South Korea students gain weight 'to dodge military service' - Sensationalist Headlines

I would rather shoot myself in my foot/leg then do any military service. I would never go further then pay my taxes for my country.

Training takes time, if people just joined up when they expected conflict, chances are they will come too late to be trained effectively. As mentioned before, having the training done preemptively is a good thing since it allows people to get prepared for combat. Also I’d say compulsive military training and compulsive schooling are not too different. I have no idea what they teach in South Korea, but I can say I’ve definitely learned a lot of excellent life skills from the US army. I know it wasn’t forced on me, but it has given me way better life skills than anything I have gotten from the schooling I’ve gone through. I think the main problem with mandatory service as it currently is the fact that you don’t just go through training but also are obligated to do a job afterwards for mediocre wages doing something you don’t necessarily care about. If it was just the training I think mandatory military training is something that would be beneficial to a lot of people.

Then you can have voluntary military service to train those who would be willing to fight when push comes to shove, instead of forcing it onto everybody, including people who wouldn't want to go to war? If military service is such an all-around rosy and enriching experience then surely it shouldn't have to be compulsory to attract enough people, should it?

People don’t just do things because they believe they should. Look at all the people that say that they want to get in shape, but are never really in the mood to go for a jog. If you forced them to go running they wouldn’t complain about it, but sometimes people need an extra push to do things. And idk, if going to school is such an all-around rosy and enriching experience then surely it shouldn’t have to be compulsory to attract enough people, should it?

Like I said, depends on the country. That and people are naturally lazy. Look at any country without compulsory military service (excluding the US and Russia because of the war on terrorism and military service providing money for your framily) and you'll see that troop numbers are low. People also think conscription = dying in a horrible war but that's not the point unless, again, if you live in a third world shithole.

I think the us should adopt this, could instil better discipline and mindset.

We're not talking about people who want to get military training but can't motivate themselves to do so. We're talking about people who don't want to get that training period. Compulsory service would be more like forcing people to jog regardless of whether they care about getting in shape. Besides, it all assumes going through service is a net positive experience for everybody, and from what I've been told by my relatives who had to go through it and from what posters on this thread said, I can tell that's not necessarily the case. You're comparing imposing education on children who literally don't know any better with imposing training on adults who are legally considered to be autonomous on any other matter.

Nope, you said “Then you can have voluntary military service to train those who would be willing to fight when push comes to shove,” and I’m claiming that’s bull shit. The net positive aspect of training comes from when you do it right. Just like how a shitty school can lead to a shitty life altering experience. Then have the training when they are at a high schooler’s age? I once again fail to see a different between forced schooling and forced training.

Uh, I'm pretty sure basically everyone would complain if somebody forced them to go running.

Then some people who would be willing to fight won't train beforehand? Too bad, I guess. Beats forcing unwilling people to do it, though. It simply isn't fit for some people, it's not just a matter of doing it right. It implies following strict authority and hierarchy, much more so than school education. If anything, I'd rather some people refrain from it rather than everybody blindly subscribe to it. I'm really not sure training child soldiers is politically or even ethically palatable. If you're really fixated on giving kids some kind of additional experience before they leave school, just do civil service instead. There's no reason it should be related to the military.

Nah, it completely depends on how it is approached. If everyone had a mandatory pe class in school focused on getting in shape, I know a whole lot of people that would be a fan on it.

