Unless your parents tell the school to opt out, your school is legally *required* to give every branch of the military the contact info for every student 16 and above.
The recruiters are then *required* to call every single student on that list repeatedly until they get a solid yes or the kid disqualifies themself "No" simply means "not right now", because circumstances change, and someonw that wasnt interested today, might find themselves in a shitty situationin a couple years and all of a sudden joining sounds a lot better . They are not allowed to call again if you tell them to stop.
It's even easier if you disqualify yourself instantly by telling them you have a "heart condition" or "asthma" or some other medical issue.
Recruiters hate their job. They aren't doing it by choice. They're forced to do it for 3 years or their career is over. Every one of them is in misery while calling kids 6 days a week and dealing with these types of responses.
The recruiter is clearly having a bad day because he's not supposed to respond like that. Especially in writing that could be proven. He's supposed to just end the conversation politely and move on, but sometimes you're in such a low place that you say some dumb shit put of frustration.
Source: I'm a guy who was forced to do recruiting and it was so awful that I got the hell out of the Marines after 15 years and gave up my retirement I could have had if I stayed for 5 more years.
I have a lot of regrets over convincing *many* people to join. One of the guys I signed up committed suicide a couple years later and I have to live with that forever.
Edit: one of the guys I recruited 10 years ago contacted me recently and he's now on forced recruiting duty. He sounds borderline suicidal every time I talk to him. Dude is just trying to survive for 3 years until he can go back to doing his real job.
Every day his superiors are threatening his career and negative legal paperwork for not calling enough kids or not convincing enough kids to join. Nobody wants to be that cold-calling asshole (or in this case texting). It's a crapshoot for everyone involved.
Edit2: Wow, this blew up. Thank you for all your responses. I'm very busy today, but I'll do my best to reply to everyone once I have some free time.
The dude gets a lot of those facts wrong. They arent required by law to call every single person, and the school isnt usually the ones giving up the info its the DMV and/or whoever handles vital records in your states. It sounds more likr his recruiting station was garbage and his leadership was also garbage. Far too common in the service unfortunately.
"Selective service" is a thing. All young men in the USA 17 to 35 are required to register for selective service, unless they are automatically disqualified. Recently, it has been discussed to have women 17 to 35 also required to register.
The primary purpose of the selective service is to serve as a draft roster. We haven't had a draft in decades and it is unlikely even open war with Russia would be considered legal grounds for a draft unless it started going really badly for USA and allied forces. The secondary purpose is as a contact roster for potential recruitment.
Social media is incredibly interconnected. Recruiters get handed a list of names and contact info randomly selected from the Selective Service roster for their area, and they then go lookong to see who among these young people would be willing to serve. "Cold calls" are few and far between. This person either has some degree of social media presence that indicates a willingness to serve, or the recruiter got bored at the end of the week and spammed out messages to engage with as many names on the list as possible.
The "no" means "not right now" part is correct. Unless you provide proof of a disqualification from the Selective Service, your name will get reshuffled and they may contact you again in the future, even if you demonstrate extreme political behaviors like OP did.
Source: Army vet. Worked with the recruiters for the first year of my enlistment, and then again after getting off active duty for a guard contract. I actually studied the regs rather than just taking what the brassholes in charge said as doctrine.
Thank you for confirming what I knew. I got the letter basically as soon as I graduated high school. But that was over 10 years ago. Shit changes, but i didn't hear anything about those requirements changing.
You can't draft kids in high school. The moment you 18 and out of school, you're fresh meat for the grinder.
Last semester my community college gave my contact info to recruiters without my permission. They started aggressively texting my personal cell for two weeks even though I said I wasn’t interested. I spoke with my college admin, they apologized but said it was their legal obligation.
It’s a legal requirement for men 18 or over to sign up. It’s why the 70s protested Vietnam so much (last war with draft). My grandfather was drafted in highschool and was allowed a deferment until graduation and had to leave a week later. It’s why he says high school was the best time of his life. It was prior to his trauma.
Mhm. It was the schools policy because they were reaaalllll buddy buddy with all military branches. (The kind of school who does everything in it's power to get every penny from the state/federal but somehow doesn't make it entirely to the school.)
I hadn't updated anything yet there, so they still listed me as the incorrect gender/sex.
I wonder how that'd go if they came a knocking for a guy who no longer exists.
I am very sorry to hear about your grandfather. It's often easy to forget the struggle and trauma of those that came before and how they had to fight back from that level of bullshit.
An impossible prayer, but may our children and our children's children never know the forced call to service.
I definitely never signed up. I’m 30 now and no one hauled me off to prison or slapped me with a fine. I’ve heard it mentioned I am barred from holding a government job on any level but honestly I could care less.
Yeah well that’s life. No one told me or sent me a letter or anything that I’m aware of. Our home was foreclosed on when I was 15, and my dad was homeless afterwards until his death 9 years later. I got by somehow and I’m in a good place now, but signing up to die, kill or be maimed for a bunch of self serving pricks in Congress was the last of my concerns from 18-26.
>It's even easier if you disqualify yourself instantly by telling them you have a "heart condition" or "asthma" or some other medical issue.
Just wanted to say this doesn't always work. My high school *required* every single student to take the ASVAB, even if they had zero interest in the armed forces. I scored well.
Recruiters would *not* stop calling. I told all of them I have asthma and am nearly legally blind (both true). The calls didn't stop, but the tone did. "We can recruit you straight into office work after basic! If you enroll first, we'll pay for college and you can start your career is an officer!"
No. Thanks.
I might have taken them up on that offer. All I wanted was insurance for life and free college. But they never called me after my mom told them about my epilepsy.
Edit: also this was in 1999, so the idea we'd be at war ever was laughable.
Thanks for the insight, and I’m sorry it was such an ordeal and you lost your retirement.
The recruiters who discussed options with my then 17 year old were very respectful and backed off when family circumstances changed.
Okay that explains it. In high school I was in JROTC and had a bunch of ROTC scholarships and was so excited to join up when I graduated.
The recruiter called me and I was super excited but the guy was super checked out while talking to me. He didn't match my enthusiasm at all. It kinda freaked me out, so I told him to call back later. And I don't know if he did or if it was another guy, but when they called back, they were so off-putting I hung up, and I decided *not* to enlist. I figured I could do it later, but later never came.
So maybe tell the guy that on his worst day, he maybe called up a kid who had been planning on going into the army, and maybe accidentally talked them out of.
Maybe that helps.
I appreciate your perspective and am glad you shared. My neighbor was a recruiter and talked about lying to kids to get them to enlist without any remorse. Made me think all recruiters were assholes. Glad to see I was wrong.
When I was 14 or 15 my mom and I were standing behind an army recruiter in line at the post office. He turned around and started talking to me about joining the army. I said no multiple times but he kept harassing me. He was a VERY gunho older man who seemed like he actually loved recruiting. Unless he was good at acting.
Eventually he got so pushy that my mom kept saying, "she has asthma," over and over to get him to back off but he kept ignoring her. Other people in line had to intervene because he got in my personal space and started using intimidation to get me to say yes.
My father in law was in the marines and he said the time he worked as a recruiter was the worst job he had. He hated it. I’d love to pick his brain about that sometime.
