Should Canada introduce a compulsory year of service?

Zzarchov

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Aug 28, 2006
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What generation was that Zzarchov? Rampant drug use and sex, now I remember , you had it backward. You could use some rampant drug filled sex, is it all gone or what? So us old people ruined your life, tough, stop your whineing and sign up.

I already did my service.

What about you?
 

taxslave

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Nov 25, 2008
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I have always been against any kind of mandatory military service but something along the lines of peace corps. Possibly even community service. something that gets city kids of their lazy asses and teaches them life skills. We have a number of juniors (14-19yrs.) in our volunteer fire dept. They train with the rest of us, respond to fires and first responder calls, only are not permitted to enter a burning building and we try to keep them away from the really bad accident scenes. They are so much more mature than their contemporaries that sometimes you forget that they are still kids. Thee are probably many more things like this that would work better than army life.
 

china

Time Out
Jul 30, 2006
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wulfie68
Self discipline is the willingness to temporarily put aside personal pleasures to achieve a goal. Its the willingness to get your hands dirty when it needs to be done to improve things around you. If your toilet is plugged, self discipline is what compels you to unplug it and clean up the mess instead of smelling flowers in your garden. Its not about mechanical obedience but an acceptance that life is not limited to the "nice" things. Its also what allows us to face our fears and overcome them.

And you don't need love in the bush, just respect for your surroundings. A bear,cougar or any other animal won't care if you love it or not; neither will poison ivy or the like: just get stay out of its way.

I'm not wild about the Peace Corps idea either to be honest: that seems to be more an externally focused program. I'm not saying its without worth but if we're trying to build our communities, I feel we need to focus more on them.
You see a young man, supple, eager, beautiful with clear eyes and a lovely smile, and a few years later you see him again and he is almost unrecognizable - sloppy, callous, indifferent, full of platitudes, highly respectable, hard, ugly, closed and sentimental. Surely discipline would have "saved him". My self, who have been disciplined almost out of existence, often wonder where the middle way is .Discipline means to learn, not to conform, not to suppress, not to imitate the pattern of what accepted authority considers noble , to learn, to be austere, to be free, to be sensitive, and to see the beauty of love. Learning is the freedom of perception, of seeing. And you cannot learn if you are not free. So this very learning is its own discipline - you don't have to discipline yourself and then learn. So learning is the highest form of discipline. Learning demands intelligence and sensitivity. Discipline, as it is generally understood, is the act of will, which is violence. People seem to think that freedom is the result of prolonged discipline. To see clearly is its own discipline and to see clearly there must be freedom. So freedom is not at the end of discipline, but the understanding of freedom is its own discipline. The two go together, inseparably: when you separate them there is conflict. . So freedom is at the beginning and not at the end: the beginning is the end. To learn about all this is its own discipline. Learning itself demands sensitivity. If you are not sensitive to yourself - , to your environment, to your relationships - if you are not sensitive to what is happening round you, in the "bush" in the kitchen or in the world, then however much you discipline yourself you only become more and more insensitive, more and more self-centred . To learn is to be sensitive to yourself and to the world outside you, for the world outside is you. If you are sensitive to yourself you are bound to be sensitive to the world. This sensitivity is the highest form of intelligence. It is not the sensitivity of a specialist - the doctor, the scientist or the artist. Such fragmentation does not bring sensitivity. How can one love if there is no sensitivity? Sentimentality and emotionalism deny sensitivity because they are terribly cruel; they are responsible for wars. So discipline is not the drill of the sergeant - whether in the parade-ground or in yourself - which is the will. Learning all day long, and during sleep, has its own extraordinary discipline . In this there is love. Love has its own discipline, and the beauty of it escapes a mind that is drilled, shaped, controlled, tortured. Without such a discipline the mind cannot go very far.Don't believe or disbelieve ...inquire.
 
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JLM

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Nov 27, 2008
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I have always been against any kind of mandatory military service but something along the lines of peace corps. Possibly even community service. something that gets city kids of their lazy asses and teaches them life skills. We have a number of juniors (14-19yrs.) in our volunteer fire dept. They train with the rest of us, respond to fires and first responder calls, only are not permitted to enter a burning building and we try to keep them away from the really bad accident scenes. They are so much more mature than their contemporaries that sometimes you forget that they are still kids. Thee are probably many more things like this that would work better than army life.

I agree whole heartedly on that Taxslave.
 

ironsides

Executive Branch Member
Feb 13, 2009
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Two points:

1. Compulsory service (conscription) is essentially the same thing as slavery.

2. The average high school student works 50 hours a week, mostly unpaid.


1: No, they are paid.

