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Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

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41–50 of 252 posts

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#41
post #5

Opening graph: "We should, as a society, seriously consider moving away from an all-volunteer force and only fight the next war if everyone shares in the risk and the cost," says military contractor and all-around surveillance-enabler Palantir. If that's the case, then every war to be fought needs to have the say so of those that will be doing the fighting and not the solitary decision made by a delusional leader tha…

Robert Heinlein proposed something like that in his "lost" novel For Us, the Living: instead of declaring war, Congress would authorize a war referendum, in which only those eligible for military service could vote. The catch was, everyone voting "Yes" would thereby automatically sign themselves up in the military for the duration. If a further draft was needed, it would first be composed of those that didn't vote, and lastly those who voted "No."

(In the book, the "future" Congress had called war referenda on three occasions; each time, the vote was overwhelmingly "No," and historians believed those decisions were justified.)

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#42

Other countries have compulsory military service, for example Finland. Generally speaking I am a fan of the idea that everyone should be required to do some kind of community service for 2 years once they turn 18. Military service would just be one option, could be other kinds of civic engagement. This can really help people feel connected to their society and understand that there is something to show up for. BUT -…

I like the idea of civic engagement / service in theory too, but I feel like the Vietnam war was a demonstration of possible failure modes when draft is in place: a lot of poor kids died, some rich kids allegedly used parental influence to dodge the draft. No incentive for leaders to avoid war while loop holes remain for their own interests.

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#44
post #30

> Silicon Valley owes a moral debt to the country that made its rise possible I would agree with that, but its debt is to the people of that country, not their current government. But instead, Palantir conspires to surveil and repress those people at the bidding of an elite, anti-democratic minority. And would the leaders of Palantir still argue it had a moral debt to serve the government if it was a left-wing one, e…

Silicon Valley owes a moral debt to the country, and the country now has to serve. What?

Silicon Valley could easily pay their moral debt by not evading taxes.

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#45

Other countries have compulsory military service, for example Finland. Generally speaking I am a fan of the idea that everyone should be required to do some kind of community service for 2 years once they turn 18. Military service would just be one option, could be other kinds of civic engagement. This can really help people feel connected to their society and understand that there is something to show up for. BUT -…

> These days, what are American soldiers dying for?

Israel

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#46
post #33

Karp has a right to his opinion as bonkers as it may be but it is doubly bonkers to release this as company policy. Especially coupled with all the other bonkers things that went into this manifesto. Rearming Germany and Japan? Why does Palantir care about that? Toss in some unsubtle racism and you're really just staking your company position as aligned with a very narrow political niche. Seemingly at odds with the c…

They are simply following along with the basically fascist direction of Trump, or maybe leading them.

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#47
To those HNers working at Palantir - and there's bound to be a few - what's your deal?

You do realize what sort of company you work for, right? Is it cognitive dissonance or are you really a paranoid right winger that's fully on board with Palantir's efforts to enable authoritarian governments akin to 1984's Big Brother?

I'm curious. Please feel free to explain how you go to work every day and do what you do. Fair warning, the rest of us are pretty disgusted with you.

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#48
post #33

Karp has a right to his opinion as bonkers as it may be but it is doubly bonkers to release this as company policy. Especially coupled with all the other bonkers things that went into this manifesto. Rearming Germany and Japan? Why does Palantir care about that? Toss in some unsubtle racism and you're really just staking your company position as aligned with a very narrow political niche. Seemingly at odds with the c…

Aiding and abetting to a current genocide does that to the appetite for more corpses.

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#49

Doesn’t ycombinator and hacker news have links with this company? Makes it hard to maintain the hacker ethos when this entire site seems so closely linked with such forces.

The hacker aesthetic has always been largely reactionary and hyperfocused on the individual and individual freedoms. See also the politics of "generation X"

Re: Palantir Wants to Reinstate the Draft

#50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having those sent to fight in a war being the ones to decide if the war should be fought was on of the major points in General Butler’s 1935 book War is a Racket

Great example. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot > Butler, a retired Marine Corps major general, testified under oath that wealthy businessmen were plotting to create a fascist veterans' organization with him as its leader and use it in a coup d'état to overthrow Roosevelt.

And also the us not prosecuting those people in 1935is sadly a precursor of j6 in the US.
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