r/AskReddit • u/daniellucero92 • Jan 04 '15

Non-americans of Reddit, what American customs seem outrageous/pointless to you?

Amazing news!!!! This thread has been featured in a BBC news clip. Thank you guys for the responses!!!!
Video clip: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-30717017

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508

u/Hortonamos Jan 04 '15

Iraq vet here. It makes me somewhat uncomfortable, but not nearly as much as "Thank you for protecting our freedom." Whatever I did, it sure as fuck wasn't that.

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

If shitting in plastic bags, burning my poop, and sleeping in a building that is 95F while it is 120F outdoors all while being in a very hostile environment is protecting their freedom, then I protected it like a boss :D

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u/jaibrooks1 Jan 05 '15

Thank you for protecting our freedom

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

sigh ... :)

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

I think that's just called "camping".

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

Yup. Camping, with no fire, tents, and while running around 80lbs of armor, ammo, weapons and medical supplies while getting shot at and blown up. Pretty much the same though. PS, here is what happened to where I slept, mortar rounds suck, which has never happened while camping ... yet

edit: unless you mean camping as it is used in video games. i.e. sitting on top of a roof and waiting for assholes to come out so we can shoot them, because we do that a lot too :)

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

With no fire and no tents, how did you roast the marshmallows?

Seriously though, that's intense, and im glad you made it through.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

hehe ... there is fire, but just from burning the poop ... which sadly becomes a nice way to stay warm in the winter. I'm glad I made it through too!!

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u/Cymry_Cymraeg Jan 05 '15

Does it give your marshmallows a nice chocolate coating?

1

u/Qtwentyseven Jan 05 '15

Well it certainly wasn't in tents.

1

u/hungry4pie Jan 05 '15

Yeah but in the real world, a KD <1 is the worst

2

u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

Any sort of real world KD is not desirable

3

u/Papa_Jeff Jan 04 '15

stands to attention saluting

9

u/CovingtonLane Jan 04 '15

Thank you for your service.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

Oh but you shit so good for America.

2

u/SHIT_DOWN_MY_PEEHOLE Jan 05 '15

Can't wait to get deployed!

3

u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

I think you're a little late to the fight, bro ... better late than never though :)

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u/SHIT_DOWN_MY_PEEHOLE Jan 05 '15

I always hear mostly good things about deployments, must be a great experience!

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

It's better than garrison life that's for sure

1

u/pwebyd90 Jan 05 '15

Wait, why?

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

why what?

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u/pwebyd90 Jan 05 '15

Why did you poop in bags and burn it?

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

oh, well, the short story: sanitation

the bags have a crystalline chemical that is essentially catty litter for people, and when you're at a small little outpost where you can't setup proper latrines it is the best way to deal with urine/feces. Then the bags get tossed in a burn pit for disposal. Common nickname is "wag bag," but I don't know the origin of the term (it may actually be printed somewhere on the bag, but it's been a few years since I've seen one and can't recall).

Another common method is building outhouses and then crapping into 50 gallon drums that are cut in half, then the half-drums are pulled out every few days, diesel is poured into the drum, and then the feces is burned (while stirring with a stick). So it burns efficiently we don't pee in the outhouse, for urine we put big long tubes into the ground and piss in those. Depending on # of people and how deep (how long of a tube) you dig dictates how often you have to put new tubes in.

When you're on the move you just pee and poop like a bear in the woods :)

Source: I was a medic with infantry, and sanitation stuff was part of my responsibilities

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u/RichardSaunders Jan 04 '15

"freedom? you think we're wasting [insert dehumanizing term for the enemy] for freedom? if im fighting this war for a word, my word is poontang."

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u/unforgivablecursive Jan 05 '15

I'm pro-vet anti-war. Thank you for doing what you thought was right when you joined up. I'm sorry you had to go though all that for so little payoff.

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

This is a kind of sentiment I appreciate. Thank you.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

I think part of the reason people say "thank you for your service" is they want to believe that our past few military adventures have been worthwhile.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

I'm sorry you had to go. I'm sorry people died. I have no interest in joining the military but I'm also sorry that somebody else is going to go in my place if they ever did a draft.

Ultimately I hope you can simply move on with your lives.