2: Why would any high school student work for free? Can not count homework.

How about just a year or two to learn a trade skill. Doesn't have to be military related. Stop insulting the world by sending our children out in it to look like fools flopping around like fish out of water, till the find their way.
 

Zzarchov

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Aug 28, 2006
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Side note: I deal with people alot in my job.

Those lifeskills are missing in MOST People, not just kids. They don't magically appear in people over time. Maturity is based on life experience, not age.

And alot of people just never get the life experience. You can tell who volunteers with the homeless between the coworker who shows up on time, does her job and takes respsonsibilities for her actions, and the one who shows up late blaming others, takes 2 hour lunch breaks and is a gossipmonger.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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Side note: I deal with people alot in my job.

Those lifeskills are missing in MOST People, not just kids. They don't magically appear in people over time. Maturity is based on life experience, not age.

And alot of people just never get the life experience. You can tell who volunteers with the homeless between the coworker who shows up on time, does her job and takes respsonsibilities for her actions, and the one who shows up late blaming others, takes 2 hour lunch breaks and is a gossipmonger.

You bet.
 

ironsides

Executive Branch Member
Feb 13, 2009
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Side note: I deal with people alot in my job.

Those lifeskills are missing in MOST People, not just kids. They don't magically appear in people over time. Maturity is based on life experience, not age.

And alot of people just never get the life experience. You can tell who volunteers with the homeless between the coworker who shows up on time, does her job and takes respsonsibilities for her actions, and the one who shows up late blaming others, takes 2 hour lunch breaks and is a gossipmonger.


Then based upon what you are saying doing a hitch in the military would be the best it instill discipline in a persons work ethic. There is no other way to teach a life lesson like that than by forcing someone to live by it for a while. Once you have that, all else will come a lot easier. Very well put.
 

Zzarchov

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Aug 28, 2006
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Then based upon what you are saying doing a hitch in the military would be the best it instill discipline in a persons work ethic. There is no other way to teach a life lesson like that than by forcing someone to live by it for a while. Once you have that, all else will come a lot easier. Very well put.

Oh I agree, but its not just the youth who need it. I'd say its needed equally across all age demographics. Which is why any change like this should be retroactive and apply for everyone.
 

ironsides

Executive Branch Member
Feb 13, 2009
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Oh I agree, but its not just the youth who need it. I'd say its needed equally across all age demographics. Which is why any change like this should be retroactive and apply for everyone.

Have to start at some age, in the U.S. a person (in theory) could have been drafted up until around age 28. Now of course we have no draft.
 

L Gilbert

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Nov 30, 2006
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I have always been against any kind of mandatory military service but something along the lines of peace corps. Possibly even community service. something that gets city kids of their lazy asses and teaches them life skills. We have a number of juniors (14-19yrs.) in our volunteer fire dept. They train with the rest of us, respond to fires and first responder calls, only are not permitted to enter a burning building and we try to keep them away from the really bad accident scenes. They are so much more mature than their contemporaries that sometimes you forget that they are still kids. Thee are probably many more things like this that would work better than army life.
Good idea.
 

L Gilbert

Winterized
Nov 30, 2006
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50 acres in Kootenays BC
the-brights.net
Side note: I deal with people alot in my job.

Those lifeskills are missing in MOST People, not just kids. They don't magically appear in people over time. Maturity is based on life experience, not age.

And alot of people just never get the life experience. You can tell who volunteers with the homeless between the coworker who shows up on time, does her job and takes respsonsibilities for her actions, and the one who shows up late blaming others, takes 2 hour lunch breaks and is a gossipmonger.
Pretty much.
 

JLM

Hall of Fame Member
Nov 27, 2008
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T:roll:
1. BS
2. Knowledge is the base upon which one can be paid for the rest of one's life. Of course, you can't buy a loaf of bread with it but you can start a bakery with it.

So they do 25 hours a week in school, probably another 7 hours a week homework- that doesn't make them any hero and then some of them are doing 18 hours a week for which they are being paid- whoopee ding, my heart bleeds for them.
 

Free your mind

Electoral Member
Apr 14, 2009
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compulsory year of what tho.??

sorry i don't just sell my soul for beans or peanuts or B/S.
what do i get in return for MY participation in this phony scheme..?
A life skill..? some training...?
Training to do what exactly...?
we all know the propaganda.!
Whats the facts about whats proposed, please explain the involvement whether voluntary or otherwise..