From mainerjohnthomas
"Civilians set the bar so low, and reach it so rarely it is often hard to understand them at all."
How so? Examples please.
/quote]
I'll take examples from this week, just to limit the scope. I was recertifying my Industrial First Aid (2) ticket this week, and ran up against the military/civilian thought barrier again. The subjects involved were aid to a minor child without parental consent, and mouth to mouth. In both cases, the former because touching a child if a parent was not present to consent can lead to criminal (and in some cases sexual) assault charges, even if you save said childs life; the latter because of the risk of Hep C and HIV. I tried to understand how people who have sought out the training and responsibility to save someones life could be so willing to sit back and watch somebody die, just to protect themselves. I was a minority of one. The instructor, and all other 13 candidates agreed that it was foolish to put yourself at small risk to save a life. In Mayerthorpe AB we have four officers being gunned down in the performance of their duty. What do I read in the editorials of the Vancouver Province, do I read tributes to the noble sacrifice of these officers? Nope, I get an editorial by a pot advocate explaining how if the police and govornment would stop trying to enforce the law, then nobody would have got hurt. In the paper on the following day, we have a pair of interesting articles, one on international womens day, bewailing the fact that gangrape is still a popular intertribal sport in africa, and corrupt officials and police often take part, two pages previously an artical wondering why CFB Edmonton was lending APC to the RCMP. We have a civilian population that seems to want to be protected, that objects to criminal behaviour, but objects more strongly to anyone doing anything about it. The idea that you might have to take risks to defend your fellow citizens has passed entirely from the culture. In the same way, communities can be terrorized by individuals for the simple reason that no one can be bothered to testify, because it might entail discord or confrontation. We have a country that condemns attrocities committed abroad, in the same paper that condemns the use of military equipment in support of law enforcement. We have a country that responds to every attrocity be enacting a law, but shys from enforcing them, for fear of antagonizing criminals. The civilians I move among are largely good people, but they have the beleif that standing up for what they beleive, or to defend their neighbors is somehow wrong. Where this beleif comes from, I don't know, I neither understand, nor share it. I have been out now for longer than I was in in the first place, but I am ever reminded of what side of the us/them boundry I am on.
