What does it say about the youth of today when less then 1% of graduating seniors even consider the military .

Question

Use to be that the military was picky about who they took and now they can not even find anyone to join up .
Conservatives make up half of the nation and liberals the other half so why is it that recruitment has dropped off to nothing . They can not get even get 50,000 kids out of 5 million to sign up and 7 years ago they turned away a million applicants a year .

Leo girl makes a point . When your goal is 95% lower then it was 7 years ago it is not hard to meet pass or exceed such goals .
I sold 1000 pop tarts each year for 20 years straight then just 20 so my boss said you need to sell ten I said I would try and and guess what ? I sold 11 and increased my sales over what was expected by 10% .
I love the defenders of all things that make no sense except to those proposing the wild information they pedal as the truth .

Answer 1

To me it says that the youth of today don't necessarily want a career where you have to kill people.

Answer 2

I'm not sure what it says about today's youth, but it sure says a lot about the military's poor performance in marketing.

I myself spent almost 23 years in the military and I'd recommend it as a solid career choice for any young man or woman. The military gave me a level of responsibility and supervisory and managerial experience at an age much earlier than most civilian careers. Just think -- when I was 28 years old, I was responsible for the safety and effective employment of a $750 million intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platform and a 34-man aircrew.

Also, the military's nowhere nearly as dangerous as some much lower-paying occupations, such as policeman or fireman.

Of course the situations in Iraq and Afghanistan are taking a heavy toll on recruitment and retention. But in the end I think the military needs to do a better job at recruiting. It's not the state of today's youth, in my opinion, it's the military losing touch with how to communicate with those youth.

Answer 3

There seem to be many reasons why the youth of America, are not signing up for the military. The main one seems to be that they do not want to be killed. I am in favor of every youth, upon getting out of high school, automatically being placed into the military. They then do two years, and get out to be on a five to ten year reserve. This is similar to the Israeli program. However the cost to the country to train and maintain a standing force would be tremendous. Some of these youths would find that they like the military life, and would want to stay in, giving us a nucleus, of well trained fighting men. The others could go on with their lives, and hopefully become responsible citizens. To many the discipline they receive in the military would also be carried over into their civilian lives.

Answer 4

7 years ago, we weren't involved in this war quagmire in Iraq, and the threat of a large-scale war was fairly remote. Military service did not mean 7 to 14 month tours in a foreign theater, and the chances of getting hurt or killed were small.

While the unpopularity (rightly deserved, in my opinion) of the war certainly plays a part in the drop-off, I suspect that the leading cause for reduced enlistment is that noble biological trait of self-preservation, both from the potential soldier and their parents.

Say what you will about the youth of today, but it's unfair to compare them to the soldiers who volunteered a decade ago. They are graduating into a completely different world and a dramatically altered military experience. I say, save the criticism and use that to laud the brave few who volunteer in spite of the risks.

Answer 5

Hi,

It says they see the handwriting on the wall and have a fair degree of intelligence. They realize that bush's illegal occupation of Iraq in his conquest for oil is not worth dying for.

When you fight for something and you are in the wrong, you cannot win.

As for your figures, if 50% of the American people are conservatives, then explain the less than 29% bush approval ratings with him being the head honcho of the conservative party.

All things considered, that would in turn suggest that over 70% of the American people are non supportive of conservatism, which would in turn make them Liberal minded, and considering Liberals are opposed to bush's occupation of Iraq, that in turn answers your question as to why 50,000 kids want nothing to do with bush's killing fields for oil.

Perhaps they are intelligent enough to see they are paying enough at the pump so why should they pay with their lives?

In closing, is this analogy suggesting that Liberals are now in the majority and possess an intelligence quotient somewhat above that of Conservatives?

Good question,

Darryl S.

Answer 6

The youth today have no interest in fighting George Bush's PERSONAL crusade against the middle east. Maybe enlistments will increase when Hillary takes office and the world is a better place.

To rephrase the above, the youth of today have no interest in dying for Bush's personal crusade while his daughters stay at home drinking and snorting cocaine just like daddy. Perhaps Bush should send his daughters to Iraq to show how much he believes in the war

Answer 7

What it say is the press will dig for any story or any view to make our military look bad and smear Bush and the war on Muslim terrorism.

I don't know of many high school seniors who stay with their goals after they get out of school.

Yes the war on Muslim terrorism is unpopular because it isn't pretty war never is and never will be.

Running away won't make the problem to go away.

Please remember the number of teacher that are liberal compare to conservative is not 50 50.

So have 12 years of liberal influence the teachers have done their job.

Look at the numbers going in.
http://usmilitary.about.com/od/joiningthemilitary/a/recruitgoals.htm

Can you tell me during the 8 years of Clinton did they watch the number in the military as closely?

Answer 8

The military is losing its glamour because of some politicians treating them as erroneously fighting a war which should not be the case. Soldiers must be treated as heroes in order to entice the youth to join the military establishment.

Answer 9

Because the American youth of today have different idols to look up to than 40 years ago. Now they want to be like Brad Pitt or some pop or hip-hop artists not that image of a strong, courageous, fight for what you believe in type of idol! I always notice how they have become shallow & weenies! That's my personal idea & I'm not generalizing anything! No offense to today's youth!

Answer 10

The youth today are spoiled brats. Most lack in work ethic. And rate high on the "Me" radar. In my opinion. Kids should work are fields in the first four hours of their day. Followed by four hours of basic reading, writing and math. Let the parent be responsible for teaching belief systems. Maybe the kids would be to tired to text, myspace and complain about how bored they are. And focus on how awful their parents are.