Actually my recruiter was completely honest with me. He told me somethings it would suck beyond belief, sometimes it would be fun, but most of the time it would be just a job and be as rewarding as I worked to make it. I enlisted in 1983, two years out of high school. He was right.
I stayed in for 20 (surface, though. Didn’t volunteer for subs, although I was eligible.)
Air Force, 1987 to 97.
I talked with the Marine recruiter first, and his opening question to me was “Why should I let you in my beloved corps?”
I honestly had no answer for him.
I had to show the Air Force Recuiter my job specialty in the Big Book of Jobs.
He was a newly minted Staff Sergeant who had never heard of “Broadcast Journalist” as an Air Force career. he was great, though, no lying, no withheld info, just "They are going to yell. A lot. Don’t let it get to you and you’ll do fine.
It also helped that my dad was a twenty year man in the Air Force, so there weren’t a whole lot of surprises for me. Man, I loved that obstacle course. I could have run that every day of Basic.
Aw, come on. Tending a controlled nuclear explosion is practically the DEFINITION of high adventure…
*Cut the Blue wire!
Now cut the Red wire!
Now cut the Blue wire again!
(continue until the end of your watch, or until you tie up in Subic Bay)*
Heh. I had a friend who decided that what she needed to turn her life around was the discipline of the military (now, nothing against the military, but this was in the Top Three Not-Good Things she should’ve done at the time).
She was taking anti-depressants, and so the Army, Navy and Air Force all turned her down. She scored really well on those tests they give you, though, so the Marines recruited her hard. Luckily, a few weeks into her foray, she finally realized she definitely was not suited to the military.
She tried and tried to tell her Marine recruiter that she changed her mind. Man, oh man, did he give her shit. Then when that didn’t work, he turned to relentlessness. Finally, she had to tell him her personal truth.
That she was a lesbian, depressed alcoholic with a bad back.
He said, “We can work with that!”
If they can’t get enough recruits who meet Army standards, why don’t they just lower their standards?
To what? Early parole?
There was a time when some convicts were offered military service as an alternative to prison.
About ten years ago, a friend’s kid was offered the chance to join the Army or go to prison. He picked the Army, and honestly, it was the best thing that ever happened to him. He wasn’t a bad kid; he just needed to learn that the rules were for him, too.
Military service as an alternative to prison might conjure up images of homicidal pedophiles being given military weapons, but I’d bet that mostly that option was/is extended to slightly screwed-up kids that might benefit from the discipline. In at least one case, it worked a treat.
Would you believe that is grounds for disqualification form the Air Force? I a judge tells an applicant, “Join the military or go to jail” the applicant is disqualified from ever joining the Air Force. Period.
When I walked into the U.S.A.F. recruiting office back in 1976, my recruiter did everything he could to make me feel at ease. He showed me pictures of the modern dorm buildings we would be living in(that were still in the planning stages when I arrived on a hot Texas June afternoon), told me that the aptitude test I took indicated that I would work out just dandy as an analog flight simulator specialist(even though the piss-ant hick school I went to offered Beginning Algebra as the highest level math class and I knew absofuckinglutely nothing about computers or flying), then told me I could put three bases on my wish list and that I was almost guaranteed to get one of them(even though they didn’t have analog flight simulator specialists at any of those bases.)
However, Stinkgerholenturd AFB, Greenland…
Worse-Minot, North Dakota.
“Why not Minot? It’s cold I’m told-freezin’s the reason!”
You might be onto something: let’s fight them over there so we don’t have to fight them over here! Ohhh, you mean terrorists, not psychopath dullards with guns.
My recruiter didn’t really even have to do anything for me. I searched him out. He was completly honest with me. Told me Basic would suck. Hard. And it did.
Gave me a list of jobs to research on the internet so that way when I got to MEPS I knew exactly what I wanted.
He even put up with my dad trying to get him into trouble because my did didn’t like the job I got.
Funny story that has absolutly nothing to do with anything.
In high school I wanted to join the Marines. My mom wouldn’t sign the papers because it was too dangerous. She said I could either join teh Navy or Air Force. So, I up and joined Big Blue…and got “Aerial Gunner” as a job. I do combat search and rescue.
She was NOT happy, to say the least.