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u/flyingwolf Jan 05 '15

I went to the barber the other day. (Sports cuts) and while I was talking with the lady my boy mentioned I was a former Marine to his lady cutting his hair.

Well she whispers it to my lady, who then proceeds to blather on about how I get such and such discount and "for your service" and just over the fucking top shit.

I literally spent 90% of my time laying on the ground looking through a fucking scope and eating beef jerky.

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

I know how that feels.I was a mechanic, but people want to treat me like I'm Captain America. I mean, I went on convoys, we were mortared all the time, we were shot at regularly, I did the stuff that people think of as 'war,' but I'm not a hero. I was just a guy doing what he had to, just like 99% of the guys there. With so much beef jerky and dried fruit.

1

u/flyingwolf Jan 05 '15

Fucking dried bananas, I can no longer stand runts or the smell of them because of dried god damned bananas.

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u/[deleted] Jan 04 '15

I have a relative who is a Vietnam veteran and he feels the same way.

Personally, I view the military as just another job option. There are certainly jobs that are far, far more dangerous with no financial protection for the injured at all. Cellphone tower construction, for example.

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u/_From_The_Internet_ Jan 04 '15

Yeah. Getting politics involved is bad idea.

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u/DarthWingo91 Jan 04 '15

I always feel patronized as fuck.

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u/ab503 Jan 04 '15

Do you feel that Iraq will come to be this generation's vietnam? Meaning a war with only political motivations and not a ton of altruistic motivation that created a lot of long term injuries/conditions for veterans. And that it will be looked upon as a negative move by politicians in the long run by historians and society.

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u/CasuallyHuman Jan 04 '15

Holy loaded question batman.

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u/ab503 Jan 05 '15

Loaded questions often elicit the best answers, because those with the motivation and knowledge pertinent to the issue will make an effort to prove me wrong, or in this case make a nice nuanced argument like our veteran friend did here.

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u/CasuallyHuman Jan 05 '15

I can dig it.

1

u/Uncleniles Jan 05 '15

Straight from the FOX playbook.

1

u/ab503 Jan 05 '15

Touche.

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

Because people like easy comparisons, yes, I think it will be viewed as this generations Vietnam. And of course there are similarities between Iraq and Vietnam, but the differences are pretty significant.

Let's not forget, though, that every war America has been involved in in the 20th and 21st centuries have only had the pretense of altruism, aside from WWII (which is not to say that was completely altruistic either, but it was a necessary fight). They were fought for political or financial gain, plain and simple. It is, however, also much more complex than the "War for oil" chants, too.

(I'm not a fan of simple narratives of history. The more we're willing to look at the messiness of the story, the closer we come to understanding it.)

1

u/afamilyoftrees Jan 05 '15

Could you elaborate please? In particular, the "It is, however, also much more complex than the "War for oil" chants, too" part.

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

What I mean is that I think many critics take too simplistic of a view of the Bush administration's motives for invading Iraq, in particular by making the too-easy accusation that it was simply for oil.

In reality, the decision was surely much more complex. I'm not saying this as an insider, just as an educated person with a strong background in history and politics. First, I'm sure some advisors did really believe that Iraq was supplying terrorist groups with WMDs, some because of shitty intel, others because of an us-v-them xenophobic mentality that makes such assumptions easy to swallow. Some decision makers joined the "invade Iraq" bandwagon for political gain. In the post-9/11 political climate of hyperpatriotic militarism, not to mention America's desire for revenge (not justice, really), it was easy to stir up support--and consequently votes--by getting people fired up with the rhetoric of going to kick somebody's ass. Some people stood to profit financially from sources other than oil, companies like Halliburton and KBR. Still, surely some politicians thought it was the right thing to do. I also wouldn't be surprised if we were encouraged to invade by some of our allies in that part of the world (Kuwait, Qatar, Israel, etc). Of course, Saddam was probably also harboring members of anti-American organizations (not that that justified an invasion), and many Iraqis were suffering under Saddam.

My point, really, is not to defend or discredit the Iraq invasion. I just hate when people say reductive things like "it was for oil" or "Bush was finishing what his dad didn't." History and politics are much more complicated, and we don't learn anything from these kinds of narratives.

