Mandatory public service for young Americans

[MillCreek]

https://www.npr.org/2019/01/23/687715869/should-young-americans-be-required-to-do-public-service-federal-panel-says-maybe?utm_source=facebook.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=npr&utm_term=nprnews&utm_content=20190123&fbclid=IwAR0-ZapJmZtznwj-MtHLIZS7pGj_UuCmzdMVPD67ZVYjpwH3qfnvlEVKy0I

This commission is also looking at many other things, such as requiring women to register for the draft, etc.  I have often thought we need the 21st century equivalent of the Civilian Conservation Corps, to start working on the billions of dollars of backlogged upkeep and new construction in our National Parks and other wilderness lands.

[MikeB]

I have always thought we should have mandatory service. You get to pick between military, healthcare, national parks, maybe some infrastructure building, stuff like that. Everyone serves. Make it somewhat flexible so people can attend college, or pursue trades. Some of that could be done at the same time. We would still need professional volunteer military, this could lead to that for those so inclined so no draft, outside a WW2 situation people completing their service don’t get sent overseas.

I actually think it would help people to have more pride in the country and help teach life skills.

Most important though. If you don’t participate and complete your service you don’t get to vote.

[Perd Hapley]

Like every good American, I also favor mandatory left-wing indoctrination camps.

[Ron]

Like every good American, I also favor mandatory left-wing indoctrination camps.

Yea, what we imagine and what we would get probably would be two different things.

[Brad Johnson]

Make it retail, hospitality, customer service, or internship in a service/trade and I might just be on board.

Brad

[AJ Dual]

 

Much right of center. Very wow. So limited government.

[RoadKingLarry]

I have always thought we should have mandatory service. You get to pick between military, healthcare, national parks, maybe some infrastructure building, stuff like that. Everyone serves. Make it somewhat flexible so people can attend college, or pursue trades. Some of that could be done at the same time. We would still need professional volunteer military, this could lead to that for those so inclined so no draft, outside a WW2 situation people completing their service don’t get sent overseas.

I actually think it would help people to have more pride in the country and help teach life skills.

Most important though. If you don’t participate and complete your service you don’t get to vote.

Service Guarantees Citizenship!

[MillCreek]

Service Guarantees Citizenship!

Would You Like To Know More?

[MillCreek]

I once worked with a physician who went to medical school in West Germany and subsequently came over here. He said that West Germany (at least at the time) had mandatory national service for young people, and if you did not want to join the military, you did 'a social year' doing scut work in a hospital, nursing home or some other human services work.  He was in favor of it.

[brimic]

Hell.No.
Mandatory servitude is a happy-feely way of saying slavery.

[Firethorn]

Hell.No.
Mandatory servitude is a happy-feely way of saying slavery.

Indeed.  I much prefer them just ponying up the money to do things properly, if they're going to do them.  Rather than drafting people.

That said, I also support the government being some sort of employer of last resort.  It shouldn't pay much, but be kind of like enlisting in the Army as an E-1 Open.  They decide where you're going to work, what you will be working on, provide training if necessary, and provide food, shelter, and clothing while paying you a minimal stipend.

Hell, give them something like 1/2 of the GI bill.  4 years gives two years of some equivalent of GI bill benefits.

Just have it be all volunteer.

[Boomhauer]

Absolutely positively not

[MechAg94]

Indeed.  I much prefer them just ponying up the money to do things properly, if they're going to do them.  Rather than drafting people.

That said, I also support the government being some sort of employer of last resort.  It shouldn't pay much, but be kind of like enlisting in the Army as an E-1 Open.  They decide where you're going to work, what you will be working on, provide training if necessary, and provide food, shelter, and clothing while paying you a minimal stipend.

Hell, give them something like 1/2 of the GI bill.  4 years gives two years of some equivalent of GI bill benefits.

Just have it be all volunteer.

It will just become a new form of welfare and some judge will tell them they can't force them to work and they have to pay for sex changes and drug/needles. 

As said above, what you imagine and what will actually happen are two different things.  The worst version of your idea you can imagine probably gets you half way there. 

[230RN]

Hell.No.
Mandatory servitude is a happy-feely way of saying slavery.

I was going to say "Lotsa luck getting anything mandatory nowadays."

So you beat me to it.

Oh, won't the law indu$try have a field day ha$hing thi$ one out?

[Pb]

I do favor the USA setting up mandatory militia training and service for young men like the Swiss do it- but only if they can take their weapon home like the Swiss.  It would do a lot to make the Second Amendment a more effective deterrent on tyranny, as it was originally designed to do.  I admire the Swiss system.  It helps keep the gov accountable.

Mandatory militia service was pretty standard in the colonial period and early USA.

I do absolutely oppose mandatory "social service" rubbish.  More slave-like left wing indoctrination.

