How the US. military is portrayed in the media

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LuchaShaq

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Yes there is a small section that brings up games but honestly think it belongs better here in OT. Have had multiple friends join the military after going to a naval academy or west point, and they have since then always viewed the average "common soldier" in disdain. Never really dug deeper because well when I saw them they were home didn't want to push them for stories about why they hate most of the people they are connected to.

This is a great article http://www.mediumdifficulty.com/2012/03/01/call-of-apathy-violent-young-men-and-our-place-in-war/

Just q few choice quotes
Let me give you an example. I was in Iraq in 2007. Over a 3-month period, we saw some of the bloodiest fighting since the invasion, losing more than ten men and killing hundreds of insurgents. A reporter for a very well-known men’s lifestyle magazine visited us to learn about our experiences. About halfway through his escort, an officer from the military media centre tells him that he is not allowed to speak to us anymore. He has to use stories taken from a non-combat unit earlier that day. It turned out that the officer was appalled at the jovial nature of our recollections; the story in which a vehicle commander sawed two men in half with a mounted machinegun because they were on their phones “dicking” us made him balk in particular.
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A friend of mine came under fire inside a compound. He followed up the shooter, who disappeared into an escape tunnel. My friend followed standard procedure and threw a grenade into the tunnel entrance before following up. When entering the tunnel, he found only the bodies of a woman and a small child, whom the terrorist had used to cover his escape.

When I spoke about it to my friend years later, he recalled how pissed he was at losing the insurgent, and how bad he felt afterwards about it. He’d had his professional pride tarnished. I asked him if he ever thought about the woman and her kid and he just looked at me blankly.

He didn’t even remember they were there..
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Honestly always have been disgusted with how our media deals with the military but just wanted to share the article.
 
I find the kind of examples in the OP disgusting, but I also really really dislike the way that modern military situations are framed as "gamey" in current video games.
 
Salvadora said:
Why do Americans seem to worship the military?
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Some do, but only because it goes with the whole over patriotic thing.

Personally, I respect that these people give up their lives for our country, but I'm not blindly loyal to them, or all their practices.
 
Salvadora said:
Why do Americans seem to worship the military?
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worship? I dont know anyone who worships them, we tend to have a lot of pride in them though, they put there lives on the line everyday, willingly. If a ww3 broke out, they would be the ones out there fighting for us, defending us. That deserves my respect.

However, with any large group of people, there are some seriously rotten apples.
 
I don't know if they treat them bad, but they don't give them a ton of attention nowadays, is my only observation, really.
 
Salvadora said:
Why do Americans seem to worship the military?
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I sem-worship the good side of our military normally. But in wartime you respect the soldiers not the job.

also the media does both sides evil murdering invaders, and heroic liberating force.
not to much show the true middle gray area.
 
A friend of mine came under fire inside a compound. He followed up the shooter, who disappeared into an escape tunnel. My friend followed standard procedure and threw a grenade into the tunnel entrance before following up. When entering the tunnel, he found only the bodies of a woman and a small child, whom the terrorist had used to cover his escape.
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Or they just happened to be there. And that's why war sucks, because when shit hits the fan it's absolute madness and no one has any clue what so fucking ever what the consequences of their actions will be.
 
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
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If we don't then why the fuck is our budget ten times that of the next closest competitor?
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
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there's always the next big thing in the pipeline.
 
I don't think Americans worship the military, we just respect the hell out the people that do the job and are super thankful for them.

On the whole i think we always have it in the back of the mind that we can't always trust "the military" in general with the whole Pat Tillman spin doctoring and the My Lai massacre.
 
i'm not really sure how this is the media's fault, i'm pretty sure military pr is pretty careful about this after stuff like vietnam
 
The_Technomancer said:
If we don't then why the fuck is our budget ten times that of the next closest competitor?
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if you don't spend the money this year, you'll get less next year.

DanteFox said:
there's always the next big thing in the pipeline.
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sure, but consequences of being in the pipeline would be impracticality in production, impossible costs or an inability to quickly train personnel on a mass scale.

Seriously, the us tests a small scale railgun and we had youtube videos of it within 2 weeks.
 
Blackace said:
yup... there is a position in the military that works in Hollywood. My friend kept applying for it lol
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Is anyone really surprised by this though? They're trying to advertise, and get a good image so that they get more recruitments, and to a lesser extent, possibly even more funding.
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
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The US military kind of does though. I bet even Israel, China and Russia have few weapons no one is really keen on.


And why are some of you acting as if other countries don't value there military? This is not just a US thing. And in many ways the US military makes it very worthwhile to join. Its not just about KILL, KILL, look cool.
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
Click to expand...


In the Pentagon's mind, not compromising that tech is more important than saving lives.

Look at Libya in '86. An F-111 was shot down and 2 people got killed. We didn't use the F-117, even though it was a good mission for the platform. Why not use it ? They didn't want to risk it getting shot down, and thus compromising stealth technology over an unimportant conflict.

