Comments on: Rites Of Passage

By: Bryan

Bryan — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 03:40:42 +0000

It happens in other places, and I think it would give a lpt of people a break before college to decompress from school.

By: oldwhitelady

oldwhitelady — Mon, 20 Nov 2006 03:19:05 +0000

Your idea on universal national service sounds like a good idea.

By: Bryan

Bryan — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 19:47:55 +0000

Minou, I’m one of those crazies who think that universal national service would help adolescents and society, and I do mean universal. There is something that everyone can do, even the disabled, and the shared aggravation helps to tie a nation together.

I don’t want it limited to military service. There are a lot of public jobs that need to be done other than shooting guns. It will do a lot of people a world of good to live in communal conditions with a cross section of the nation, as well as getting kids into shape with a little physical labor, and accurately measuring the educational level and health level of young adults.

By: minou

minou — Sun, 19 Nov 2006 11:15:21 +0000

There’s a lot to be said for traditions, some of them are still useful, but we throw the baby out with the bath water in an unseemly scramble for ‘modernism’.

I still think that National Service was a good thing for adolescent/adult males – it provided an outlet for aggression in a controlled environment, it also marked a transition from a boy to a man and it probably helped a few choose a future job, training was free in any branch of the services. I would like to know, when National Service was around, whether we had the problems of youths on the rampage, football thuggery etc. National Service would also instil some respect – something sadly lacking in todays society.

We’ve gone from one extreme to another, society had rules, now the individual has his/own rules, perhaps the pendulum will stop at the middle and respect both society and the individual.