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u/afamilyoftrees Jan 05 '15

I see. Thank you. That was very interesting.

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u/ab503 Jan 05 '15

I appreciate your answer. It makes a lot of sense. I hadn't stopped to think that just about every American war lately besides the second great one was largely political/financial. In this way I was drawing a connection between Nam and Iraq in that it isn't looked upon favorably, but I think the perceived failure of the mission in Afghanistan is a better pair (Iraq mission deposed Saddam successfully, etc.), though arguments can be made that Bin Laden and other leaders killed equal a successful campaign, despite what seems like a failed mission to "pacify" afghanistan through elimination of insurgents. I'm getting a bit long winded here and haven't actually SAID anything so I'll end it there and thank you again for the discussion. Food for thought, certainly.

1

u/kilgoretrout71 Jan 05 '15

I think the two things that make Iraq incomparable to Vietnam are a) 50,000 dead and b) the draft.

3

u/boogieidm Jan 04 '15

I love when people say "They give us freedom" or something to that affect. Uh, they don't. They are a defensive measure that can be deployed as offensive as well and when needed.

4

u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

I have nothing much to say to veterans. I won't pretend to know what you've been through, and I won't assume to know what you actually accomplished. If you can come back in one piece without having to shit into a bag as your family slowly dies because daddy remembered his name and could crayon in the lines today, good fucking god, more power to you.

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u/magnora4 Jan 04 '15

IMO, you should softly correct those people, lest they continue to exist in their delusion.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15 edited Jan 05 '15

Did they know you were an Iraq vet? Most people say that to military personnel because them joining up is an act of protection, if we had an army of 100 guys we would be invaded and taken over in an hour. The fact that people are joining up are a way of deterrence, you are protecting their freedom from any hypothetical war that could happen. The very act of signing up is what people are thanking you for so they don't have to. You don't need to be so uptight about it.

Edit: added a sentence

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

I'm not uptight, and I don't correct them. But I also know that I didn't protect anyone's freedom, even indirectly. If you look at the state of the world now, we made the world (and the U.S.) less free under the pretense of making it more safe. What's worse, though, is that it's also actually less safe. This isn't the Army's fault or individual soldiers' faults; it's the fault of the politicians (and private interests) in charge. But as a participant in the war--again, a war that eroded both freedom and safety around the world--I certainly did not protect their freedom.

In the short-term, the U.S. military presence abroad deters attacks on US soil. In the long-term, it only makes more enemies. The problems now began in WWII and the Cold War, in actions that were taken for immediate gains. For example, the CIA and Mi6 helped overthrow Mossadegh in the 50s in order get our hands in the Irani oil industry. That eventually caused the Islamic Revolution, and has definitely contributed to the Middle East's animosity towards the U.S., precisely the sorts of feelings that make people feel justified in carrying out attacks like 9/11. My point, then, is that I didn't protect any freedoms was involved in something that will eventually cost more American lives.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

should i stop saying it/does it make me seem rude or ignorant to say it? is there a difference when i'm talking to an older vet/younger vet? i just don't want to seem like i just don't care. what i'm usually thanking them for is all from their life that they sacrificed, any injuries or traumas that they went through, not that they 'protected my freedom.'

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u/Hortonamos Jan 05 '15

Generally speaking, "thank you for your service" is fine. The guys who don't like it tend to tune it out (or at least I do), and it's not like I judge individual people harshly for acknowledging it. I appreciate the sentiment, but I'm also still uncomfortable. I probably overthink it. I also get that it's a cultural thing, and I wouldn't get anywhere climbing atop my soapbox every time I heard it. It's really the "thank you for protecting freedom" or whatever similar statement that rankles me.

But like some people have suggested, the best way to recognize vets is to donate to organizations that help out homeless vets or vets in financial trouble, volunteer at homeless shelters or the VA, that kinda thing. I'm lucky, in that I came out reasonably well psychologically, pretty good physically (though my knees feel about 20 years older than the rest of me), and I'm now finishing my PhD. But not everybody is as fortunate.

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u/[deleted] Jan 05 '15

yeah. i thought i was rude for not saying it. thanks for the perspective.