It's hard to put into words on how I feel, though I'll generalize. I'm fairly biased since I'm military myself. Conscription isn't inherently wrong. Korea's reasoning being a mandatory 2 year service isn't remotely unreasonable or bad. If you're trying to deliberately avoid something that makes you a literal reserve component almost, then you shouldn't be freaking out over it. This isn't a situtation like the Draft from the Vietnam War, where literally thousands of Americans were forced into service. Going by the numbers for the entire conflict there were 9 million American Military members, with 1.7 million of them being drafted, with the remaining 7.8 million being volunteers. Korea's situation is the fact they have a very large force in reserve outside of their active components. They're literally 2nd behind NK in how many people are capable of being able to fight, which is a whopping 6.1 million fucking people out of 51-53 million people in their country are basically trained how to fight and do a military job. I'm going to say that this, and it's gonna sound pretty horrid to some of you. But these kids are selfish, the sole reason that this conscription exsist is being of a persistent threat of the North Korean military potentially planning to invade at any given moment. We've seen what has happened in Iraq where they started to raise the PMU groups to combat ISIS because the military wasn't as effective. We see in Syria with the ride of the YPG/J and SDF being to able prevent the fucking wholesale slaughter of their ethnic group because they took in volunteer and conscripts. There is a necessity for it when there is a clear and present danger. "All gave some, but some gave all." You might not be some big hero, specific forces bad ass, or even the hotshit in your shop. But you had the fortitude and the courage to actually put yourself on the line, if the time ever came. I'm not saying that we need to force these kids into service if they don't want it. It's perfectly fine for someone to want to back out of any training since the military isn't for everyone, it's not a thing you enter into to be self-serving.

it's a pretty ok defense strategy from a leader's perspective when you get 100's of thousands young people as reserve soldiers simply because we are used to it almost like as if it's a norm, which it is around here.

This doesnt apply to Estonia where they are even obligated by law to force fellow ciitzens go into service if they re abroad. They just sanction you with fines and other bullshit (take away your drivers license, freeze your bank account) if you are avoiding their call to arms. I am myself forced to start conscription next month and its a fucking joke of 8 month waste.

We can agree to disagree on this point because it has already been discussed quite a bit in the thread already. Schooling, as it currently is, is very unfit for a whole lot of people. I'd say it is pretty clear that schooling causes a fuck ton of stress that ends up causing long term emotional health problems in a lot of people. I think the issue, as with the issue of military training, is just the method by which it is done. Call it military-esque training then, all I'm saying the closest thing we have to a more physical skills training course is a military training course. Logistically it would make sense to make use of something that has already been demonstrated to work pretty effectively. Hell even take away the weapons training if that is what scares you. All I'm saying is that, done well, an analog of basic training would be very helpful for people's development. Especially with our trend towards technology, younger kids need to learn what it is like to be physically involved.

Sure doesn't paint a very good picture of a country when they're basically forcing all of their able-bodied men to train to become guerilla fighters (aka low-investment meatshields) in case someone invades. They have a professional army and allies to back you up, who also have guerrilla armies. Fucking rely on them. The notion that in this day and age the average young guy who couldn't give less of a fuck about fighting anything would be shoehorned into learning how to fight is fucking retarded. South Korea isn't some kind of backwater jungle. People have better shit to do with their lives than waste two years learning the basics of shooting people just so in the possible theoretically hypothetical distant chance of a land invasion they can serve as cannon fodder instead of doing what any civilian should be told to, which is hide and let professionals do their work.

Excuse me for not believing in real violence. We live in a time where the human "desire" for violence can be fed through media and other fiction. Everything else is bureaucrats saying your life is meaningless to them.

Do I HAVE TO drink sulfuric acid to be able to tell it tastes awful?

Schooling has been determined to be pretty important for the development of a child's critical thinking skills and mental capabilities. Yes, that does mean it has to be done right, but that doesn't make it optional either. Can you demonstrate that military training provide essential skills that the vast majority of people wouldn't develop or learn on their own? Am I missing some important skills as a result of never having undergone military training? Hold on, so you mainly defend military service as a way of developing physical skills? Because it entails a lot more than just that. Again, if you want people to be more active physically, then you can simply build onto the already mandatory PE school courses.

Lmao consider yourself lucky try 2 years

Lmaooooo It doesnt remedy the fact i still waste a considerable amount of time and is such an incredible hindrance for my current plans. 8 months is still a fucklot to me.

