71–80 of 109 posts
My uncle lied about his age to join the Army during the Korean War. He was 16 I believe.
Why did he want to fight in that war so badly?
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"Child soldiers" is dramatic. I don't see a problem with a 16 year old joining the military, with the support of their parents, esp. if they don't have an interest in college. They could learn some valuable skills, certainly more than you'd learn in public education.
Damn straight. A structured environment that doubles as a boarding school is exactly what some children at that age need.
A bit of an aside, but it seems like the South would've had a lot fewer able-bodied, young men to fight the war especially since they weren't inclined to arm black soldiers. Given that the south was primarily agrarian with fewer urban areas to draw from - the population was more sparse. How did the confederacy think they could win given that difference?
* They planned to fight a defensive war * They had more military experience and a stronger military tradition * They were more motivated * There were a not-insignificant number of Northerners who weren't particularly in favor of fighting a war against slavery (which, despite the "states' rights" commentators, was the real cause of the war) * They expected recognition from the British government due to their supposed…
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Meh. Lets not pretend like a 16 year old signing papers to join the army was too dumb to understand it meant they were joining the army. 16 is hardly fingers-in-the-wall-socket level of understanding the world.
Seriously? Why do you think we recruit teenagers and not 25 to 30 year old men, who are stronger, tougher and more mature? Because teenagers are easy to manipulate and control, don’t value their life, and think with their dick.
I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say by sheer coincidence you're in that 25-30 year old male demographic, and in about 5 years you'll be of the opinion that actually its 30-35 year olds who are clearly the strongest, toughest, most mature and capable fighting force and all them 25-30s are a bunch of idiots that don't value life and think with their dick.
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There is zero reason to demand that drinking age is same as joining army age or voting age or owning gun age. It is absurd to demand same age for all these.
No it isn’t. You don’t get to cherry pick the scenarios that someone will be considered an adult for. Either you’re an adult or you aren’t, and “you’re an adult when it’s politically favourable to me” is not an acceptable compromise. I get the impression that you’d be the same type of person to defend the patriot act if it was made about tax evasion instead of terrorism.
But we do get to pick and choose which privileges we extend to minors, and when. A 16 year old has no legal right to consume alcohol, but that only means that we can ban them from doing so, not that we have to.
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At first glance one might suspect that South's disinclination to arm black soldiers would harm their ability to field a large proportion of their population, but that wasn't the case. The ready availability of slave labor enabled free men, who would have otherwise been required at home to work the fields or bring in the crops, to go off and fight instead. IIRC, around 80% of able-bodied free men in the South fought i…
> When your country gets invaded, you don't grab your abacas, you grab your gun. The confederacy was not being invaded when they chose to start the war.
Marching into a country and killing hundreds of thousands of men isn't an invasion? What do you call it where you're from?
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Meh. Lets not pretend like a 16 year old signing papers to join the army was too dumb to understand it meant they were joining the army. 16 is hardly fingers-in-the-wall-socket level of understanding the world.
No. Pretty obviously they are not as mature as 18 years old which is why they should not make these decisions. They are more naive easier to manipulate and more of kids the adults. 10 years old understand joining army means joining army. And still don't get to make those decisions.
Age cutoffs are an arbitrary and shitty substitute for a test of competency, prone to both high false negative and high false positive rates.
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> When your country gets invaded, you don't grab your abacas, you grab your gun. The confederacy was not being invaded when they chose to start the war.
On the night of December 26, Major Anderson's men were ordered to turn their overcoats to hide the military buttons and to take off their caps, so as to be taken for the civilian laborers who passed daily between Forts Sumter and Moultrie. The ruse was successful, a turncoat matter one might say. The act of soldiers posing as civilians in war historically has been viewed as an act of perfidy. With the ruse, Union tro…
A bit of an aside, but it seems like the South would've had a lot fewer able-bodied, young men to fight the war especially since they weren't inclined to arm black soldiers. Given that the south was primarily agrarian with fewer urban areas to draw from - the population was more sparse. How did the confederacy think they could win given that difference?