Ignorant Civies

[Ex-Dragoon]

It's not my fault that I have talked to war vet's from America and they seem to just brag about the kills, not about how much they actually "helped".

Sorry for my ignorance.

I know plenty of vets from the US and I have never met any that bragged about their kills so I call BS on your story. If anything they prefer not to talk about it or forget it entirely.

 

[medaid]

I know plenty of vets from the US and I have never met any that bragged about their kills so I call BS on your story. If anything they prefer not to talk about it or forget it entirely.

Neither have I... there's allot of dark humor in conversations between us and them, but I have yet to hear a guy brag about their kills. If they talk about it it's only because of training value or purposes. The professional ones keep these things to themselves.

 

[NovaScotiaNewfie]

I wonder if some people forget...


"It's the Soldier, not the reporter,

who has given us freedom of the press.

It's the Soldier, not the poet,

who has given us freedom of speech.

It's the Soldier, not the campus organizer,

who has given us freedom to demonstrate.

It's the Soldier, not the lawyer,

who has given us the right to a fair trail.

And it's the Soldier who salutes the flag,

who serves the flag,

whose coffin is draped in the flag,

that allows the protester to burn the flag"


I guess in short, it's the men and women tha serve the country and all Canadians and have paid/will continue to pay in blood so they can be a-holes. Maybe if they thought about what it means to serve, to give of yourself and become part of something bigger then yourself.

I wonder if we had more military documentaries/shows like Truth, Duty, Valor etc would more folks get even a somewhat basic idea of the CF?

To the folks who ask is the uniform, CADPAT or Dress Uniform is a costume..I'd say..do you ask a Police Officer, RCMP or Municipal if what they are wearing is a costume..or better yet..if their side arm is real.

BTW good job with the info on the Royal Newfoundland Regiment . Always great to share the knowledge/history of what Newfoundland and her sons and daughters paid on that day.

 

[NovaScotiaNewfie]

Do some of those questions like can you take your own pistol on a tour etc...make you as upset as some of those civi question/stereotypes?

Oh and by the way...just wanted to say thanks for being patient and polite when it comes to discussions..sites like you tube etc...where they have video of military always end up starting "fights". You get one person saying Military Y is better then Military Z or A's SPEC OPS is better then B's....but more then likely it's more of the video game veterans or folks that have never served...at least here folks try to teach and educate those who visit and do in a grown up mature and professional manner IE) Act like Soldiers, Sailors and Air men and women, and for our USMC/Royal Marine friends that might be members here Marines.

 

[NovaScotiaNewfie]

"It's not my fault that I have talked to war vet's from America and they seem to just brag about the kills, not about how much they actually "helped".

Sorry for my ignorance."

You're entitled to your beliefs but to come in and make a statement like that, you should have realized that some people are going to take offence to it. Since the US Military and CF train, and operate together, a statement like that is not going to go over well on a military forum.

I'm not trying to bash you, just to say that this is not the place to make such a statement.

 

[Richie]

.... I don't agree with what most of the American's are there for, which is purely to kill people, where we are there to help, so I commend you boys and girls!

Thanks!

As a fellow civilian, I'll say what everyone else on this thread is tiptoeing around: your are ignorant and condescending. I lived in North Carolina for two years and met lots of people who had served in the U.S. military and none of them bragged about their military exploits. If nothing else, their experiences in some of the world's less desirable locations gave them a better appreciation of what we have here in North America and why we have it.

Sounds to me like you suffer from the typical knee-jerk anti-Americanism that so many of my fellow countrymen are afflicted with. Lighten up! The U.S. is not a "Great Satan".

And please don't call the members of our military "boys and girls"; they're just men and women doing a job. Try to at least give them that much respect.

Richie

 

[X-mo-1979]

I know army wifes who don't know anything about what their Husbands do.Asked one what trade her husband was and she told me he did something with big tanks.Found out later he was a LCIS tech posted to a service batallion.