Same goes with Iraq + Afghanistan. They are limited wars.
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
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6023739020_9fd220db12.jpg

Used in one mission and we only found out because the tail was not destroyed.

We use outdated weapons(M4,M16) because Colt has a strong lobby but if needed we have alot better options.
 
Izick said:
Some do, but only because it goes with the whole over patriotic thing.

Personally, I respect that these people give up their lives for our country, but I'm not blindly loyal to them, or all their practices.
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What do you mean by "give up their lives for our country" ?
Are you saying if they wernt there that your country would actually be under any threat? What about the tens of thousands of lives "given up" by innocent Iraqi civilians just so Americans can grab some oil and convince themselves they are making the world more "free" ?
 
Huh, the brits must do stuff waaay different than the U.S

I was an infantryman during the heaviest fighting on the Syrian border and Fallujah and I've come away with a completely different experience. I don't see anything wrong with war games or movies because they are just entertainment. They don't even approach realism other than the props shown on the screen. I agree that everyone serving is not a "hero" but as someone who has never met more people with more character, courage and selflessness than I have during my time in, I think the stuff of heroes resides there. I still watch these forms of media because I enjoy them, though I did not enjoy combat.

Also, his guys unit sounds like they were Grade A garbage. Put a new guy on point? "FNG" mentality? I didn't know Brits ran their shit that way.
 
ave had multiple friends join the military after going to a naval academy or west point, and they have since then always viewed the average "common soldier" in disdain
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Oooh Officers! fuck 'em. butterbars don't know shit.
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
Click to expand...

I can think of a couple of reasons, the most obvious of them being that keeping your really high tech and valuable stuff secret just makes sense. The weapon that you have hidden is as/ if more deadly to your opponent than the one that is in his face. And some of this stuff is so specialized that you simply can't use it except in certain circumstances.

Another reason is that if we knew exactly how much money and resources goes into making this stuff every year, alot of people would be very unhappy. The money outside of the defense budget in particular, organizations that have essentially a blank check would not be seen so favorably by a populace that has their homes foreclosed on through illegal methods by corrupt banks.
 
goomba said:
What do you mean by "give up their lives for our country" ?
Are you saying if they wernt there that your country would actually be under any threat? What about the tens of thousands of lives "given up" by innocent Iraqi civilians just so Americans can grab some oil and convince themselves they are making the world more "free" ?
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Yeah there would be a threat, end of discussion.
 
If by media you mean 'Journalism/news and news media', perhaps negatively.
When you look at entertainment media, the military is almost always portrayed (as a collective) in favourable terms, with a few bad enlisted/officers that said military will work to root out, and bureaucrats are either incompetent or adversarial.
 
Eh... There's a couple of different ways that this gets spun. I'm not a fan of any of them. I hate going anywhere in uniform tbh.
braves01 said:
I heard Act of Valor was pretty good. Anyone see it?
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It was a decent action flick.
 
Pandaman said:
why do americans seem to think their military has tons of super secret overpowered weapons and technology that they don't use to save money and lives now solely because it would ruin the surprise for some nebulous future war?
Click to expand...

Google U-2 and SR-71.
 
Salvadora said:
Why do Americans seem to worship the military?
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Republicans only represent like half of the country at best you know.

I sure as shit don't worship the military and I don't envy the people who sign up to go over to these hellholes and kill more innocent people than actual terrorists.
 
SpectreFire said:
Oh I don't know, the dozens of other countries in the world?
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No-one is going to threaten the US with war. That would be insane. Neither are they going to threaten Germany, France, most of Europe really. There's no point.

I don't think our military needs to be at its current size. Its not even the military's responsibility to actually "defend" us against terrorist attacks. What they're doing in Iraq and Afghanistan is pre-emptive defense, and I'm not entirely sure its needed.
 
HomShaBom said:
More referring to military swearing in. Wrong terminology likely, but lets go it this way. Is this not a legal function of the executive branch?
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No, I'm saying I don't see a non-preemptive roll for the military in terrorist attack prevention. Terrorist attacks occur at unpredictable frequencies, locations, and types, you can't plan or mount a "defense" against that with large bodies of troops and equipment (the closest you can get to "defense" is possibly for screening people entering the country, which isn't the military's job). The only use I see for the military in the context of terrorism is if we expand their duties to maintaining a presence across the globe to constantly ferret out threats against the US before they're set in motion and...I'm not sure if that should be their job.
 
Salvadora said:
Why do Americans seem to worship the military?
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We don't. At least, not all of us. There are plenty of American stories in which the government and military are portrayed as the villains.

That said, I have respect for my nation's military. Partially because my grandfathers were navy men, and my father and sister were and are army, respectively. I think it takes a lot to say you'll put your life on the line to defend your nation and its ideals. Whether that's what you wind up doing or not.
 
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