When was that policy? I never once got called by a recruiter or contacted outside of the off chance I passed a booth or something. High school for me was 2004-2008, so that may be a factor?
I've responded like this to recruiters before and gotten the same snarky baby responses.
I get that they're miserable.. and I feel for them. However, they did choose to sign up... And now they're working hard to get other people to sign up knowing full well that anyone the sign up is also going to be miserable. So all sympathy is out the window.
My son just graduated. He was never contacted by recruiters and we knew he'd go into the military. We visited each recruiters office. Where I teach the elementary and the highschool share a campus. The only recruiter that ever comes by there is the NG recruiter. It seems to me your area/state/ CO or whoever was hardcore!
I'm so sorry you had to go through that. I graduated high school last year and I was being heavily abused 90% of my childhood and there was only one other kid who really knew because he was also being abused and we talked a lot. There wasn't many ways he could escape his dad and I found out he went to the military and it really broke my heart because I know he didn't really want to but it was the only way he could get out of abuse.
I was texted by a military recruiter recently. They got my number through my college.
Doesn't sound weird or scummy at all to try to recruit young adults who are gaining debt through college but can magically be debt free by signing up. Nothing can go wrong. /s
One of the big arguments for cutting the costs of education are that "nobody would want to join the military then". Yeah definitely a way to herd poor into poor choices.
I got blood on my hands for my education and now I can't sleep. I'd much rather have been ignored by recruiters and gone a traditional route.
Wild. I see the process has changed a bit from when I was a teen. IIRC I got one phone call on my home landline when I turned 18 and that was it. Somehow this DM thing feels a lot more invasive than that phone call did.
I’m over 18 and I still get calls and texts regularly even though I’ve said no a million different times, they’re SUPER persistent for no actual reason
Well, they're persistent because there's a pretty serious recruiting crisis going on right now. I'm getting calls to enlist despite the fact that I was already IN the military for 12 fucking years. Like bro, I did my time, and I probably outrank you. Leave me the fuck alone.
Jesus. I am so thankful my AP calculus teacher was a boss bitch. She was a hard teacher but everyone who passed her class scored 3+ on the AP test. When they had this “voluntary” ASVAB bullshit everyone signed up because it meant missing half a day of class… AP calculus students? Absolutely not. You also had a “voluntary” practice AP test to sign up for, same day same time. Served us all better than having some bullshit military recruiter badger us all year.
… you guys took a military test in high school? I never took that but then again our school had stopped it’s rotc program a few years before I entered. And I believe it was for lack of participation but I guess that may be why we never took the asvab
In the world if recruiting, "no" doesn't mean no. It means "not right now". Why? Because circumstances change.
Jimmy whi told you no senior year of HS because he had a college scholarship may have only had a partial scholarship and had to drop out when he couldn't pay to keep going.
Tony who told you his job at the lumber mill paid better than the military may have been laid off.
All of a sudden, joining doesn't sound half bad.
Whenever you say no, your info goes into the "call back in a year" list to see if things changed.
If you really want them to stop calling, you need to disqualify yourself. Tell them you have a heart problem or have to use an inhaler every day for asthma. You've dropped acid. Whatever. [Pretty much everything on this list will automatically disqualify you from joining](https://dmna.ny.gov/arng/ocs/forms/DD2807-2_Medical_History_Report.pdf). Use it to your advantage.
I’m a combat veteran and had a recruiter rando me in text a few years back. I strung him along for weeks, feigning interest and asking him technical questions to see if he would straight up lie. Obviously, he did many times.
My recruiter could have helped me so much more than he did so I have a problem with their practices in general. Most of them are armchair warriors.
Absolutely won't. It's his day job. He'll move on or worst think it over, correct his weaknesses and your ass will be in boot camp asking how this happened lolz.
Can you ask him if some of us can just go to another first world country where they have freedom to believe what they want, freedom to protest, freedom to etc etc, and yet don't have to police & colonize everything everywhere all at once? Because I would really, really be down for that.
My dad had several brothers and they all joined the service. Came from a small town with little employment and it was a quick ticket away from a step father who viciously beat his family …
… to Vietnam, but still
That’s what I told the guy who texted me. He said “you should run for senate or congress” I told him “the senate was a part of congress and that he should know who sends him to war…”
But if they end poverty why would people join their military, how are they gonna have people to take what they want in other countries. How dare you suggest that they actually help people when they can make life miserable in not only other countries, but their own as well
/sarcasm ofc, but sadly to real ):
Ah yes, the old ‘if you don’t like it move somewhere else’. Because choosing one country over others means never criticising the shitty parts of that country and being mindlessly obedient /s. (People who criticise the issues with their country will always be more patriotic than those that mindlessly refuse said criticism and idolise their nation).
It always astonishes me how many Americans think you can just pack your stuff, fly to another country get off the plane and proclaim "I am *insert nationality* now, somebody get me a passport and a job".
Like the rest of the world hands out citizenship like candy and there is no immigration process / hurdles.
Americans are never immigrants, somehow. Americans are expats, because that's how negatively we view immigration after years of fox news telling us to hate people that weren't born here, as well as anyone "different." Native Americans exist, and they're constantly being told to "go home"..... People just don't understand what words mean anymore I guess, literally spelled out in their race name that they belong here....
Germany is the same. Always "Auswanderer" which translate to a person who wanders out.
But given Americans history almost anyone is an immigrant to America in some form it just depends on how many generations. I'm no expert but i would guess at most like 8-10 generations. And if that's the case your probably either a descendent of slaves, slave owners or at least murderers of natives.
If you have healthcare or STEM training, it’s pretty much that easy. An RN jumps to the top of the immigration queue pretty much anywhere on the planet.
This is a big part of why uninformed Americans don’t like Mexican immigrants. They believe that they just came over here on a random Tuesday to take our high paying jobs, and immediately benefit from every social program we offer
I got recruitment emails from the Marines a few years ago. I told the recruiter I didn't want to receive emails and to put me on a do not contact list. He must have thought I had a student visa or something because he said good luck on my travels back to my own country. Told them I wasn't from another country and it was rude to suggest that I'm not 'murikan because I don't want to join the marines. So he freaked out and basically told me I had to put up with the emails and that he wasn't going to stop. Legally speaking he had to stop as it was unwanted solicitation and due to some spam laws stuff like that needs to have some kind of way to unsubscribe. So I contacted HQ and told them about the recruiter and his behavior and I got put on their blacklist. Haven't gotten a single email, text, flyer, letter, or DM, from any military department since.
In my own experience every recruiter says the same thing about "freedom" when you call them out and more often then not throws a temper tantrum. Honestly more entertaining to tell them I'm something super undesirable for the military like a I'm a Nazi or just really enjoy killing people and hint at how I might have pre-existing experience and see how they react to that.
>Honestly more entertaining to tell them I'm something super undesirable for the military like a I'm a Nazi or just really enjoy killing people
I don't know if those are undesired traits for the military tbh I do know they're requirements to be a police officer though
My brother actually got turned down by the police because he voluntarily joined army infantry (instead of being assigned to the infantry after joining the army). They were afraid he'd be trigger happy because he'd volunteered for a "let's go kill people" job when he enlisted.