Just getting back from Texas I can honestly say they were the most receptive people I have ever seen when it comes to military.I was thanked at least 10 times for my service.

 

[retiredgrunt45]

Ignorant civilians don't bother me anymore, once upon a time they used to, but no more. It really doesn't matter how you explain what you do or did in the military, they will never understand unless they've been in the uniform. It's like expalining to a bus driver how to be and astronaut, doesn't compute.

Now that i'm a civilian myself, I usually have a good chuckle when I hear someone say what a bad day they had at work.

So don't get to bent up about when some civilian starts spouting of at the mouth about something he can't even imagine about, instead have a good chuckle knowing he looks and sounds like a total retard.

I like to think there are more people who will try to understand than those who will just come of as ignorant jackasses.

 

[leroi]

As a civilian it saddens me deeply to hear your many stories of rude, insensitive, treatment in Canada, by fellow Canadian civilians. I'm appalled and shocked at the same time.  I thank you all for doing a wonderful job protecting our interests. It breaks my heart every time I read about another soldier's death.

I offer the following observations to perhaps try to understand the incredible apathy, and yes, stupendous ignorance:

1) Historically, civilian life in Canada has been soft; geographically we have been sheltered; during WW 2 the only hardship my grandparents remember suffering was a short-lived, shortage of citrus fruit
2) I do blame the Canadian Press (and not to offend any CF personnel who've been comrade-in-arms with American military personnel) some of us Canadians are culturally tired of being bombarded with American content in our multimedia sources: i.e. What's front page news in Canada today? Answer: the latest American sex scandal. One of the reasons I love Army.ca is because I can actually get good information about  Canada and the world around me. Thank you for that.
3) Complacency and taking what we have for granted. I truly believe that civilian Canadians are going to be sorry for this one day. The wonderful freedom and peace that we enjoy in Canada is someting that many Canadians believe they are entitled to. That sense of entitlement is wrong--IMHO.  There is a price for everything on this planet.
4)My experience: I have a son who only just announced he wants to serve in the Canadian Forces; we don't come from a military family and this was a big shock for me but I supported him and I'm proud of him.  Sadly, these are some of my friends/families responses:  Is he mentally (you know) okay? Why would he want to do something stupid like that? Does he have a death-wish? And, I feel sorry for you (meaning me his mom) ... So ... welcome to my small (minded?) white-collar civilian world. And thank you for graciously welcoming me to Army.ca.

At any rate,  while I'm proud of my son's decision, I can also empathize with some of the comments posted on this thread.  Much work needs to be done to wake the Canadian public from its slumber ... Please understand also that I am in no way critical of Americans--my beef is with news coverage in Canada ... my aim is to maintain Canadian autonomy ...

Let's try to get along, shall we ....?

 

[TCBF]

leroi,

Thank you for that fine post, and welcome to army.ca!

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

Piper calling ryan a tool is in contravention of the Guidelines I will give you time to edit your post. If you do not you will be placed on Warning.

Milnet.Ca Staff

 

[JABAC]

On the same line of the previous posts, I think that one of the most appalling ignorant attitudes of many Canadians today is anti-americanism in general.  We need to keep in mind that without the States as our main trading partner and ally, Canada wouldn't exist the way we do.  Anti-americanism makes Canadians look ignorant, selfish, and self-righteous.  I am proud that we have such strong connections with the States and it makes me sad and angry to hear people bad-mouthing them.  Although I know this attitude is not shared by all Canadians, the ones who do support them are a lot quieter about it...I hope these negative attitudes will begin to change within Canada.  I would be very proud and honoured to serve next to an American soldier.

 

[Lune]

I had to do a presentation on world issues for one of my classes. I chose the War in Afghanistan, specifically the list of facts from Ruxted about the good we've done there. At the beginning of the presentation, before I displayed the facts, I asked, "How many of you think we should be in Afghanistan?" Only one person raised their hand. During the presentation, this one girl spoke up, and said something along the lines of, "all the soldiers over there are uneducated, ignorant people who had no other choice but to join the army." Basically, people in the Army aren't intelligent enough to make it in the "real world." Then she went on and basically tried to imply that the facts were FAKE. She pointed out the facts about medical care and said it's only risen that much because we destroyed all their hospitals when the war started. I was dumbfounded by how misinformed she was.