The volunteers would be fighting, not training. Volunteers works as a regular force but we still had a draft at the height of American Eagle Screaming during WW2. Training is often one of the first things cut to speed up pumping out troops. So those chat go through compulsory service are often times better trained than a war time volunteer.

I think it's kind of obnoxious that people who are rabidly for conscription are almost always A. Current service members. B. People living in comfy Scandinavian countries, some of whom barely have real conscription at all, neglecting the experiences of conscripts seemingly everywhere else in the world (israelis, russians, etc.) I mean seriously, you frankly admit that Swedish conscription is a joke in this post. To my knowledge, is it not basically RNG with a 4 in 100 chance of having a few years of your life wasted?

For a country like South Korea? I'd say it's exactly what they should do. And just think, if NK ever decides to attack it and potentially invade they have an entire male and some female population that's been in the military

That has nothing to do with what I said. I'm talking about making military service voluntary, so that those who want to fight should the country go to war can train in peacetime. I've never said anything about waiting for war to volunteer.

sometimes you have to do shit you don't want to do. fighting a defensive war isn't about feeding a desire to fight but quite literally defending your way of life. not talking about some far-off land, but a force crossing the border with aggressive intentions, killing your countrymen and destroying your cities. choosing not to fight is choosing to submit, to throw yourself at the mercy of the invading force. if that is what you want, then you're within your rights to do so. i see it as a pretty selfish thing to do unless you honestly, truly believe the invading force is one of good for your country.

I am neither A nor B, and while I don't believe conscription is right for every country, a nation under constant threat from aggressive neighbors is absolutely a situation where I can understand conscription. It's been a necessary component of South Korean, Swiss, and Israeli foreign policy, and a key component in dissuading invasion. Israeli conscripts were on the front lines in the Arab-Israeli War and were essential to winning the conflict. Switzerland's conscription system is a major reason they've been able to remain neutral in major conflicts. South Korea, in the event of war, would be facing an invasion force millions-strong, and their regulars alone are not up to the task. People say they can just rely on their allies to help, but those allies are only committed because South Korea has a credible defensive plan to begin with. The minute South Korea says 'don't worry, our allies will do the heavy lifting' is the minute US strategy shifts from 'How do we win a land battle on the Korean peninsula?' to 'How do we respond politically after North Korea takes over South Korea?'. The founders of the US expected all able-bodied men to be able to take up arms to defend the Republic, and our 2nd Amendment and Militia Acts were expressly designed to ensure that the citizenry could be called to action, supplying their own weapon and ammunition, and expected to be reasonably well-trained. They had just fought a revolution where the common citizenry had been forced to take up arms, and believed that the people should be responsible for their own defense. After over two hundred years without a defensive war, that sense of common responsibility for defense atrophies. It's easy to say that fighting should be left to a tiny proportion of volunteers when all of our hypothetical conflicts are set in far-off lands and never threaten the very existence of our society. South Korea doesn't have that luxury, and I haven't even started on the fact that North Korean military policy won't spare civilians. In the event of renewed conflict, the first thing that happens will be that Seoul will get shelled by as much artillery as the Norks can muster. There is no 'sit out and let the professionals do the fighting' when you're going to be under fire whether you're in-uniform or not. My main problems with mandatory conscription are that the penalties for refusing to comply are harsh, and there are ways people can contribute to the common defense without serving as a uniformed combatant. I'd rather see a system where people are incentivized to serve rather than be required to, and given options for service that aren't strictly as combatant personnel.

in Eritrea your mandatory service may last up to 10 years I wouldn't call people cowards or traitors who want to dodge that and I can sympathize to that, but then again I don't really want more Eritreans in my country either

believing in defending your homeland is not the same as believing in mandatory service. you should be fully in your right to not fight or not participate in the military if you really don't want to. however, you should be prepared to fight to defend your way of life should it come to that.

Minimum of 21 months of military training is ridiculous, no wonder people are dodging it. make it 6 months minimum like we have over here.