Oh, and don’t forget the ultraorthodox crazies who sometimes go around stoning people. Or spitting on them, or whichever.
Actually this pretty much is how it works for your average enlisted folks. When you first start in the military you’re on a very short leash. Morning formations, constant inspections, etc. In basic for example the military makes sure you’re exactly where they want you 24hrs a day. After that, you have your technical training where things get a bit looser. There are still formations but fewer of them, time off, maybe a curfew and room inspections but you’re expected to get yourself to where you need to be when you need to be there. The same trends continue as you get to your operational base, make rank etc as the military gives you more responsibilities, more freedoms and expects you to balance the two to accomplish what you need to do. The reason enlisted folks manage to do this is… ta-da! They have self-discipline.
Now, you may have a point that the military doesn’t have an official “Self-Discipline” course that they send their people through but that’s because they don’t need it. You either develop the self-discipline you need to fulfill your responsibilities or you find yourself booted out.
Now, in regards to your ‘point’ that since the military punishes those who do not fulfill their responsibilities that therefore the military does not instill self-discipline in the enlisted ranks I’m not really sure where you’re pulling this from. How is that different then any other aspect of life? If you don’t have the self-discipline to get to work on time you find yourself reprimanded. If it happens a lot, you find yourself fired. Hmm, sounds like a situation where a company has expectations of their employees [lets call them rules] and if employees fail to meet those expectations then you get fired [punished].
The main difference is that the military has a lot more rules then most businesses and has a lot more punishments it can dish out. All in all, I’d say it often takes MORE self-discipline to be successful in the military as they’re much less likely to let things slide in the interests of keeping an extremely profitable employee.
Finally, I really have to ask. What do you base your [apparently very low] opinion of the enlisted ranks on? You do realize I hope, that even assuming they are accurate, your father’s stories may not have much bearing on the state of today’senlisted force.
That’s self-contradictory; if the military is less likely to let things slide, which implies MORE likely to apply exernal punishment, that’s not self-discipline.
Having served and half down civilian jobs, I can tell you in my experience civvie jobs require more self-discipline, since the military does in fact provide far, far more external discipline than any civilian job I’ve ever heard of.
I wonder if the term “self-discipline” has somewhat different meanings for each of you guys. It isn’t clear if you’re talking about the same phenomenon.
There’s more controls over what you do but you’re also asked of a hell of a lot more.
I mean, the guys who charged up hardened automatic weapons positions, rules and regulations be damned, had to have a lot of self-discipline to do their jobs and not run away.
Anyways, just because a certain organization has a lot of rules and regulations doesn’t preclude self-discipline, in fact I don’t think the matters are related at all…
FWIW, when I went to the induction center one of the things they asked me in between asking about previous drug use and chronic medical conditions was whether a judge or police officer had offered to let me off if I joined the military.
I must be the only one thinking of Tom Lerers “It makes a fellow proud to be a Soldier”
The line {paraphrased} “He traded in his switchblade and zip gun for a baionet and a new M1”
Yea just me.