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[+] -9 points 2 days ago* (last edited 2 days ago) (3 children)

I don't give a shit what you believe. I am telling you from first hand experience (not "belief") the truth.

You want to do a whole "guilt by association" thing, but you haven't put ANY thought into what that means. Is the cook a "killer"? Is the IT guy a murder? How about the guy who does fuel maintenance? Yeoman?

What about those serving on ship tenders? They don't even have weapons, they're supply ships. Are they all killers by association too?

Why not blame farmers too? I mean, they did give the ship tender food... and that tender did give that food to a destroyer... and that destroyer has a cook, so we know he's a bloodthirsty baby killer... and that food was eaten by hundreds of people.... one of them might clean/maintain a weapon system... and someone else might shoot it... so they're all murders now too..... right? Especially that water guy from before....

Where's the line? Or maybe, we should just judge the person who pulls the trigger, instead of engaging in blind group punishment?

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  • [–] 12 points 2 days ago (1 child)

    well your truth would have ships running weapons systems with under 10 people and in some cases less than one. In a tank crew the one firing the gun is not the only one killing people.

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  • [+] -7 points 2 days ago (3 children)

    Apples and oranges, an amazingly flawed and poorly thought out example.

    You're comparing 100s (sometimes thousands) to a crew of 3-5 people.. as if that's even nearly the same thing.

    Plus you're ignoring the whole motopool behind the tankcrew too, and the supply team with them. The mechanics and logisticians, cooks and even water boys....

    And even those two things aren't comparable. Wheras a "waterboy" in a motopool might have to worry about being directly attacked (and be prepared to defend themselves). Ship maintainers will never have that happen..... there's no scenario where suddenly the ship's water engineer is picking up a gun to murder people; even in defense...

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  • [–] 8 points 2 days ago (1 child)

    Pit crew for the murder machine are all still murderers

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  • [–] -5 points 2 days ago* (2 children)

    brain dead edgy teen take. It's like saying the amazon delivery drivers are equally uber-capitalist oligarchs.

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  • [–] 1 point 9 hours ago (1 child)

    Yes you should also not work for Amazon, if you have a choice. For most people they do not have that choice unless they want to be essentially homeless. Most people do have other choices than the military. The severity is also worse, one is supporting an evil company, one is killing civilians, so you are more morally in the wrong for being complicit in the latter.

    If I'm the one who hands the killer the gun, am I almost exactly as culpable? What if I hand it to the guy who hands it to him? What if I just fix the ship he is on to kill people? Well suddenly now I'm just fine and did nothing wrong?

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  • [–] 0 points 9 hours ago* (1 child)

    Most people do have other choices than the military

    THIS, is your privilege showing.

    This is your normalized worldview because, to you, you had other options. Most people do, right? Meanwhile ignoring the minority of hundreds millions.....

    Lets do some math real quick.


    What percent of households make less than $30k net?

    It's about 23.5% of America...


    23.5% of 350milllion people. Actually, lets be fair here and only use that adult populate of 205.7million and round it down

    23.5% of 200million?

    47million people a struggling.


    How many of them do you think have better options?

    Most of them, right? Lets say 95% of them have better options, so, of 5% of 47million?

    That's 2.35 million people that don't have better options....


    what's the size of the US active duty military?

    US has 1.33 million active duty military.... Obviously, not everyone in the military is some empoverished slave. The gungho yipee types do exist too.


    But, just guess, what ratio do you think of those two types of people exist in 1.33 million? I'll do you a solid, I'll say that the gunghos outweigh 2:1....

    That's ~400,000 people who were poor, likely with no other options.


    NONE of this excuses the actions of the American imperalist military. This is the system working as intended. Keep the people poor, and dangle socialism through military service.

    If you didn't have to choose between military and homeless, or Amazon and homeless... if you had other options, I'm happy for you, I am, really. It's a privilege to have the opportunity and luck to do something else.... but you're using that privilege to punch down by ignoring the millions who didn't have your opportunities.

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  • [–] 1 point 5 hours ago* (1 child)

    I mean sure you could just guess at the percentages, or you could look at what people actively serving said their reasons for joining were.

    https://worldmetrics.org/reasons-for-joining-the-military-statistics/#b-7-data-sources

    29% said it was for financial security, and if we assume ALL of those have NO option besides being homeless, not just that they wanted financial stability, that's still 70% of the military supporting the current evil by choice.

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  • [–] 1 point 5 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago)

    OH DANG, so you mean to say, when I clocked it around 33% were poor and needed a job I was almost spot on with a study you found.... crazy....

    it's almost like... My lived experience means that I probably know wtf I'm talking about vs some terminally online, privileged, teenagers.

    You can be mad, you can downvote me in protest.... but.. you see the numbers, right? The same numbers I've just shown and you just linked to.... You can't downvote the facts and numbers. And the fact is, that you have a bias, a privilege, that blinds you. That tells you it's justifiable to punch down at millions of people (active and veteran) who are victims of the same shitty system of opportunistic capitalism.

    I'm not making excuses for the military as a whole, or its actions. But I'm not going to lump the cook as the same kind of monster as the general. And again, you're a crazy person if you do.

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  • [–] 3 points 2 days ago (1 child)

    Ethically consistent take, everyone knows what the military does, it's an all volunteer force, you're responsible for your choices. Quit making excuses for killers, dumbass

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  • [–] 3 points 1 day ago

    Bless you for giving us someone to argue with! The killers cannot kill without helpers to help them kill. If the helpers all decided that the killers needed to stop killing there would be no killing at all, so the killing happens with the consent and participation of the helpers. Drawing a little line around these and those in the organization is especially meaningless seeing as how in real war all are completely valid targets for the killers on both sides.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 day ago

    When I say don't believe I mean it does not make logical sense. You are also doubling down without actually taking into what I am saying and pointing out. The main issue is with your 99%. No ship carries thousands. The largest carry over a thousand but just a bit. Most carry hundreds and some carry less than 100. The largest ships with many weapon systems are simply going to need more than 10 people to fire them given they run 24 hours with multiple ships. Similarly the smallest ship cannot have only one sailor who fires weapons. Ship maintainers often are these people. If the ship is not using its weapons they don't sit around. They do maintenance. Further if you job is to help keep the ship running you are part of the ships killing. If you work in a factory on land making shells for the ship you are. And we as taxpayers are as well. There are degrees but when you sign on to help do the killing that degree is very very close even if you don't pull triggers.

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  • [–] 5 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    When the mob is committing crime, RICO treats the whole organization as equally responsible. To dismantle organized crime you MUST also go after the helpers, the ones who assist the murderers and then exclaim that their hands are clean. Nope, you all share the same blood on all of your hands.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    I thought the purpose of Rico was to dismantle the mob by getting the ones at the top instead of the lowly peasants of the organization. The uphill guilty by association. I don't remember Rico being used to finally pin the kid making delivery runs.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 day ago (1 child)

    RICO goes after everybody in the hopes that the ones at the bottom will continue turning on their leaders until it gets to the top. If the ones at the bottom don't flip, they are charged with the rest. The kid making the delivery runs will absolutely get charged if he retains solidarity with the organization.

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  • [–] 2 points 1 day ago (1 child)

    Still sounds like the purpose is to get at the people at the top tho

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  • The purpose is to stop the crimes. Get the ones on the ground and you stop today. Get them to roll and you stop tomorrow. Then the next layer has to act and gets caught. One is the same as the whole until the whole has been stopped. Turns out people don't live taking punishment that they think is unfair.

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