous objectors) or a life long military tax for people who don't volunteer to join the military before 25. Not just the issues you described but a lot of social issues rooted in americans not being able to relate with each other or understand each other will be solved.

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How about making people care about their fellow citizen and believing in the future of their society instead of scheming to fool people into the military?

What sane person would join the military after all these pointless, lost, immoral, BS wars?

Adress the root problem instead. And it is not the youth being lazy.

>What sane person would join the military after all these pointless, lost, immoral, BS wars?

It's a bit of conundrum. Do you assume the rest of the world is moral, altruistic and peaceful? The entirety of human history is war, strong neighbours conquering the weaker. Sometimes that works out for the losers, but most often it doesn't.

So you hope for the best and plan for the worst (building a strong military). What other option is there?

What is the conundrum? If you don't support the elite and you feel they don't support you, don't take the low reward high risk task of fighting their wars?

I don't see where the theoreticcal need for protecting society by military force enters the picture. Especially since the last wars have been nothing about defending yourself. The next one will be righteus and unavoidable?

I am not arguing against having a community that people would be willing to defend. I argue that if the elite is bad enough you make things worse by fighting for them.

> there should either be mandatory military service (or physically intensive alternatives for conscientous objectors) or a life long military tax for people who don't volunteer to join the military before 25

Served in a country with conscription. It is deeply unpopular here, at least amongst the men. Only men need serve which holds them back as women start university and their careers two years earlier. The pay sucks, and there are many less well-off men who have to moonlight, at risk of being court-martialled and set to military prison. The commitment doesn't end there: men can and will be called back annually for ten years after leaving full-time conscription for two to three weeks of reservist training, which disrupts their civilian work. There are negligible benefits for reservists, and conscripts don't get the respect that American veterans and servicemen seem to.

Conscript armies work very differently to volunteer armies; you should be wary of what you're asking for.

The respect that American veterans and servicemen receive is insanely shallow, in both public and institutional support.

Having met a lot of people who have been in the military (including my dad and grandpa and a few other people in my extended family) I don't think military people were any better at relating to or understanding people. For me that's been people I know who are teachers but that's likely because of the sort of people that go into that profession.

I don't like his phrasing, but what I think he was referring to was how overcoming some sort of substantial adversity together often creates a strong bond among people, even from entirely different ideologies/backgrounds/etc. When everybody has to go through this it would create a common shared bond. Those in your family who were in the military might not be particularly able to relate to you, but are probably quite capable of relating to themselves or other vets. I am vehemently against hegemony, and how politicians use the military in modern times, but I'd also actually support compulsory military service.

Not only do I think the bonds and training would be exceptionally beneficial for society, but it might even help us get back on the right track in terms of this hegemony nonsense. So many people seem somewhere between apathetic and thrilled about endlessly escalating military conflicts around the globe, probably because they never envision themselves being affected by it. Same reason our old enfeebled politicians act like much bigger hard asses than it's like that even warrior kings of times past did. Because it's not like they'll suffer for these wars - the only "hard decision" they have to make is to send people that they couldn't care less about, off to kill and die. War's a lot different when you're not just 'spending' other peoples' lives.

This is an issue journalists have raised in the past. With military populations becoming smaller and more isolated over time they are slowly becoming population bubbles outside their local communities. Military populations tend to be a tiny bit more intelligent, better educated, and higher wage earners than the average non-military population in localized areas and amongst the average population of the country as a whole. If the military is selective about who joins and those people do not interface with communities outside the military they are forming isolated more elite populations. So far the difference is statistically negligible both in terms of performance differences and degree of isolation that the subject remains limited to magazine articles.

I think some kind of mandatory service to one's community could be worth discussing. I don't agree with a lifelong penalty for a onetime choice.

Criminals pay a lifelong penalty for a onetime choice.

I disagree with this, too. Once a debt is paid, that should be it.

I've seen this sort of thing mentioned but I wonder, where does it leave people like me who had a childhood disability (Perthes disease - look it up, it's a disqualifying condition in the military's medical standards)? I get to be disabled for life and have to pay a tax for it?

In Switzerland this system exists right now, it's an extra 3 percent income tax for 11 years. Some people with disabilities are exempt from the tax, but it is common to be deemed unfit for military service due to a disability, and have to pay the tax. It doesn't seem fair to me, but it seems the Swiss voters accept it.

Yes, disability is quite a spectrum. My issue is quite easily imaged via x-ray and is written down in black and white on the standards. I can imagine that mental health and potentially soft-tissue issues could be a bit harder to pin down.

I don’t know the exact law, but my understanding is most people who can work, don’t get the exemption, no matter how clear-cut the disability.

Correct. Good friend of mine couldn't do service due to a physical disability and paid it. He wasn't unhappy with it. His reasoning is that defending the country is a good thing and if you cannot do it yourself - for whatever reason - it's okay if you instead help by paying.

That’s quite a magnanimous attitude. As an American with some disability, I feel the need to save all the money I can while I am able to work in order to meet my inevitable healthcare needs where the social safety net is very thin. Perhaps Switzerland is different? Also, I do not feel like most of our military spending has served to make us safer in quite a while. Perhaps it that effort was focused more locally, it would be easier to accept.

I have a few friends who deeply regret their time in the military as it’s let to lifelong physical and mental health issues. I don’t think forcing people to potentially endure that is a good idea.

(One was on a nuclear sub, not sure the others)

If people who volunteered have mental issues, is that fine? The military isn't optional, everyone must do something to support it or find a country with a military they would prefer to join. But people who have a hard time coping in the military should get free help.

I think Americans are already paying for life long military tax. Maybe people who serve don't have to pay for defense portion of tax.

Yeah the idea is to have them pay more with that dedicated tax and pay less elsewhere.

What's the advantage of doing this instead of just taxing everyone and paying a salary to soldiers?

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