heir careers and studies are disrupted and sometimes the whole course of their lives is altered. they spend at least two years in the armed forces engaged in activities which do not provide them with any useful experience with regard to their future work. it can’t even be argued that what they learn might prove valuable in a national emergency. when they leave the services, young men quickly forget all the unnecessary information about warfare which they were made to acquite. it is shocking to think that skilled and unskilled men are often nothing more than source of cheap labour for the military.
some people argue that military service ‘ does you good’. ‘ two years in the army,’ you hear people say, ‘will knock some sense into him.’ the opposite is usually the case. anyone would resent being pushed about and bullied for two years, all in the name of ‘discipline’. the military mind requires uniformity and conformity. people who do not quite fit into this brutal pattern suffer terribly and may even emerge with serious personality disorders. there are many wonderful ways of spending two years. serving in the armed forces is not one of them!