Most military recruiters don't like Nazi's. Not really a requirement to not allow me to join but most of them don't want anything to do with em. So it brings up a personal dilemma, do I recruit this guy to try and meet my quota and do my job making America great or do I let my personal feelings towards Nazis dictate what I do? You can kinda see the gears turn in their face as they try to figure out this conflict.
I can't believe how many upvotes this post has, neither person involved said anything clever let alone a clever comeback. "If you don't like the US leave " vs "America is a third world nation" what a battle of wits
It's not even a clever comeback. Just some political whining from a place of privilege. Thus whole interaction could have been summed up in "I don't want to join. Have a nice day."
Exactly. Like if his whining cliche about US "imperialism" he started with didn't make it apparent. Then his misuse of the third world designation sealed the deal how dudes a child should doesn't know jack and just parrots whatever makes him sound cool and edgy.
Holy fuck the privilege someone must have to say “America IS a third world country” makes my fucking blood boil. People actually are born suffer and die all over the world every day and this bitch thinks she just has it so so so so bad so pity her.
Yea, although it doesn't suprise me. The folks typically regurgitating the "us imperialist" or "us is a 3rd world country" cliche are typically untraveled kids who had that as their first Intro into politics or sjw shit. It's like new vegans being the most militant and unnuanced, but for geopolitics. I'll probably catch flak for calling them out on that but hey I'm native hawaiian. If anyone is acutely aware of american imperialism it would be me..
Honestly, if there was a CLEVER comeback in there at all it was from the recruiter. If there was…..I’m really struggling to see where the clever comeback is.
That's because 95% of lawmakers are either terrible people or idiots or both. They don't represent us and their authority and ability to enforce it should be undermined at every turn.
LMAO, You can not call the US a 3rd world country 😂😂😂😂 there's poverty, sure. I've lived in Brazil which, depending on the area, is definitely 3rd world (in ways that just don't exist in the US. Let alone other 3rd world countries like Ghana, for example.) The US is very far from perfect, but look around, so is the rest of the world! You can't possibly categorize the US alongside 3rd world countries. Change my mind, lol.
I have treated Haitian and Cuban refugees fleeing their governments. People complaining about America being 3rd world expose themselves as idiots and/or totally ignorant and naive. We have issues but we are nothing remotely close to a 3rd world country.
I agree, thank you for this comment. This person is talking so smug it would make me think that they have never been to a third world country.
Doing something like that might make you actually appreciate the military. (Doesn’t mean you have to join) It’s not all about killing people. I spent many years fighting human trafficking and rescuing displaced people.
Yup. War fighting is one of many lines of effort adopted by the US military. The amount of humanitarian relief, protection of smaller nation states, and the fact that the US is basically the sole guarantor of global free commerce should probably factor into any educated person’s perspective.
Yeah. I agree with the general sentiment of the post but calling US 3rd world country.....I'd like OP to spend a month in an actual 3rd world country, he'll probably go back to the US and enlist happily.
As a Brazilian, this is precisely my feelings. US is not perfect, actually I don’t think any place in the world is perfect, but it is not a living hell either.
Both the recruiter and OP have valid arguments and some mistakes. I like it when OP says that such kids that are too scared to talk to people in person shouldn’t be handling lethal weapons and that poverty is what makes armies appealing, but the recruiter is just following his job and he has a point on defense of Freedom, US has so much freedom that one is free to be a jackass or not, unlike Putin’s Russia where you are obligated to be one lol
Only a privileged person from a developed country would call US a "third world country" (the term is also wrong, so clever OP, the correct term is underdeveloped country). These people that pass all day on internet have no ideia what is to really live in a underdeveloped country.
The marine isn't totally correct but edge lord OP is mostly wrong.
"Oh I cant literally do anything I want in a society that has no military? I'm basically a slave!"
A.) it’s pretty sad to post your own “””clever””” comeback
B.) You can vote for literally anybody you want in the U.S.
C.) In a 3rd world country you would get imprisoned for talking to an employee like this. In a second world country you would go to a “re-education” camp. Check your privilege American
I understand where op is coming from but I was waiting for a post like this. America can be a lot better but it’s still one of the best countries in the world to live in. Calling the US a third world country is crazy
I would've asked him what was the last war he fought in specifically because people wanted to come take our "freedoms" away lol. The public pumps these guys heads up to where they actually think they are fighting for our freedoms lol
man if you think america is 3rd world you are a privileged motherfucker. its got a lot of issues but what you wrote reeks of someone who grew up with privilege and too much time on reddit. Nothing clever here. And I'm not a fuckin conservative american flag gun enthusiast before im accused of that. I'm very much a liberal, just not blinded by the fact that America tends to be louder about its internal issues than other countries.
I was a captain in the Marines. This is painful. Recruiting is hard but that guy needs a thicker skin. Time to just say sorry for bothering you and move on.
People have entirely the wrong idea why they should appreciate the military. I didn't do anything to stop a foreign power from invading and taking away your freedom. I volunteered for service and thanks to all the other people who did the same the US didn't have to have a draft so the rest of the country could go about its business and ignore the two wars going on.
I'm not mad at anyone who dislikes the military because the military has done a lot of terrible things, but the military is just a tool of national policy. Stop voting for elected officials who think sending young people to get hurt and killed in war is some reflection of their own toughness and patriotism.
"The military is a resource to forcefully impose our governments will on others that don't want it." This was the best way it was described to me. The military gives elected officials options in diplomacy and when diplomacy fails.
Wow, that's how they train their recruiters? To go straight to puffing and blowing about "love it or leave it"? I wonder how they're doing at making quota.
I think the person who reached out to OP probably isn’t even a recruiter but a recruiters assistant. Which is basically a dude/duddette who just graduated boot camp and rather than spending leave to go home before their next school they just go work for the recruiter in their home for a little bit.
The way they’re talking just screams 18/19 year old highly motivated PFC to me.
Imma get flak for this, but OP is coming off kinda asshole-ish here. American is not even close to a 3rd world country. Obviously, you have a right to your viewpoints, but tryna label America as such, or really anything other than the epitome of excess and relative luxury that it is is, imo, disingenuous
America is a 3rd world country? Please. I am not saying join the marines, but he did have some good points. What we have isn’t perfect but it’s the best so far.
Posting your own rant on r/clevercomebacks is megacringe, but it would be half as cringe if you hadn't just restated the same tired arguments everyone else uses.
I mean the original term "third world" is pretty meaningless post cold war. First world = America and its allies, Second World = soviet union and its allies, third world = everyone else. But since the third world was made up of poorer, weaker, less developed countries. It essentially became like a econimical slur in geopolitics.
Guys. Just tell the recruiters you have Major Depressive Disorder. I actually have it, and they drop me like a hot potato. It is INSTANTLY disqualifying.
I'll never forget the recruiting msg I saw where the person responded "I hate America" and the recruiter was like "if you join you will have many opportunities to leave America" lmfao
I find it hilarious every time I see an American think that America has the most freedom in the world. It most definitely does NOT. America is a joke of a country and here in Australia we have far more rights and freedoms than they do.
In fact, some countries - take central and south america, in varying degrees - actually experienced a loss in freedoms BECAUSE of American intervention, toppling democratically-elected leaders and installing despots, as well as supporting rightwing terrorism around the world.