Women in the draft?  Get the women out of all combat position in the military instead.

[Jamisjockey]

Like every good American, I also favor mandatory left-wing indoctrination camps.

Thread win, full stop.

"mandatory" anything is unamerican.  Period.

Could you require service to receive certain perks? Sure.  Free college? Access to the GI Bill via conservation corps, etc? 

But mandatory?  *expletive deleted*ck no.

[brimic]

The idea that universal militia training would prevent tyranny is the exact reason why the idea will be quashed at every opportunity.

The local HS which my son attends requires 100 hrs of volunteer service in order to graduate.
I’m very much opposed to this nonsense as well, it really degrades the meaning of volunteering when you are required to do it.

[Jamisjockey]

Get the women out of all combat position in the military instead.

 



https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/8408236/Female-medic-awarded-Military-Cross-for-bravery.html

Women have been defacto in combat positions for over 30 years. And the invasion into Iraq was telling of such.  Convoy drivers. Pilots.  Many other positions that aren't combat, but being placed into harms way and having to act.

You think women can't perform in a combat role?
They already have.
My Marine Sister Lt. Turpin is a prime example
https://www.mcbhawaii.marines.mil/News/News-Article-Display/Article/539638/54-hours-of-valor-female-marine-awarded-combat-v/

[Ben]

Perhaps not mandatory, but maybe there is a viable way to incentivize a voluntary year of service at ~18. A college stipend or $5000 put into an IRA or something.

Only because I have found that people I interacted with in my working years who have done "dirty jobs" (in the Mike Rowe sense) have generally been better grounded and seemed to have more common sense than those who went from High School to college to a cubicle in a govt office.

If nothing else, working as a roustabout in the oil patch instead of going to college right out of High School taught me that I didn't want to do hard labor all my life and made me appreciate the job I got after paying my way through college. Many times when I was having a bad day at work I thought to myself, "You could be carrying bags of sandblasting sand up three floors of ladders on an offshore rig." And I also happened to learn a lot of manly tool skills during that time that came in handy later in life. "Specialization is for insects."

Edit: Jamis hit on the incentivizing while I was typing.

[Pb]

Deleted.

[AZRedhawk44]

Eff this. 

This is using coercion to create a class of "super citizens" who get special benefits versus those that may choose not to do the service.  Or those that have religious/philosophical objections to the forms of service the government wants versus alternatives in the private charitable sector or just plain old private sector.

And on top of that, it's using stolen tax revenues to accomplish the goal.

I already loathe every cent the government takes from me via sales/income/property taxes (I can accept more market-oriented approaches to usage fees for certain government services, i.e. airport taxes on plane tickets and similar).  I'll loathe it to a higher degree if my stolen money is used to indoctrinate and create more AOC's via additional year(s) of commie/statist exposure on top of everything received from public schools.

[Ben]

I should add something regarding "Conservation Corps".

California has the California Conservation Corps. I may be prejudiced, or may simply not have enough data points, but whenever I see a van load of these kids, it reminds me more of a Juvie road crew doing their community service in lieu of jail time than it does bright young kids doing good works on their way to a bright future.

[Pb]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/8408236/Female-medic-awarded-Military-Cross-for-bravery.html

Women have been defacto in combat positions for over 30 years. And the invasion into Iraq was telling of such.  Convoy drivers. Pilots.  Many other positions that aren't combat, but being placed into harms way and having to act.

You think women can't perform in a combat role?
They already have.
My Marine Sister Lt. Turpin is a prime example
https://www.mcbhawaii.marines.mil/News/News-Article-Display/Article/539638/54-hours-of-valor-female-marine-awarded-combat-v/

Women on average make worse soldiers than men.  The perform worse on military tasks.  They are injured more frequently.  This is based on women average lack of strength and greater body frailty to injury.  That is an empirical fact that can be determined by testing.  And it has been:

https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2015/09/10/mixed-gender-teams-come-up-short-in-marines-infantry-experiment/

Like you said, some women are brave and perform well.  But on average, women do much worse, and adding them to units makes the whole unit perform worse.  That is an actual fact, not anecdotes based on exceptional individuals.

[Jamisjockey]

Keeping standards for such roles high is the obvious answer.  Anyone that can perform at the required level should be allowed to do the job.

[MechAg94]

Women on average make worse soldiers than men.  The perform worse on military tasks.  They are injured more frequently.  This is based on women average lack of strength and greater body frailty to injury.  That is an empirical fact that can be determined by testing.  And it has been:

https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/your-marine-corps/2015/09/10/mixed-gender-teams-come-up-short-in-marines-infantry-experiment/

Like you said, some women are brave and perform well.  But on average, women do much worse, and adding them to units makes the whole unit perform worse.  That is an actual fact, not anecdotes based on exceptional individuals.

So as long as standards are kept high, there will always be few women in combat so it all works itself out.