When I was a little little kid I used to have this reoccurring nightmare. A theme would play on a music box, and there would be a stuffed bear sitting there and a voice would sing "a teddy bear's dream is to join the army" over and over again as the bear got progressively more injured.
But instead of polyfill the bear was a real creature, blood would pour out his wounds. Intestines would come out of cuts in his abominale wall. Eventually after a thousand cuts and chars by invisible shrapnel (explosions, bullet grazes) the bear would get a severe head injury, his cranium would show, his macerated brains would ooze out what was typically a gaping wound.
A teddy bear's dream is to join the army.
I haven't had that nightmare since I was a kid and now it has been replaced by an all too-real horror: a never-ending parade of my less ambitious friends tossing their mortal bodies into a murderous meat-grinder chasing after false promises of wealth, respect and power.
Her: so i think im joinin the army
Me: why
Her: for broadcast journalism
Me: if it's for any other reason that you wanting to die for america blindly following the orders of a madman you're an idiot
Her: i think it'd do Me some good to be broken down and built back up
Her: the chances of Me gettin deployed are so slim
Her: and i'd make a bunch of money
Me: being broken down and built back up is called brainwashing, there are a lot nicer cults than the army
Her: and i know sooo many people in the military and being over there really isnt that big of a deal
Her: lol
Her: i wanna be brainwashed
Her: i'm tired of thinking so much
Me: into being an army drone?
Her: oh i wouldnt be any army drone
Me: that's what they build you up into, after breaking you down
Me: I'll just say: I've told a lot of people the army/navy/marines is a bad idea and every single one of them is miserable now
Me: do what you think is best, but I am here to say I think it is an awful awful idea
Her: lol
Her: ok
Me: don't do it!
Her: omg you're like really against this lol
Me: if you want to make a positive change in your life, you should do it, but don't do it through the armed forces -- all that positive change nonsense they stuff down everyone's throats is just as much advertising copy BS as a tide commercial saying it'll make your whites brighter
Her: well the guys that I know that are in the military
Her: i admire alot
Me: join the americorps if you insist on serving your country, at least no one will ever have an excuse to shoot at you
Her: i likethey way they think and act and carry themselves
Me: then act that way and carry yourself that way, you can be the person you want to be without signing your life over to an inhumane bureacracy
Me: unless what you want to be is a slave
Her: max you're such a rebel i love you lol
Me: I'd rather die at my own hand than because some old fart in an office sipping on single malt scotch decided my unit might be expendable
Me: not me personally even, just a random group of people I'm in
Please please please don't throw your life away one someone else's game for someone else's profit in someone else's bombed out hometown!
I extend my plea to anyone and everyone: your life and agency is more valuable than anything else and so is the life of anyone who will ever end up on the other end of your weapon.