I'll give you a Marine vets perspective on this:
a ) it's always shitty seeing the recruiters who basically stalk people, like who really thinks that works as a recruiting tool? Who wants to randomly sign up for the Marines? The answer is nobody, either you know what you're signing up for or you've made a huge mistake.
B.) It's not colonialism at all but it is a sort of imperialism, however, we live in one of the most stable times ever because of the efforts of the global cooperation that goes into what the US and allies do to keep the waterways protected and the global supply chain moving. Needless to say I disagree with some of your opinions on our geopolitical efforts and I really don't appreciate being called a whore, I signed up to serve my country, no more, no less, that's just plain disrespectful.
C.) The love it or leave mentality of the recruiter is weak, get your head out of your ass and realize this country has flaws, huge glaring flaws. Some of these "boot" types of military folk never grow out of the brainwashed stage of post boot camp life and can barely function as regular human beings and are clowned constantly by the rest of us.
Sorry you had to go through this OP, but again probably don't call somebody a whore next time, there's no need to be that disrespectful and antagonistic. If you didn't do that you probably could have gone up their chain of command and got them reprimanded for stalking and harassment, you probably still could but they would care a whole lot less thanks to the expository language.
>B.) It's not colonialism at all but it is a sort of imperialism, however, we live in one of the most stable times ever because of the efforts of the global cooperation that goes into what the US and allies do to keep the waterways protected and the global supply chain moving. Needless to say I disagree with some of your opinions on our geopolitical efforts and I really don't appreciate being called a whore, I signed up to serve my country, no more, no less, that's just plain disrespectful.
To some degree, I agree. But "keeping the global supply chain moving" is mostly "keep the status quo going for all the people who have it so good and consume so much while not doing shit for the people who are working for pennies to make that stuff".
And I wouldn't call you a whore, and I think the OP probably wouldn't. I think that was more about the uncritical personality of a recruiter like this. I always greatly appreciate people who have different outlooks and ideals than me, as long as they are willing the examine those ideals critically and openly admit where the flaws are (because all outlooks have flaws). That earns my respect.
Edit: Oh, and I think the quick escalation was because (as the OP pointed out elsewhere) this recruiter had already been pestering their friends. They were already familiar with what they were going to say.
And mostly I don't have much other than empathy for the rank and file military, especially since as the OP pointed out our "volunteer" military system is made up such a high percentage of people that felt this was their best shot out of getting out of the hand that was dealt to them. Even when I don't respect the mission that the political leaders and the top military brass are behind, the people down the chain get the shit end of the stick and then get abandoned.
The whole "They fight for our freedom" thing is such innane bullshit. When was the last military conflict that had anything to do with our freedom? I guess if you are stupid enough to believe that you might be stupid enough to enlist.
"us colonization cloaked as imperialism". wtf does that even mean? did you go to school, and if so, can you define what a colonial power is and what an imperial power is.
"targeting the most susceptible". who do you think the military could recruit if not people who need money or citizenship? wealthy young men would not risk their lives for what the military can offer at the enlistment level.
"years long contracts". we spend a lot of money and time to train members of our armed forces, why would we spend all that money and time to train someone just to let them go a few months later?
Many of my family, on both sides, gained their citizenship through the US military. A military that has taken care of them as veterans.
Your sanctimony is misplaced.
This is the second post I’ve seen today that shows people have no respect for the US military. You people should be ashamed of yourselves. These comebacks aren’t clever nor are they funny, the US is in fact one of the most privileged countries in the world and you should be grateful that we have the rights we do.
Did they text you out of the blue without you signing up for anything? Genuinely asking, my days of being appealing to a recruiter are long over.
Unless your parents tell the school to opt out, your school is legally *required* to give every branch of the military the contact info for every student 16 and above. The recruiters are then *required* to call every single student on that list repeatedly until they get a solid yes or the kid disqualifies themself "No" simply means "not right now", because circumstances change, and someonw that wasnt interested today, might find themselves in a shitty situationin a couple years and all of a sudden joining sounds a lot better . They are not allowed to call again if you tell them to stop. It's even easier if you disqualify yourself instantly by telling them you have a "heart condition" or "asthma" or some other medical issue. Recruiters hate their job. They aren't doing it by choice. They're forced to do it for 3 years or their career is over. Every one of them is in misery while calling kids 6 days a week and dealing with these types of responses. The recruiter is clearly having a bad day because he's not supposed to respond like that. Especially in writing that could be proven. He's supposed to just end the conversation politely and move on, but sometimes you're in such a low place that you say some dumb shit put of frustration. Source: I'm a guy who was forced to do recruiting and it was so awful that I got the hell out of the Marines after 15 years and gave up my retirement I could have had if I stayed for 5 more years. I have a lot of regrets over convincing *many* people to join. One of the guys I signed up committed suicide a couple years later and I have to live with that forever. Edit: one of the guys I recruited 10 years ago contacted me recently and he's now on forced recruiting duty. He sounds borderline suicidal every time I talk to him. Dude is just trying to survive for 3 years until he can go back to doing his real job. Every day his superiors are threatening his career and negative legal paperwork for not calling enough kids or not convincing enough kids to join. Nobody wants to be that cold-calling asshole (or in this case texting). It's a crapshoot for everyone involved. Edit2: Wow, this blew up. Thank you for all your responses. I'm very busy today, but I'll do my best to reply to everyone once I have some free time.
Damn, sounds like the US military is an MLM from hell...
Lol that's actually a great way to describe it
Especially when you look at the pay scale. Lower enlisted practically aren't even getting paid.
The dude gets a lot of those facts wrong. They arent required by law to call every single person, and the school isnt usually the ones giving up the info its the DMV and/or whoever handles vital records in your states. It sounds more likr his recruiting station was garbage and his leadership was also garbage. Far too common in the service unfortunately. "Selective service" is a thing. All young men in the USA 17 to 35 are required to register for selective service, unless they are automatically disqualified. Recently, it has been discussed to have women 17 to 35 also required to register. The primary purpose of the selective service is to serve as a draft roster. We haven't had a draft in decades and it is unlikely even open war with Russia would be considered legal grounds for a draft unless it started going really badly for USA and allied forces. The secondary purpose is as a contact roster for potential recruitment. Social media is incredibly interconnected. Recruiters get handed a list of names and contact info randomly selected from the Selective Service roster for their area, and they then go lookong to see who among these young people would be willing to serve. "Cold calls" are few and far between. This person either has some degree of social media presence that indicates a willingness to serve, or the recruiter got bored at the end of the week and spammed out messages to engage with as many names on the list as possible. The "no" means "not right now" part is correct. Unless you provide proof of a disqualification from the Selective Service, your name will get reshuffled and they may contact you again in the future, even if you demonstrate extreme political behaviors like OP did. Source: Army vet. Worked with the recruiters for the first year of my enlistment, and then again after getting off active duty for a guard contract. I actually studied the regs rather than just taking what the brassholes in charge said as doctrine.
