The US National Guard

Do you want a list?

Yuck yuck yuck...

Why are you laughing?

Joe, you wouldn't believe the propaganda we're exposed to on a daily basis.

It's now mandatory for certain theatres to dedicate a long segment of their pre-feature advertising to the military. Now before each film you have to sit through five whole minutes of glorified, commercialized brainwashing.
It depicts men and women, blacks and whites, working together to feed starving brown people, using complicated missile guidance systems to blow up starving brown people, traversing en masse across rough terrain as they are accosted by starving brown people. They use expensive Hollywood-style special fx to create these completely false, science fiction environments where you see soldiers working with advanced robots, or using virtual reality to pin-point a single person on the other side of the planet and then shooting them with some imaginary laser beam from space.

They have absolutely no qualms over exaggerating or outright lying to get you to sign up.

Whoah, whoah, whoah. Hold the fucking phone. The theatres are not required to show this ad. The army pays for the ad time.

I learned this from my bud who works as a manager at the local theatre. He says not too long ago, a deal was cut between film distributors and the military where the theatres would get supplemental funding from the army if they ran their ads. Because it's so easy to see films these days, alot of theatres' business is lousy (their only pocket of income being from gimmicks like 3D and I-Max), so they have no choice if they want to stay afloat. I don't actually know if this is a national thing or if it's limited to certain states. This whole issue has actually been subject of controversy for a while now, that is the military's taking advantage of certain medias that are dwindling in the market so they can inject their own message into said media.

It doesn't effect me that much though, I often show up to movies late as it is.

All we get is quick thirty second long adverts of average looking people crawling around in mud ending with 'Be the best you can'.

Yours borders on glorifying warfare, and if I was the president of the UN I'd move for an international agreement against that.

I think our slogan used to be the same, or something extremely similar. "Be All You Can Be" I think it was.

For a while it was "Army of One" trying to appeal to nationalist individualism. Now it's simply "Army Strong". I think they tried "Join The Fucking Army Already, You Faggot" for a while too.

It's advertising. Of course it's unscrupulous. But it isn't as if this is better:



Yes, the production value is lower, but the intent is identical.

The main problem I have with the one I linked is the blatent all consuming propaganda, brainwashing and patriotism. Although I despise all army adverts.

Do you not think that if your military was given the budget to hire a really expensive marketing firm they would jump at the chance?

I hope that our government would be smart enough to stop them.

But yeah, I see your point.

I have to say that I really don't think that your government would stop them.

Oh? The UK has been all about anti-patriotism since Thatcher was thrown out. Although our government is a bit too inept at the moment to stop anything.

Yes, I can see them now. "Nooo, don't try to convince young people to join our understaffed military by appealing to their sense of honor and duty. That would be wrong"!

Appealing to their sense of honor and duty would be a pretty tough gig.

Fun fact: In 2006 the CIA spent 14 Million dollars on Scissors, which they promptly buried in the desert.

Enjoy your shitty countries.

I see nothing wrong with the original video. It's advertising. It's doing what it's meant to do.

I don't strongly disagree with the Youtube commenter either. My main issue is simply the fact that s/he has confused political opposition to warfare with 'bashing the soldiers'. Frankly*, I've never seen anything but complete and utter support for the armed forces from even the most leftist pundit or comedian and anyone who assumes otherwise is an idiot.



* Actually, with the exception of the Westboro Baptist Church.

It's glorifying warfare, that's not cool.

I respect the military and am grateful for their committment, but I don't like many of the kinds of people who enlist. Plus, the only reason why we have a military is to protect us from other militaries, or invade lands that have inferior armed-forces.

And not all soldiers are heroes.

Are you suggesting that we shouldn't have an army at all?

I think he's just against the ad.

How do you suggest the military should recruit without making themselves sound exciting?

Besides, whilst I concede that the advert glorifies the military, it really doesn't show any warfare as such. They're shooting guns, but not at anything in particular.

Exactly. I don't blame them for their means of recruitment, considering how widely spread the US military is these days. It still doesn't make the advertisement of an institution that was made for war and runs on brain-washing any better.

That's weak.

Yes. But you still haven't answered my question.

If military = necessary, then military recruitment = necessary. If military recruitment = necessary then advertising that makes the military look cool = necessary.

Spot any flaw in the above logic and I will concede my point. Or possibly come up with a new one.

A big military is not necessary, advertising should be firmly grounded in reality and not fairytales.

I just wish they'd start using money on school and better health care systems rather than warfare and death :-/