I had a meeting with a Navy recruiter this week and I can honestly say, I walked away shocked.
Once the formal introductory accolades were finished, this recruiter looked straight at me without even a polite smile. “I no longer cared about recruiting,” he said.
I get it. Military recruiting offers few rewards and the hours are always long while skirting your calendar around schoolers.
But, it wasn’t the long hours, the daunting quotas that perked up his blood pressure.
“They (prospects) don’t care anymore. They don’t care about their country or have pride in their nation (as their forefathers).”
At the end he said that bringing back the military draft may be the best thing.
As I sat there listening, I could see the pain in his face. His words did not flow evenly nor without some pain. Regardless, if I agreed with this man or not, he was sharing his heart without any regard to any negative bounce. Basically, I walked away with newfound respect for this man’s transparency rarely seen, but hurting for our future military prospects if what he said was true.
Concern for the Military & National Pride
With 2018 around the corner, military recruiting quotas are already going northbound. Not only that, but unemployment is at the lowest in decades thus causing the Army to consider lowering the entry standards for new recruits.
Just today, Psychology Today reports, “Research has discovered that large amounts of young people are developing an entitlement complex. The psychological trend comes from the belief that you are superior to others and are more deserving of certain things. This form of narcissism has some significant consequences such as disappointment and a tendency to lash out. Psychology Today reports that some examples of entitlement range from the disregard of rules, freeloading, causing inconveniences and like to assume the role of leader when working in groups.”
The University of Hampshire found that youngsters who were studied on issues of entitlement scored 25 percent higher than people aged 40 to 60 and 50 per cent higher than those over that age bracket.
For me, I had hoped that my concern for national pride was limited to Sunday afternoons. Like many, I no longer enjoy professional football while the players focus on their political issues rather than standing during our nation’s anthem, honoring our country’s flag and our freedom and our men and women in uniform.
As a military veteran, I do know that when the going gets tough, the tough get going. I believe our military is and will remain the greatest military force in the world. I believe America has a great future. After all, we are America and forever we stand.
Our military veterans matter. Forget the political skirmishes for the day or hour, what truly matters today is honoring our military veterans.