 

[Lumber]

I had to do a presentation on world issues for one of my classes. I chose the War in Afghanistan, specifically the list of facts from Ruxted about the good we've done there. At the beginning of the presentation, before I displayed the facts, I asked, "How many of you think we should be in Afghanistan?" Only one person raised their hand. During the presentation, this one girl spoke up, and said something along the lines of, "all the soldiers over there are uneducated, ignorant people who had no other choice but to join the army." Basically, people in the Army aren't intelligent enough to make it in the "real world." Then she went on and basically tried to imply that the facts were FAKE. She pointed out the facts about medical care and said it's only risen that much because we destroyed all their hospitals when the war started. I was dumbfounded by how misinformed she was.

What class was this for and at what school? (Just so I can get an idea of HER level of education)

 

[ghyslyn]

On the same line of the previous posts, I think that one of the most appalling ignorant attitudes of many Canadians today is anti-americanism in general.  We need to keep in mind that without the States as our main trading partner and ally, Canada wouldn't exist the way we do.  Anti-americanism makes Canadians look ignorant, selfish, and self-righteous.  I am proud that we have such strong connections with the States and it makes me sad and angry to hear people bad-mouthing them.  Although I know this attitude is not shared by all Canadians, the ones who do support them are a lot quieter about it...I hope these negative attitudes will begin to change within Canada.  I would be very proud and honoured to serve next to an American soldier.

I've recently come back from California, and I can understand the many many anti-American thoughts, while many are nice and polite, a good number are also ignorant, a man I had a conversation with was extremely nice, but I almost laughed when he asked me if I went to the University of Canada.

The worst I saw though was a man at the dollar store, after noticing that we were speaking in french, passed by us saying "excuse me american coming through". You might also want to note that he had ragged clothes and many bloody bandaids on his face.

But apart from that the people were generally very friendly and open-minded.

 

[Ex-Dragoon]

Piper thank you for your co-operation

Milnet.ca Staff.

 

[rmc_wannabe]

Seems that even people you grow up with turn on you when you don the uniform.

I recently looked at my facebook this week and found a message from a long lost highschool friend. I was pretty excited because i hadn't heard from her in a few years and so I was eager to see what she had to say; all I say were 3 words :"fuck the army" written across the screen.

I was pretty much dumbfounded and haven't really been able to fathom how to respond to such biting, but weak criticisms  ???

 

[X-mo-1979]

Sheep, wolf's,and sheepdog comparrision is my favorite comebacks.

 

[Yrys]

I was pretty much dumbfounded and haven't really been able to fathom how to respond to such biting, but weak criticisms  ???

I would say wait before answering . Wait until it bits less or you know more how you would like to answer.

Winds from high school past are sometimes strange... I was asked last week if I knew about and was going to our 20th anniversary of
high school graduation this may. A school where I was bullied each day, and was "reject no 2". I was flabbergast by the question,
and wait a few days before answering that I didn't have any reasons to go, but thank you for asking... but I could also have not respond.

Bottom line: answer is not an obligation.

 

[George Wallace]

Seems that even people you grow up with turn on you when you don the uniform.

I recently looked at my facebook this week and found a message from a long lost highschool friend. I was pretty excited because i hadn't heard from her in a few years and so I was eager to see what she had to say; all I say were 3 words :"fuck the army" written across the screen.

I was pretty much dumbfounded and haven't really been able to fathom how to respond to such biting, but weak criticisms  ???

You could ask her if she meant that to mean that she supported the soldiers in much the same way as women supported the French Foreign Legion in their brothels that followed the Legionnaires around the world? 

I am sure that this response, being a little creative and historic, may really baffle her mind.   ;D