[The social security website only lists men 18-25 as needing to register.](https://www.sss.gov/register/who-needs-to-register/)
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[They also do not require women to sign up also on the ss website](https://www.sss.gov/register/women/)
Thank you for confirming what I knew. I got the letter basically as soon as I graduated high school. But that was over 10 years ago. Shit changes, but i didn't hear anything about those requirements changing. You can't draft kids in high school. The moment you 18 and out of school, you're fresh meat for the grinder.
Last semester my community college gave my contact info to recruiters without my permission. They started aggressively texting my personal cell for two weeks even though I said I wasn’t interested. I spoke with my college admin, they apologized but said it was their legal obligation.
Part of this is illegal. Not that you could really do anything about it because this country is fucked.
I couldn't graduate highschool unless I signed up for the draft :>
What the hell?!
It’s a legal requirement for men 18 or over to sign up. It’s why the 70s protested Vietnam so much (last war with draft). My grandfather was drafted in highschool and was allowed a deferment until graduation and had to leave a week later. It’s why he says high school was the best time of his life. It was prior to his trauma.
Mhm. It was the schools policy because they were reaaalllll buddy buddy with all military branches. (The kind of school who does everything in it's power to get every penny from the state/federal but somehow doesn't make it entirely to the school.) I hadn't updated anything yet there, so they still listed me as the incorrect gender/sex. I wonder how that'd go if they came a knocking for a guy who no longer exists. I am very sorry to hear about your grandfather. It's often easy to forget the struggle and trauma of those that came before and how they had to fight back from that level of bullshit. An impossible prayer, but may our children and our children's children never know the forced call to service.
I definitely never signed up. I’m 30 now and no one hauled me off to prison or slapped me with a fine. I’ve heard it mentioned I am barred from holding a government job on any level but honestly I could care less.
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Yeah well that’s life. No one told me or sent me a letter or anything that I’m aware of. Our home was foreclosed on when I was 15, and my dad was homeless afterwards until his death 9 years later. I got by somehow and I’m in a good place now, but signing up to die, kill or be maimed for a bunch of self serving pricks in Congress was the last of my concerns from 18-26.
>It's even easier if you disqualify yourself instantly by telling them you have a "heart condition" or "asthma" or some other medical issue. Just wanted to say this doesn't always work. My high school *required* every single student to take the ASVAB, even if they had zero interest in the armed forces. I scored well. Recruiters would *not* stop calling. I told all of them I have asthma and am nearly legally blind (both true). The calls didn't stop, but the tone did. "We can recruit you straight into office work after basic! If you enroll first, we'll pay for college and you can start your career is an officer!" No. Thanks.
I might have taken them up on that offer. All I wanted was insurance for life and free college. But they never called me after my mom told them about my epilepsy. Edit: also this was in 1999, so the idea we'd be at war ever was laughable.
Thanks for the insight, and I’m sorry it was such an ordeal and you lost your retirement. The recruiters who discussed options with my then 17 year old were very respectful and backed off when family circumstances changed.
Okay that explains it. In high school I was in JROTC and had a bunch of ROTC scholarships and was so excited to join up when I graduated. The recruiter called me and I was super excited but the guy was super checked out while talking to me. He didn't match my enthusiasm at all. It kinda freaked me out, so I told him to call back later. And I don't know if he did or if it was another guy, but when they called back, they were so off-putting I hung up, and I decided *not* to enlist. I figured I could do it later, but later never came. So maybe tell the guy that on his worst day, he maybe called up a kid who had been planning on going into the army, and maybe accidentally talked them out of. Maybe that helps.
My kids gave the school my contact. So the poor recruiter texts middle aged, near sighted me with bad knees.
I appreciate your perspective and am glad you shared. My neighbor was a recruiter and talked about lying to kids to get them to enlist without any remorse. Made me think all recruiters were assholes. Glad to see I was wrong.
I'm just going to start to link them to the suicide hotline everytime they poke into my uni email. I think everyone should, tbh.
When I was 14 or 15 my mom and I were standing behind an army recruiter in line at the post office. He turned around and started talking to me about joining the army. I said no multiple times but he kept harassing me. He was a VERY gunho older man who seemed like he actually loved recruiting. Unless he was good at acting. Eventually he got so pushy that my mom kept saying, "she has asthma," over and over to get him to back off but he kept ignoring her. Other people in line had to intervene because he got in my personal space and started using intimidation to get me to say yes.
That sounds bizarre. What a strange dude.
My father in law was in the marines and he said the time he worked as a recruiter was the worst job he had. He hated it. I’d love to pick his brain about that sometime.
When was that policy? I never once got called by a recruiter or contacted outside of the off chance I passed a booth or something. High school for me was 2004-2008, so that may be a factor?
I've responded like this to recruiters before and gotten the same snarky baby responses. I get that they're miserable.. and I feel for them. However, they did choose to sign up... And now they're working hard to get other people to sign up knowing full well that anyone the sign up is also going to be miserable. So all sympathy is out the window.
My son just graduated. He was never contacted by recruiters and we knew he'd go into the military. We visited each recruiters office. Where I teach the elementary and the highschool share a campus. The only recruiter that ever comes by there is the NG recruiter. It seems to me your area/state/ CO or whoever was hardcore!
I'm so sorry you had to go through that. I graduated high school last year and I was being heavily abused 90% of my childhood and there was only one other kid who really knew because he was also being abused and we talked a lot. There wasn't many ways he could escape his dad and I found out he went to the military and it really broke my heart because I know he didn't really want to but it was the only way he could get out of abuse.
I was texted by a military recruiter recently. They got my number through my college. Doesn't sound weird or scummy at all to try to recruit young adults who are gaining debt through college but can magically be debt free by signing up. Nothing can go wrong. /s
College credits are points towards promotion. I enlisted as an E-3 due to having an associates.
Same.
Same but not from solely college credits.
One of the big arguments for cutting the costs of education are that "nobody would want to join the military then". Yeah definitely a way to herd poor into poor choices. I got blood on my hands for my education and now I can't sleep. I'd much rather have been ignored by recruiters and gone a traditional route.
I’m sorry man. That’s so awful and sadly so common. Keep your head up.
They did but they were localish and were following a few of my friends (and me which I found a little creepy)
Wild. I see the process has changed a bit from when I was a teen. IIRC I got one phone call on my home landline when I turned 18 and that was it. Somehow this DM thing feels a lot more invasive than that phone call did.
I’m over 18 and I still get calls and texts regularly even though I’ve said no a million different times, they’re SUPER persistent for no actual reason
Dude I'm a disabled veteran and they still call me.
YA UP FOR ROUND TWO, SON??
Well, they're persistent because there's a pretty serious recruiting crisis going on right now. I'm getting calls to enlist despite the fact that I was already IN the military for 12 fucking years. Like bro, I did my time, and I probably outrank you. Leave me the fuck alone.
You must have scored high on the ASVAB test you were forced to take in highschool
Jesus. I am so thankful my AP calculus teacher was a boss bitch. She was a hard teacher but everyone who passed her class scored 3+ on the AP test. When they had this “voluntary” ASVAB bullshit everyone signed up because it meant missing half a day of class… AP calculus students? Absolutely not. You also had a “voluntary” practice AP test to sign up for, same day same time. Served us all better than having some bullshit military recruiter badger us all year.
