It doesn’t mean they have authority over you. As a civilian, even generals are supposed to treat you with respect, and the general has no jurisdiction over you.
Ok ok…hold on…let me go ahead and appologize for that blanket statement. I was obviously not clear about what exactly I was talking about. I can certainly understand if it’s required for you to wear it…just like the BDUs. I can also see it if you work somewhere in or on a flight line where you realistically might have to get into some type of aircraft. But I trust you can understand that what I’m talking about are those pilots that wear their flight suites everywhere. As I said, I work at a flag command that is easily 30 miles from the nearest airport…and I see a very large number of people that wear the flight suites for duty here. So if I can backpeddle and admit that not everyone that wears a flight suite is a Tom Cruise wannabe, then you can perhaps give that there are perhaps a few people that wear them when it’s not really a requirement…m’kay?
I don’t find it offputting or offensive. It does seem a bit casual though. To me, they are the military equivalent of civilian work clothes - like a mechanics overalls or jumpsuit. The dress uniform seems too fancy for everyday wear though (kind of like wearing a suit everywhere).
Now if they were in the grocery store shopping while wearing their Kevlar and carrying their M-16…that’s a little offputting.
checks forum
IMHO, while the BDU’s are far more casual than a dress uniform, it is still readily identifiable as a uniform. Uniforms by definition are required. Hell, I look for all the world like I’m going bowling on my way to work. That or I’m gonna be bringing back some nectar for the queen. (Our uniforms are hideous polyester black with a yellow vertical stripe down the center, and it’s an ugly yellow too)
I am sitting here thinking about how nice most of the soldiers I’ve seen in the BDU’s look. They aren’t wearing the cammo pants with doc martens and wife beaters, usually it’s the whole kit and kaboodle and I think they look pretty neato. I do think that most folks in BDU’s do look good. That is more than I can say for my uniform and certainly more than I can say for most postal employees or police officers.
Up thread someone said something like “it’s easy to be a pacifist when someone else is doing your killing for you.” I tend to agree. They may NOT have duty that requires going out and killing people willy-nilly, but whether you are in some god forsaken outpost in Kazahkstan or Iowa, the uniform brings them together. That army fry cook is just as important a part of the military as the guy hunkered down in Afghanistan. I don’t think it is a coincidence that the word uniform and unify are so similar. Who wants to join the military to cook? Well, thankfully, some folks do, otherwise it’d be a pretty damned hungry crowd and I certainly have no problem with them symbolically via the uniform being united with the rest of their branch.
I’m sitting here typing this and I keep looking at the Challenge Coin I was given Saturday by a gentleman from the Air Force who played at my table. He was very respectful, pleasant and generally a pleasure to deal to. As are the vast majority of the military folks that come into our establishment. They don’t get drunk, they don’t get thrown out and by and large, are the cream of our crop. FWIW, they do not EVER come in in uniform, usually you can tell if someone is/was military. There is something different about them.
Ron, Russ, Christine, Jarrard. Come home soon, your dealer is waiting.
In certain cases, they have a lot of authority over you. On/Near federal property, disasters, and sometimes airport security.
I’ve counted one person, who hasn’t posted in the thread since, who used the word “offensive” (or “offended”) to decribe wearing military uniforms, but the word keeps being used over and over by those in the service as if that is representative of the other side in this discussion. And a lot of the contempt is being directed to other posters who are only reporting the personal reaction a lot of us have to seeing cammos in public. Most of us, in fact, haven’t said we mind it particularly when a soldier is stopping on the way home from work, and no one has failed to understand that you dress how you are ordered. Nor has anyone said that they think of military people only as killing machines, but that cammo, specifically, makes them think of killing. (I agree with them. I grew up in Arkansas and it makes me think of killing deer. It has nothing to do with what I think of soldiers or airmen.)
I Love Me, Vol. I hasn’t expressed anything negative about military people in this thread, only that BDUs make people look foolish. They do. They look sloppy, casual, out of place, unflattering, and generally stupid. For pointing out that recruiters would likely get a better response if they looked better, I Love Me got acused of being ignorant and spewing bullshit.
If I were to wear a t-shirt with a picture of a burning flag on it, it would convey a message, and you would have every reason to react to that message. There is a reason you aren’t allowed to wear jeans and a hoodie on duty–those clothes convey a message as well. BDUs also convey a mesage, and it is: We’re here to do a job that is dirty, messy, and hard, and we don’t care what we look like doing it. That is a perfectly appropriate message for a soldier to convey under many circumstances–that’s what a lot of soldiers spend a lot of time doing! But it is markedly inappropriate when honoring someone, representing the military formally, recruiting, or attempting to build goodwill among the public.
That is generally not the case either. Unless actual martial law is declared, not just a state of emergency. When it comes to natural disasters, civil disturbance and infrastructure security, the military has very limited authority. they are used to augment the civilian authority and can not act in any other capacity. Generally a civilian law enforcement official is there with the actual authority and the military is there to help. The Posse Comitatus Act is still in effect. There are exceptions to the act but most of what you mention does not meet the requirements. Most of the federal security roles around federal/DOD property are filled with civilian police officers such as the DOD police.
:rolleyes:
I may not have been looking hard enough but I never met anyone in the Cannon-Fodder MOS. The whole paragraph was negative. If you agree with it fine, this is the place to state your opinions. To say it is not negative is false. To say it is bullshit is my opinion.
Then the criticism should be aimed at the base commander, but it’s still valid criticism. There is no reason for anyone in the United States to have camouflage on his shirt. As one poster pointed out, we are not in a war zone, so they won’t need to camouflage themselves. The only cover it provides is making the soldiers resemble bums and dimwitted twentysomethings. And under no circumstances should a band arrive in camouflage. If it’s so dangerous an area that you need to blend in with your surroundings, then it is no time to be playing the oboe.
Hehe, all soldiers hate it when bums and twentysomethings wear our clothing as fashionable. We all realize that it’s our job to defend their right to wear such things, but it’s still a minor slight in our eyes. I find it hilarious that, at least in saoirse’s opinion, we look like bums/dimwits instead of the opposite.
I don’t think the services care too much whether their BDUs or cammies make them look like bums, that most of their dress uniforms make them look like bus drivers, and that their haircuts typically make them look slightly brutal. I think they’re mostly concerned that they look tough and (in the case of male servicemembers) hypermasculine. These days, that doesn’t have a lot to do with looking respectful of occasions, and about zero to do with mollifying a few punctilious civilians.
There’s more of them and, unless we bring back the universal draft, there always will be. Also, I didn’t see actual soldiers wearing camo until the 90s (as I stay away from free-fire zones, generally), but there were jerkasses wearing them to the opening weekend of Red Dawn.