Young America in particular is no longer very interested in far flung nations and their politicians’ obsession with instigating wars in them. The U.S. Army also struggles to recruit more young Americans to fight them. What does it all mean?
Perhaps the ‘shoot ‘em up’ and ‘car chase’ movies that Hollywood constantly churns out slake the thirst for violence and an adrenaline rush. Online gaming provides a real enough experience of warfare without real blood and guts spoiling the enjoyment? Or, could it just possibly be that the new, mobile phone obsessive couch-potato generation don’t see any reason to have their day spoiled by too many reminders of reality? Perhaps they are also rather too self-obsessed and cowardly, pampered and even drug-addled to care for actual conflict.
And the old hands, the oldies, those who suffered through the indignities, death, destruction and ultimate humiliation of either Vietnam or Afghanistan know what a scam America’s wars are, They had their buttons pushed regarding ‘patriotism’, ‘defending America’ and all that PR bullshit that entice them to wage war and regretted every moment since, disabused with the idea that they are the ‘shining white knights’, the ultimate ‘good guys’ and defenders of ‘freedom’ and ‘democracy’. They are now the most cynical generation America has ever known and their motto is most certainly “Fuck no, I won’t go!” And certainly fewer and fewer Americans are going to enlist. Why? Because ‘The Big One’ may be coming.
World War Three is a very real prospect and in fact we are already within it in Ukraine. The USA is at war with Russia just as most NATO nations across Europe are at war with Russia. Is anyone fooled by the protestations by U.S. and European politicians and heads of state that they are not? Would you join up at this moment of time? Only if you were on a slow-burn suicide mission or found that psychiatry couldn’t cure your rampant masochism. The mushroom clouds could appear on the horizon or closer any day now. That rush of wind may not be what it appears. That burning sensation all over your body may not be caused by some temporary allergy. Death is permanent, as far as anyone knows and those who wish to extend their time here in a corporeal existence are avoiding war in any of its aspects except the virtual.
Look in vain for interest in the conflict in Ukraine. It’s like a sequel to Americans, a poor second, third or fourth best in a series of bad movies in which America gets its ass handed to it and is whipped to utter humiliation. Delight in watching ‘ragheads’ get stomped on, having their doors kicked in and screaming “Kill ‘em all, let God sort them out!” has waned. The final scenes where the last helicopter leaves the U.S. embassy in Saigon or frantic humans jump onto the undercarriage of planes leaving Kabul airport or blackened husks of U.S. officials hang from wires in Tripoli have caused many to switch off and who can blame them?
Most Americans are well aware how these wars go now. No amount of beer, french fries or even cocaine can convince them that they make good entertainment any more. Photos of Guantanamo camp, of coffins draped with the Stars and Stripes coming of transport planes in their dozens have soured the experience for these hedonistic young men. They now seek more reliable (and far safer) sources of intensity, orgasmic pleasure and pumped up, adrenaline pleasure. You may have even seen some of them where this can hardly be said to have worked out for them,in images of the new zombies, slumped motionless on the streets of Philadephia or hundreds of other North American streets, reduced to living statues by Fenatyl or the latest mental bomb of choice, Xylazine.
Whatever Americans are doing these days, chasing wealth in Wall Street casinos or Las Vegas, experiencing drive-by shootings, indulging in the porn industry in one form or another, getting out of their heads on alcohol or illegal drugs, screaming about shape-shifting aliens or involving themselves in weird cults, born again idiocy and even weirder woke head games, there is one thing they are very definitely not into, not interested in and scrupulously avoiding any involvement in, and that is the precursor to Armageddon now occurring in Ukraine.
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