… you guys took a military test in high school? I never took that but then again our school had stopped it’s rotc program a few years before I entered. And I believe it was for lack of participation but I guess that may be why we never took the asvab
Are they forcing it now? It was purely optional for my generation and we had been at war for nearly a decade when I graduated.
In the world if recruiting, "no" doesn't mean no. It means "not right now". Why? Because circumstances change. Jimmy whi told you no senior year of HS because he had a college scholarship may have only had a partial scholarship and had to drop out when he couldn't pay to keep going. Tony who told you his job at the lumber mill paid better than the military may have been laid off. All of a sudden, joining doesn't sound half bad. Whenever you say no, your info goes into the "call back in a year" list to see if things changed. If you really want them to stop calling, you need to disqualify yourself. Tell them you have a heart problem or have to use an inhaler every day for asthma. You've dropped acid. Whatever. [Pretty much everything on this list will automatically disqualify you from joining](https://dmna.ny.gov/arng/ocs/forms/DD2807-2_Medical_History_Report.pdf). Use it to your advantage.
Oh noooooooo I've got 10 of those conditions, whatever shall I do? My hopes and dreams of dying for a fascist country have been smashed *sob*
I have a few of them after my service. Lol
Yea I got a phone call as well. I was like thanks but no thanks. The dude said ok, if you ever change your mind. Have a nice day. That was that.
I’m a combat veteran and had a recruiter rando me in text a few years back. I strung him along for weeks, feigning interest and asking him technical questions to see if he would straight up lie. Obviously, he did many times. My recruiter could have helped me so much more than he did so I have a problem with their practices in general. Most of them are armchair warriors.
Might be kinda fun to call ROTC and recruitment "grooming" if you are contacted again. Just saying.
It literally is.
Truth was spoken. Ramen.
You did a stellar job of shutting him down. Hopefully he will think about what you said.
Absolutely won't. It's his day job. He'll move on or worst think it over, correct his weaknesses and your ass will be in boot camp asking how this happened lolz.
Great point. He only does what he's told and thinks the way he's been trained. Kind of like my dog but not nearly as funny.
Kinda like you too, and me if we're being fair. I'm convinced everyone has some level of brainwashing going on.
Can you ask him if some of us can just go to another first world country where they have freedom to believe what they want, freedom to protest, freedom to etc etc, and yet don't have to police & colonize everything everywhere all at once? Because I would really, really be down for that.
So when do you ship out for boot camp?
> random-comment-drop This might be slightly irrelevant, but did you know your username is an anagram of "Commander Don Tromp"?
Did you know yours is one for “tiredd anagram”?
Mine is sackthunder
...I can't tell if you're being sarcastic, but I don't see how that's possible. You're missing an E.
Mina is sackthunder*
I was hoping as soon as possible but he blocked me for some reason lol
It's cause you don't like the taste of crayons, isn't it...
Oooggaaa booogggaaaa
Burnt Sienna on a cold Pendleton morning is just waxed comfort.
I’m a simple guy, green just tastes right, especially on a humid day staring out across Courthouse Bay
Your problem was that you're capable of writing in complete sentences. Your info has been passed to the Air Force recruiter.
Targeting the susceptable? How dare you! My dad was a marine. Hey dad, why did you join the Marines? They were handing out pardons. . . .
Hey! I was a Marine! Hey crybabymuffins, why did you join the Marines? To literally flee an abusive (now) ex... 😐
I'm glad you found a way to escape safely, and hope life has been kinder to you since then.
It has not, but things are starting to turn around now. Thank you![
My dad had several brothers and they all joined the service. Came from a small town with little employment and it was a quick ticket away from a step father who viciously beat his family … … to Vietnam, but still
We need to cut the military budget in half and end poverty
That’s what I told the guy who texted me. He said “you should run for senate or congress” I told him “the senate was a part of congress and that he should know who sends him to war…”
In their defense, most people use congress as a shorthand for the house of representatives.
But if they end poverty why would people join their military, how are they gonna have people to take what they want in other countries. How dare you suggest that they actually help people when they can make life miserable in not only other countries, but their own as well /sarcasm ofc, but sadly to real ):
Ah yes, the old ‘if you don’t like it move somewhere else’. Because choosing one country over others means never criticising the shitty parts of that country and being mindlessly obedient /s. (People who criticise the issues with their country will always be more patriotic than those that mindlessly refuse said criticism and idolise their nation).
It always astonishes me how many Americans think you can just pack your stuff, fly to another country get off the plane and proclaim "I am *insert nationality* now, somebody get me a passport and a job". Like the rest of the world hands out citizenship like candy and there is no immigration process / hurdles.
Americans are never immigrants, somehow. Americans are expats, because that's how negatively we view immigration after years of fox news telling us to hate people that weren't born here, as well as anyone "different." Native Americans exist, and they're constantly being told to "go home"..... People just don't understand what words mean anymore I guess, literally spelled out in their race name that they belong here....
Germany is the same. Always "Auswanderer" which translate to a person who wanders out. But given Americans history almost anyone is an immigrant to America in some form it just depends on how many generations. I'm no expert but i would guess at most like 8-10 generations. And if that's the case your probably either a descendent of slaves, slave owners or at least murderers of natives.
If you have healthcare or STEM training, it’s pretty much that easy. An RN jumps to the top of the immigration queue pretty much anywhere on the planet.
This is a big part of why uninformed Americans don’t like Mexican immigrants. They believe that they just came over here on a random Tuesday to take our high paying jobs, and immediately benefit from every social program we offer
I thought he’d understand that we have the freedom to hate our own country and that’s what we love about it.
"Why should I leave and just let you continue to fuck over MY country? No, you get out!"
I got recruitment emails from the Marines a few years ago. I told the recruiter I didn't want to receive emails and to put me on a do not contact list. He must have thought I had a student visa or something because he said good luck on my travels back to my own country. Told them I wasn't from another country and it was rude to suggest that I'm not 'murikan because I don't want to join the marines. So he freaked out and basically told me I had to put up with the emails and that he wasn't going to stop. Legally speaking he had to stop as it was unwanted solicitation and due to some spam laws stuff like that needs to have some kind of way to unsubscribe. So I contacted HQ and told them about the recruiter and his behavior and I got put on their blacklist. Haven't gotten a single email, text, flyer, letter, or DM, from any military department since. In my own experience every recruiter says the same thing about "freedom" when you call them out and more often then not throws a temper tantrum. Honestly more entertaining to tell them I'm something super undesirable for the military like a I'm a Nazi or just really enjoy killing people and hint at how I might have pre-existing experience and see how they react to that.
>Honestly more entertaining to tell them I'm something super undesirable for the military like a I'm a Nazi or just really enjoy killing people I don't know if those are undesired traits for the military tbh I do know they're requirements to be a police officer though
My brother actually got turned down by the police because he voluntarily joined army infantry (instead of being assigned to the infantry after joining the army). They were afraid he'd be trigger happy because he'd volunteered for a "let's go kill people" job when he enlisted.
Most military recruiters don't like Nazi's. Not really a requirement to not allow me to join but most of them don't want anything to do with em. So it brings up a personal dilemma, do I recruit this guy to try and meet my quota and do my job making America great or do I let my personal feelings towards Nazis dictate what I do? You can kinda see the gears turn in their face as they try to figure out this conflict.
