Would you support this military model for Canada?

[damngrumpy]

Its like everything else, you can't go about forcing kids to take such courses anymore than we
should be forcing them to take part in social activities by force. Yes you can encourage them
to take part in life around them but force is not the best policy. There is a difference between
using force to ensure they obey the law of the land if required but forcing people to take part in
almost anything I find counter productive.
I remember back in high school, I was told I had to take part in dancing as part of some subject
getting people to socially interact and I refused, did care if I danced or not. I was in fact told I
would get a failed grade in physical education if I refused. it was a subject I did well in and enjoyed.
Not after that. I took the fail, never learned to dance, and I just drifted away from the entire sports
program. When asked to be on the school team I refused, I was a good player in a small school
and they needed all the help they could get, but I never participated again.
There are a lot of stubborn people out there who will not be forced to do things they are not interested
in, I have one grandson, who actually told the school officials to shove it, and quit rather than be
forced into the PE Program. Took his schooling later and is a carpenter today, still have nothing good
to say about the education system. The sad fact is he was an A and B student in everyone of his
classes. He just didn't want to take part in their other school activities and the alternative was force.
I am opposed to using force to get people to do what someone else wants.

 

[Trotz]

My guess is that even the hippies and flower children would be prepared to take up arms if their own national homeland were being invaded. When the Japanese were pillaging China, I'm sure many pacifists quickly changed their minds. In WWII too some pacifists did in fact support that particular war. I think it has to do with the threat level.

In a real threat, I think the only ones who would still refuse to pick up arms for the most part would be those refusing to do so based on some religious conviction or other.

I disagree,
the Ontarian and Quebecer Hipsters (hippies) that hangout in Downtown Victoria are extremely unreliable and poor fighters at best. I've been in fights with a couple and they can neither back you up nor fight. Not because they are hipsters, but rather a diet of ramen noodles and bread doesn't turn you into a warrior and pot itself does impair your endurance and ability to fight.

They'll probably buy the enemy's propaganda for free food and pot, only to find out the stuff has been laced with poison, or are sent to a Gulag and soon shot (hippies like 'protesting to the man' and thus aren't good slaves)

 

[Unforgiven]

There is some merit here but not the way you have constructed it. There is advantage in martial arts training other than teaching "babies to kill" (thanks Gerry :roll in the discipline of learning and practicing correct and controlled movement, physical activity and exercising mind and body at one time.

I like and always have like the idea of all youth spending two years in the military learning various aspects of the service, and having that opportunity to influence them when their parents and other usual mentors have failed to.

But a better job of training should be paramount coupled with proper outfitting with the tools needed to defend our nation. Not to be confused with fighting for the political whim au courant on foreign soil. Military could be geared much more toward engineering tasks in the far north paving the way for private development.

No opting out, if there is a moral objection to combat, then other duties can be performed to serve out the two year commitment.

Not only would this help to instill the merits of discipline, work ethic, and nationalism, it also disrupts the thug life method of recruitment and violence that becomes part of life for lower income youth.

 

[wulfie68]

I could go along with making kids study a martial art for a couple reasons: to encourage physical fitness, along with other activities in their gym classes; to teach them about self discipline, which many kids have no idea of; to possibly eliminate bullying, by leveling the playing field somewhat, through ensuring the kids all know how to react and what works in certain situations. I can see a lot of value in teaching this to children.

Using it as a preclude to eliminating the military is ridiculous.

The military is much more than pointing a gun or knife at someone and trying to kill them, something that seems to be lost on so many. In Canada, our military is used for disaster relief (such as in the ice storms in central Canada a few years back, the field hospital unit we sent to Indonesia during the Boxing Day Tsunami, or the relief and supply convoy we sent to Louisiana after Hurricane Katrina), search and rescue operations (both on and off shore), coast guard operations and other tasks. Now I suppose we could spin off some of these units into other agencies or create new agencies, but the original premise is already stumbling into problems when examined. How do we handle the "peace keeping" operations that even the most anti-military voices in politics want to sustain? How do we handle our treaty obligations, or do we take the diplomatic credibility hit that withdrawing from all our existing mutual defense treaties would bring? We're geographically blessed in that our only land neighbour is a good friend and trading partner but do we really want to give up sovereignty to anyone who feels they can come along and violate it?

If we want to change our structure at all, I would rather see something discussed in another thread a while back: compulsory federal service, be it in the armed forces or a gov't sponsoured "peace corps" style organization, doing humanitarian work both at home and abroad. Something to bring Canadians from different regions together, to say it doesn't matter where we're from, but we worked together to do this and make our country and our world a better place, not something that would increase our isolation from each other and the world at large.