Those army recruits commercials...

[Dangerman]

I am very pissed at those army and marine commercials. Why they still on TV even if the War in Iraq is getting worse.

All this crap about "strength for now, strength for later" and "fighting for my country" and all those recruit wannabees will get is a trip to Iraq and sent home in flag-drapped coffins or the Walter Reed hospital for losing their arm or leg.

[MADem]

1. Oh, the tearful parent ones are the absolute WORST

...where the kids are convincing the 'rents that joining up is a good idea...one can't help but notice the latino/african demographic in them either (message--"you guys" are all poor and don't have any college cash socked away)...it isn't little Thurston Howell the Third saying, "Oh, Mummy, do let me make you a cocktail, and oh, I say...I DEEW think I shall join the Army--won't that be such fun, pumpkin????"

No shame, blatant pandering, and offensive in the extreme.

[havocmom]

2. The one where the WASP dad comments that the son looked him in the eye

for the first time, then asks: "Where'd that come from?" Really pisses me off. Yeah, convince the young males going through the usual coming of age issues that if you just sing on the line, you will grow balls and be able to stare your old man down.

I notice there is more pretend footage about how wonderful life will be when they sign up and damned little REAL FOOTAGE of how life IS after they give up their rights and become cogs in the kill-or-be-killed-machine that makes money for the few by the blood of the many.

[MADem]

4. Says something about the faux dad's parenting, dunnit???

Where'd that come from?? Not from YOU, ya lousy parent!!!!

Hell, back in the old days, at least some aspects of the ads were true (my old favorite was PORT O'CALL--HONG KONG!!! which showed all of the sailors racing down the gangway to get drunk and laid on HK liberty). Now, what can they say? Go to a desert hellhole, wear twenty plus pounds of lousy body armor, plus yer gear, get bit by sand fleas and blown away by IEDs? Be all that you can be? Gee, look at all those pieces--little Timmy sure is a lot more than he used to be, spread out all over this dusty road....

[txindy]

5. How about the one with the African-American mom and son?

Where he tells her it's time for him "to be the man of the family." Because we're to automatically realize that there's no father in his life. :eyes: It doesn't help the commercial's realism that the young man wants to go off and study environmental protection in the military and feels confident he can do just that. Oh, yeah, THAT'LL happen. The military leads the world in environmental causes. :eyes:

The one that ticks me off the most, though, is the white kid in the garage with his father. He wants to join the Army Reserves and makes the (fairy tale) point over and over again that he'll be in the RESERVES, so he won't be on the front lines or leaving town anytime soon. He'll do his weekends and learn mad skills, Dad! :eyes:

Are there really people stupid enough to buy that shovel-full? Wait. Rhetorical question.

[MADem]

7. Those two will go down in history as incredibly offensive ads

The former for the racist message, and the latter for sheer stupidity.

I guess if you look at the DOD recruiting numbers, and the personnel standards reductions, you have the answer to your rhetorical question! Even LOWERING the goal isn't cutting it! Lowering the standards hasn't worked either! They're backfilling the forces in Iraq with a bunch of out of shape USAF pencil pushers (poor bastards thought they were in the "safe" service--think again)! It's a complete and total mess, and getting worse by the day...making the pissed off, high, attitudinal Viet Nam draftees look like a crack "total force" operation!

[Throckmorton]

3. Oh, You just hate us for our freedoms.

Poor kids, seeing no other options, join up and become cannon fodder for the BFEE, PNAC, GOP Oil Money machine.

[lpbk2713]

6. In today's failed BushCo economy ....

people who are out of work (because their former job was sent offshore) have two choices.....

either work two or three deadend McJobs or enlist in the military.


They are trying their best to make it look like an attractive option.

[Xenotime]

8. They don't fight for my country...

They fight for Iraq. They die in Iraq. Does Iraq care or appreciate it? No.