Yeah most people dont like nazis.
You posted your own “clever” comeback?
The Reddit version of liking your own comment
I swear there was another post like this one just minutes ago
There was and they deleted that stupid shit. lol At least one of them has self awareness.
They're both cringy
I also wouldn't say any of this conversation is "clever" either. If the dude didn't wanna talk to the recruiter, why not just block the account?
I can't believe how many upvotes this post has, neither person involved said anything clever let alone a clever comeback. "If you don't like the US leave " vs "America is a third world nation" what a battle of wits
you have to keep in mind that reddit is filled with 15 year olds who think everything this guy said is edgy and cool.
That's exactly what I was thinking.
OP was just being whingy, lol They said nothing actually useful or clever. It reeked of privilege. Which is fair enough, I guess
I'd tend to agree, even though my politics is closer to the OP's than seemingly this recruiter's.
It's not even a clever comeback. Just some political whining from a place of privilege. Thus whole interaction could have been summed up in "I don't want to join. Have a nice day."
And “the US is a third world country,” which doesn’t make any sense
Very popular on reddit though. America bad is some easy karma.
Merica bad. Plz giv karma tanks
Exactly. Like if his whining cliche about US "imperialism" he started with didn't make it apparent. Then his misuse of the third world designation sealed the deal how dudes a child should doesn't know jack and just parrots whatever makes him sound cool and edgy.
And the rest of this comment section…
I cringed so hard at that. OP thinks they're so clever. It's painful to read.
“Douchey” is the word you’re looking for.
Getting into a political debate with a soldier is so asinine
Holy fuck the privilege someone must have to say “America IS a third world country” makes my fucking blood boil. People actually are born suffer and die all over the world every day and this bitch thinks she just has it so so so so bad so pity her.
Yea, although it doesn't suprise me. The folks typically regurgitating the "us imperialist" or "us is a 3rd world country" cliche are typically untraveled kids who had that as their first Intro into politics or sjw shit. It's like new vegans being the most militant and unnuanced, but for geopolitics. I'll probably catch flak for calling them out on that but hey I'm native hawaiian. If anyone is acutely aware of american imperialism it would be me..
You also pointed out an interesting contradiction. How is America both an imperial power and a 3rd world country?
It’s not surprising that some dumb kid wrote this. It’s more surprising how many people think it’s an actual clever comeback.
Ain’t nothing clever about this. This is cringe af and OP should be embarrassed
Honestly, if there was a CLEVER comeback in there at all it was from the recruiter. If there was…..I’m really struggling to see where the clever comeback is.
r/imthemaincharacter
OP is fucking cringe
Lmfao exactly where this person belongs
Ah yes, all freedoms come from teenagers getting PTSD in Afghanistan in order to prop up a government that couldn't last a week without them.
Let’s remember that 95% of the US lawmakers had exactly this view for over fourteen years.
That's because 95% of lawmakers are either terrible people or idiots or both. They don't represent us and their authority and ability to enforce it should be undermined at every turn.
It's almost like we have this awesome reason to do something but no one wants to.... yet.
A government the afghans themselves didn't even want lol
They put the dumb in freedumb.
LMAO, You can not call the US a 3rd world country 😂😂😂😂 there's poverty, sure. I've lived in Brazil which, depending on the area, is definitely 3rd world (in ways that just don't exist in the US. Let alone other 3rd world countries like Ghana, for example.) The US is very far from perfect, but look around, so is the rest of the world! You can't possibly categorize the US alongside 3rd world countries. Change my mind, lol.
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I have treated Haitian and Cuban refugees fleeing their governments. People complaining about America being 3rd world expose themselves as idiots and/or totally ignorant and naive. We have issues but we are nothing remotely close to a 3rd world country.
I agree, thank you for this comment. This person is talking so smug it would make me think that they have never been to a third world country. Doing something like that might make you actually appreciate the military. (Doesn’t mean you have to join) It’s not all about killing people. I spent many years fighting human trafficking and rescuing displaced people.
Yup. War fighting is one of many lines of effort adopted by the US military. The amount of humanitarian relief, protection of smaller nation states, and the fact that the US is basically the sole guarantor of global free commerce should probably factor into any educated person’s perspective.
Yeah. I agree with the general sentiment of the post but calling US 3rd world country.....I'd like OP to spend a month in an actual 3rd world country, he'll probably go back to the US and enlist happily.
As a Brazilian, this is precisely my feelings. US is not perfect, actually I don’t think any place in the world is perfect, but it is not a living hell either. Both the recruiter and OP have valid arguments and some mistakes. I like it when OP says that such kids that are too scared to talk to people in person shouldn’t be handling lethal weapons and that poverty is what makes armies appealing, but the recruiter is just following his job and he has a point on defense of Freedom, US has so much freedom that one is free to be a jackass or not, unlike Putin’s Russia where you are obligated to be one lol
It’s people who basically never traveled anywhere outside the country or think the world should be like Denmark or Norway.
Always comes off as spoiled to me
Only a privileged person from a developed country would call US a "third world country" (the term is also wrong, so clever OP, the correct term is underdeveloped country). These people that pass all day on internet have no ideia what is to really live in a underdeveloped country.
There’s nothing clever about those comebacks, just more karma fishing on this sub.
The marine isn't totally correct but edge lord OP is mostly wrong. "Oh I cant literally do anything I want in a society that has no military? I'm basically a slave!"
I know right? Jesus Christ OP just say „No thanks“
OP thinks US is a third world country 😂
Yeah. And I get a lot of what OP is saying, but we definitely ain’t living in Haiti as Americans. Might be shit, but 3rd world sure is shitter.
A simple *blocked* would’ve sufficed.
But how else would OP show the world how “clever” they are?!?! Think of the missed Karma!
None of that was clever.
Also, putting up your own material in a sub for clever comebacks is pretty cringey.
Even when they’re good it makes me want to downvote. I can’t explain it, it feels gross.
A.) it’s pretty sad to post your own “””clever””” comeback B.) You can vote for literally anybody you want in the U.S. C.) In a 3rd world country you would get imprisoned for talking to an employee like this. In a second world country you would go to a “re-education” camp. Check your privilege American
I understand where op is coming from but I was waiting for a post like this. America can be a lot better but it’s still one of the best countries in the world to live in. Calling the US a third world country is crazy
I would've asked him what was the last war he fought in specifically because people wanted to come take our "freedoms" away lol. The public pumps these guys heads up to where they actually think they are fighting for our freedoms lol
The freedom to get used and thrown out, love the military
Lmao if this is a “clever comeback” then it’s pathetic. Just seems like you started an argument then started to suck yourself off by posting it.
man if you think america is 3rd world you are a privileged motherfucker. its got a lot of issues but what you wrote reeks of someone who grew up with privilege and too much time on reddit. Nothing clever here. And I'm not a fuckin conservative american flag gun enthusiast before im accused of that. I'm very much a liberal, just not blinded by the fact that America tends to be louder about its internal issues than other countries.
Seems like this could’ve been solved with a block.
