Bye Sean

[Kat Kanning]

Still reeling over this.  He went from wanting to be a catholic worker, helping feed the homeless and doing civil disobedience to the war to joining up to kill brown people?? 

[David]

I'm horrible with names, so I am not sure if I have met him or not. 

Still reeling over this.  He went from wanting to be a catholic worker, helping feed the homeless and doing civil disobedience to the war to joining up to kill brown people?? 

That would be a big turnaround.   

[FTL_Ian]

Tall, quiet, nice guy.  Hard to find pics of him as he was very behind the scenes.

[Roycerson]

He must have been fairly intelligent but he chose to go infantry instead of something like a linguist (comes with extra stripes and tech school in Monterrey).  So maybe, like many other young males, he thought it might be fun to shoot big guns and throw grenades.

[David]

Off topic, but my younger brother joined the army about 6 months ago.  I thought I had talked enough sense into him to not to go into the human meat grinder.     I just hope my brother and Sean both keep their honor, and refuse to kill innocents, or to follow unjust orders. 

[Puke]

He must have joined to go through airborne training, but that doesn't guarantee getting into the 82nd.

[Kat Kanning]

I was wondering how he'd joined a specific regimen.

[Roycerson]

I know three people who were told by their recruiter that they were joining the 82nd.  None of them ended up there.

About the background check.  I knew a guy in tech school with a hammer and sickle tattoo.  He was open about being a communist.  He told his recruiter that he got it when he was drunk and it didn't mean anything.  They made him an Air Traffic Controller.

[kola]

they are really pumping recruiters into the schools here in CO. they do lectures, gte phone numbers and practically harass the kids and their parents by calling and mailing letters and showing up in person all over town.

they prey on the weak and the poor.

sick bastards.

Kola

[J’raxis 270145]

Private universities are even forced to allow that, lest they lose their gummint funding.

[Russell Kanning]

You'd think they'd check for anti-government activity before letting you sign up.

maybe they needed to train more insurgents or al-quida guys

[TackleTheWorld]

With numerous warnings that I am not Sean, or even know him that well:  I did the same thing when I was 17.  Here were my thoughts

• I'm bored
• No one understands me here
• no one cares about me here
• I must get far away from here
• I want to drive big machines
• I want to do adventurous things
• I want see new places
• I want to be on my own

That last one turned out to be pretty ironic, I was ordered around for three years.

[ancapagency]

Yeah, I had a GF who joined the Army a year or so after I got back to the states.  She was from a small town in NC, had never been anywhere or done anything, her parents were both dead, and she was the youngest of three sisters, and her sisters always pushed her around.  I suspect, despite the nasty things I said about the Army (even though I was still in at the time) she thought it sounded like a good way to get out and see the world. 

Sadly, that's exactly what the recruiters prey on.

[Tom Sawyer]

[Kat Kanning]

It's one of THOSE pictures where one person is standing off away from the group.