Mandatory military service

Fuck Greece and all the countries that have this shit. I am so jealous of all of you living in proper civilised countries that you do not have to go through this fucking thing. I am about to join the forces in January and it has fucked my fucking life big time. I cannot work in the schools i used to for this year, i cannot even do the private lessons i did because of it. The pressure of finishing my master thesis until January is bigger than even and i feel like i am gonna have a nervous breakdown. Add also the fact that i broke up with my girfriend for 6 years. My life is going to hell.

I hate the army in general and every aspect of it. To make matters worse, due to my history of having a few regional gold medals in pre-teen and teen competitions of 100 meter running, and my history on martial arts training, which i was STUPID enough to mention on my resumes, there are pretty high chances that they will call me to join the fucking special forces, which i wanna avoid at any cost. Fuck the army. I am 26 years old, and was thinking of starting a fucking PHD, just to be able to postpone my military obligation until i am 30, but for music-related studies you are not getting paid for doing research, so not an option. Not to mention that if by the time i have reached 30, have gotten a good steady job, i would still have to quit. Fuck.

Sorry, had to blow some steam off.

I'm truly sorry for your situation.

My own experience in Australia is much different. I tried to join the army at the age of 16 because I wanted some discipline in my life with the opportunity of learnng a relevant trade but was denied access because my eyesight isn't 20/20. Same with the police force.

I have a lazy eye that won't be corrected by glasses or surgery. I'm 44 this year and am still playing A grade cricket as a batsman. I don't wear a protective helmet as I trust my reflexes and vision to avoid the projectile missile in the form of a cricket ball. I'm sure I could've handled any training or mission that the army could've given me. It's hard to have national pride when you've been rejected for such a simple and pointless barrier.

On the other hand, if I was forced into the armed forces, I'm sure I wouldn't have been so keen to join.

I'm sorry for you mate as well. Unless you wanna become a pilot or something like that, i do not understand why would you need a 20/20 vision. Plus i think universally, the training outside special forces is a joke anyway. And yeah, the problem here is that it is obligatory. For 9 months, no matter what you are doing in your life, studying, working, whatever, you will have to stop to do your service. And there is no way around it, unless you have a severe medical condition, physical or mental, or you are a drug addict. Alot of people actually fake it. They play crazy and do not do the service, but it's quite risky. Especially if you teach in schools like i do, cause your are marked for life as a person with mental issues. With unemployement here in Greece reaching something like 26%, you cannot afford adding another reason for not hiring you.

Thanks for your input. At this point i wanna make something clear. This so called mandatory military service that all males should go through, is not the actual force that goes to war(unless Greece is being invaded, and it's not since Greece is a member of NATO). For these purposes we have the people who join by their own choice and get paid for it(however as i said on my first post YOU CAN be called on the special forces, but still it's a 9 month training and then your are off. You are still not considered a professional soldier). War these days is about using the technology more than anything else anyway. The actual battlefield is secondary.

What mandatory military service is in reality, besides the first month where you learn some "tactics"(hahah-lol), and to shoot a weapon, all you do is being in the military camp, with hundreds of others(most of whom you don't like), waking up every day at 5:30am, and spending all day doing the chores that the shithead nationalist neo nazi generals order. Things like cleaning the camp, cooking, doing paperwork, "guarding" the wharehouses. Basically you are their little bitch, and you cannot deny anything they ask cause you might get in trouble(after several lawsuits however they mostly stopped asking for completely unreasonable things). The supposed reason is to learn how to be disciplined. The actual reason is that army service helps the economy. For starters they need much more permanent professional soldiers to boss us around, so more jobs available. Then, since they send to you serve in camps in remote places, the soldiers help the local economy. When you have some free hours and you are allowed to leave the camp, you have no other choice than visit the closest village and spend money there. Places that otherwise nobody would ever visit.

However this does not justify forcing you to leave your job, studies, family, whatever for 9 months(used to be 2 and half years in the past). You are just putting your life on hold for absolutely no reason.

I thank GOD I live in Canada, where I generally have a say about something in some regard. Sucks sir for you to have to go through that and put your life on hold for something you do not want.

The army isn't that bad...so long as they don't put you to war.

Actually quite good fun.

And (in the UK at least) the education options are quite good.

Sorry for your situation.

With the exception that your country is under direct attack, anyone who does not want to be in the armed forces, shouldn't be.

Aaah, mandatory army, we used to have that here too in my undisclosed eastern european country. The only way of avoiding it was to enroll to a college/university and I was there in an instant. Barely made it since the army was especially interested in me for some reason and I passed physical flawlessly despite the fact that I was horribly stoned during the tests.

Not that I don't like the army, but the mandatory reserve was always 9 months of being shouted at and drinking when the co's were not watching. Total of 30 rounds fired during these 9 months on average, no real skills to acquire so I bailed out.

It went away a few years back (10 maybe?) but I am willing to bet that the army was a sole reason why 95% of young males decides to at least pretend to study at an uni after high school.

I also helped my father to dodge his service during the communist days by the act of being born haha. This made him a legit sole provider for a family so he got away with it as well.

I remember many, many parents bribing doctors into certifying fake illnesses that would spare their kids from the draft, it was a small industry.

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lagwin1980 wrote:

The army isn't that bad...so long as they don't put you to war.

Actually quite good fun.

And (in the UK at least) the education options are quite good.

Well I did hear good things about army in the UK but trust me, in many, many countries the service is far from being good. I don't know what the proper english word for it is but we had a term describing mandatory horrific abuse both physical and mental upon youngsters, the unofficial kind of abuse.

Being forced to serve is horrible. I'm sorry for you. :(

Unwillingness to serve is even worse. It's the willingness to obey that is the problem. When it comes to the military it comes down to understanding the unfortunate situation the world is in. Don't let George Bush ruin the defense of democracy.

By reading the OP I presume that Greece is not something worthy of defending, or the world is in peace.

Myself, I was in a world of shit at the time I was drafted so I was excused. Today I believe it would have saved me earlier than I was saved by myself. Today I regret not going.

Go do it! Learn about a world in conflict, your country, get stronger and make friends. It's fundamental to our democracies that we do not pursue war because the people do not want to get slaughtered in stupid wars as in older times. Go find out.

I met a who served. He was all messed up talking about the shit people do to each other in Afghanistan (non of us american). Really messed up! I wished this guy would have brought back understanding after seeing the abyss of humanity. Problem is, he was never thought that, because he was expected to obey the propaganda.