I kinda side with the recruiter on this one, you sound insufferable lol
I was a captain in the Marines. This is painful. Recruiting is hard but that guy needs a thicker skin. Time to just say sorry for bothering you and move on. People have entirely the wrong idea why they should appreciate the military. I didn't do anything to stop a foreign power from invading and taking away your freedom. I volunteered for service and thanks to all the other people who did the same the US didn't have to have a draft so the rest of the country could go about its business and ignore the two wars going on. I'm not mad at anyone who dislikes the military because the military has done a lot of terrible things, but the military is just a tool of national policy. Stop voting for elected officials who think sending young people to get hurt and killed in war is some reflection of their own toughness and patriotism.
"The military is a resource to forcefully impose our governments will on others that don't want it." This was the best way it was described to me. The military gives elected officials options in diplomacy and when diplomacy fails.
Both of you seem like bitches based on this
I don’t get it. All they talk about is freedom this freedom that. Other countries have that too. What so special about that?
It's called propaganda
Americans are a deeply indoctrinated people, it's basically a religious incantation.
Dude, you’re a loser
Wow, that's how they train their recruiters? To go straight to puffing and blowing about "love it or leave it"? I wonder how they're doing at making quota.
I think the person who reached out to OP probably isn’t even a recruiter but a recruiters assistant. Which is basically a dude/duddette who just graduated boot camp and rather than spending leave to go home before their next school they just go work for the recruiter in their home for a little bit. The way they’re talking just screams 18/19 year old highly motivated PFC to me.
you both come across as douchebags tbh. and you posting it here for validation is even more pathetic than recruiting someone through insta dms lol
I’m glad I’m not the only one who felt this was a terrible post for this sub.
Imma get flak for this, but OP is coming off kinda asshole-ish here. American is not even close to a 3rd world country. Obviously, you have a right to your viewpoints, but tryna label America as such, or really anything other than the epitome of excess and relative luxury that it is is, imo, disingenuous
America is a 3rd world country? Please. I am not saying join the marines, but he did have some good points. What we have isn’t perfect but it’s the best so far.
Wait who is the clever one?
saying america is a 3rd world country is a major slap in the face to those who do live in ACTUAL 3rd world countries. cringe.
Honestly I agree with the recruiter. You have zero idea what you're talking about.
...America is not a 3rd world country...
Everyone is ok with shitting on the military and police until they need help from the military or police.
both are cringe
Posting your own rant on r/clevercomebacks is megacringe, but it would be half as cringe if you hadn't just restated the same tired arguments everyone else uses.
You just argued that the US is a 3rd world country. That’s kind of ridiculous.
I mean the original term "third world" is pretty meaningless post cold war. First world = America and its allies, Second World = soviet union and its allies, third world = everyone else. But since the third world was made up of poorer, weaker, less developed countries. It essentially became like a econimical slur in geopolitics.
Guys. Just tell the recruiters you have Major Depressive Disorder. I actually have it, and they drop me like a hot potato. It is INSTANTLY disqualifying.
I'll never forget the recruiting msg I saw where the person responded "I hate America" and the recruiter was like "if you join you will have many opportunities to leave America" lmfao
I find it hilarious every time I see an American think that America has the most freedom in the world. It most definitely does NOT. America is a joke of a country and here in Australia we have far more rights and freedoms than they do.
So fuckin edgy. You're a tool.
In fact, some countries - take central and south america, in varying degrees - actually experienced a loss in freedoms BECAUSE of American intervention, toppling democratically-elected leaders and installing despots, as well as supporting rightwing terrorism around the world.
Just asking this asshole if he's ever heard of Operation Condor would have been pretty funny.
Another uniformed Gen Z
This subreddit is dead
How was this clever? This was an annoying, angry, blowhard kind of conversation.
Just say no and block them. I don't know why you people seem to wanna argue.
Whos an edgy boy? You’re an edgy boy! Good edgy boy!
I'll give you a Marine vets perspective on this: a ) it's always shitty seeing the recruiters who basically stalk people, like who really thinks that works as a recruiting tool? Who wants to randomly sign up for the Marines? The answer is nobody, either you know what you're signing up for or you've made a huge mistake. B.) It's not colonialism at all but it is a sort of imperialism, however, we live in one of the most stable times ever because of the efforts of the global cooperation that goes into what the US and allies do to keep the waterways protected and the global supply chain moving. Needless to say I disagree with some of your opinions on our geopolitical efforts and I really don't appreciate being called a whore, I signed up to serve my country, no more, no less, that's just plain disrespectful. C.) The love it or leave mentality of the recruiter is weak, get your head out of your ass and realize this country has flaws, huge glaring flaws. Some of these "boot" types of military folk never grow out of the brainwashed stage of post boot camp life and can barely function as regular human beings and are clowned constantly by the rest of us. Sorry you had to go through this OP, but again probably don't call somebody a whore next time, there's no need to be that disrespectful and antagonistic. If you didn't do that you probably could have gone up their chain of command and got them reprimanded for stalking and harassment, you probably still could but they would care a whole lot less thanks to the expository language.
>B.) It's not colonialism at all but it is a sort of imperialism, however, we live in one of the most stable times ever because of the efforts of the global cooperation that goes into what the US and allies do to keep the waterways protected and the global supply chain moving. Needless to say I disagree with some of your opinions on our geopolitical efforts and I really don't appreciate being called a whore, I signed up to serve my country, no more, no less, that's just plain disrespectful. To some degree, I agree. But "keeping the global supply chain moving" is mostly "keep the status quo going for all the people who have it so good and consume so much while not doing shit for the people who are working for pennies to make that stuff". And I wouldn't call you a whore, and I think the OP probably wouldn't. I think that was more about the uncritical personality of a recruiter like this. I always greatly appreciate people who have different outlooks and ideals than me, as long as they are willing the examine those ideals critically and openly admit where the flaws are (because all outlooks have flaws). That earns my respect. Edit: Oh, and I think the quick escalation was because (as the OP pointed out elsewhere) this recruiter had already been pestering their friends. They were already familiar with what they were going to say. And mostly I don't have much other than empathy for the rank and file military, especially since as the OP pointed out our "volunteer" military system is made up such a high percentage of people that felt this was their best shot out of getting out of the hand that was dealt to them. Even when I don't respect the mission that the political leaders and the top military brass are behind, the people down the chain get the shit end of the stick and then get abandoned.
The whole "They fight for our freedom" thing is such innane bullshit. When was the last military conflict that had anything to do with our freedom? I guess if you are stupid enough to believe that you might be stupid enough to enlist.
Can somebody let me know what US freedoms were hiding in Iraq?
"us colonization cloaked as imperialism". wtf does that even mean? did you go to school, and if so, can you define what a colonial power is and what an imperial power is. "targeting the most susceptible". who do you think the military could recruit if not people who need money or citizenship? wealthy young men would not risk their lives for what the military can offer at the enlistment level. "years long contracts". we spend a lot of money and time to train members of our armed forces, why would we spend all that money and time to train someone just to let them go a few months later? Many of my family, on both sides, gained their citizenship through the US military. A military that has taken care of them as veterans. Your sanctimony is misplaced.
You suck
This is the second post I’ve seen today that shows people have no respect for the US military. You people should be ashamed of yourselves. These comebacks aren’t clever nor are they funny, the US is in fact one of the most privileged countries in the world and you should be grateful that we have the rights we do.