mellian said:
Since making the decision to join, I occasionally joked that I may end up ostracizing myself from a lot of the activist groups that I have been involved with over the years as most do not have the positive views of the military. Then now after reading some comments about the 'left wing' dim views of the military, made me wonder if it is some kind of social requirement to have some kind of 'right wing' view to be in the military?
I mean, a lot of my political views are left leaning. I am anti-war and helped organize and coordinate protests in the past on that basis, a long with against Bush when he came to Ottawa couple of times, against security certificates, pro-choice, etc. Guaranteed to have appeared in many of the photos and videos the police has taken in all the those protests too.
Yet, I turn around and later applied for the military...so what does that make me?
Of course, I always been known to destroy stereotypes while enforcing some others.....
Short answer: being part of the military does NOT make you 'right wing'. It does mean you may have to do some things that you (by you I mean "mellian") may or may not find troubling.
From your statement, one may conclude that you have problem with authority, and you have no problem voicing your opposition. In the military, that is highly "not encouraged". You are told what to do, when to do it and (at least early in your career) how to do it. By definition you subordinate yourself to the whims of the government and your chain of command, from the CDS all the way down to your immediate supervisor. You will be ordered to do things unquestioningly (except when given an order that is unlawful, when you are then
expected by law to oppose said direction).
The only part that perplexes me is when you say you are "anti-war". Does this mean that you think war is never an option? If so, the military is not for you. If by this you mean "war is the last resort", to paraphrase Hill, it is "an ugly, horrible thing, but not as bad as the alternative" in some cases. If that is the case, then you are a perfect fit. Contrary to popular misconception, military members are not (by and large) "pro-war".
As for "political stripes", we get all kinds in the military. "Centrists" who vote Liberal/Conservative, "Leftists" who vote NDP/Green, "Rightists" who vote Christian Heritage, or whatever. There are pro-choicers and pro-lifers. There are Catholics, Jews and Atheists. There are social conservatives and there are social liberals. There are some common denominators:
We are all Canadian Citizens
We all subordinate ourselves to the lawful direction of our superiors
We are all subject to unlimited liability. This is the part that separates us from the rest of the Public Service. We can be legally ordered to do stuff that will put is in harms' way, even "certain death", if the situation warrants.
It's not an easy choice to join the military, and yes, I agree that some stereotypes are there because they are true, but in the case of the military, there are so many that could not be further from the truth.
I hope this helps, and I certainly hope I didn't cover anything that was previously covered in the 17 (!) previous pages.