In Gwynne Dyer’s article “Anybody’s Son Will Do”, the conversion of civilians to killers is being explained in stages. This articles focuses more on male psychology and malleable people. The author’s belief is that people can be easily brainwashed if they are put in constant stress. To support this idea, the author gives examples of military training around the world which psychologically destroys individual values and loyalties and rebuilds them to make combat troops that will do exactly what has been ordered and defend his groups to the death. The soldiers are first trained in basic level where they are motivated to destroy their individualities and build comradeship amongst the men. The bond is so important among men because when they are in battle, they have to fight for eachother. In the beginning of the basic training, the recruits are all worn out. The training is being done in an island where they are conscripted to do what is being told by the drill instructor without question. Neither they can leave, nor they can communicate much with the outside world. Basic training is basically about giving mental and physical pressure to create motivation. In the first three days, the recruits are being hustled, yelled, and shouted. They learn the basic orders of drill that enable them to work in large groups. They have to surrender their clothes, cut their hair, cut their physical evidence of individuality citizen identity. The recruits sleep aside a series of hasty rituals and given no time to reflect or to look back and think about their families, friends. So that the recruits donot backout, the frantic bustle of forming is set. The creation of an environment that romanticizes the milita... ... middle of paper ... ...e brutal and harsh ways that are used in military to change people into killers seems inappropriate to me. To become a soldier, right methods can be applied as well. It is disturbing to read that the recruiters treated the recruits in such an inhuman way. They are also humans that donot deserve to be treated in such an awful way. The author argues women are also malleable to become soldiers which is right. But for women, inorder to become powerful, they have to show more willing, masculinity, and aggression like men. Yet again, the author puts another question – What causes war? I think it is because of social distribution of power. Throughout the ancient military culture, mens are already inclined to kill or die. The primitive culture where men had to be a warrior to protect tribes from natural disasters or wild animals or anything still affects civilization today.
Within Megan H. Mackenzie’s essay, “Let Women Fight” she points out many facts about women serving in the U.S. military. She emphasizes the three central arguments that people have brought up about women fighting in the military. The arguments she states are that women cannot meet the physical requirements necessary to fight, they simply don’t belong in combat, and that their inclusion in fighting units would disrupt those units’ cohesion and battle readiness. The 1948 Women’s Armed Services Integration Act built a permanent corps of women in all the military departments, which was a big step forward at that time. Although there were many restrictions that were put on women, an increase of women in the U.S. armed forces happened during
According to Christopher and James Collier,”War turns men into beasts.” It is true because many people are willing to
The motion picture A Few Good Men challenges the question of why Marines obey their superiors’ orders without hesitation. The film illustrates a story about two Marines, Lance Corporal Harold W. Dawson and Private First Class Louden Downey charged for the murder of Private First Class William T. Santiago. Lieutenant Daniel Kaffee, who is known to be lackadaisical and originally considers offering a plea bargain in order to curtail Dawson’s and Downey’s sentence, finds himself fighting for the freedom of the Marines; their argument: they simply followed the orders given for a “Code Red”. The question of why people follow any order given has attracted much speculation from the world of psychology. Stanley Milgram, a Yale psychologist, conducted an experiment in which randomly selected students were asked to deliver “shocks” to an unknown subject when he or she answered a question wrong. In his article, “The Perils of Obedience”, Milgram concludes anyone will follow an order with the proviso that it is given by an authoritative figure. Two more psychologists that have been attracted to the question of obedience are Herbert C. Kelman, a professor at Harvard University, and V. Lee Hamilton, a professor at the University of Maryland. In their piece, Kelman and Hamilton discuss the possibilities of why the soldiers of Charlie Company slaughtered innocent old men, women, and children. The Marines from the film obeyed the ordered “Code Red” because of how they were trained, the circumstances that were presented in Guantanamo Bay, and they were simply performing their job.
Drill sergeants must break them down twice, building them back up afterwards. The first three weeks is the first breakdown - the hardest part. “They tell us we're worthless, that mommy ain't here, and that we are no different than any other rotting piece of compost in army fatigues. They tell us we're not wanted, that our recruiters lied to us, and that we should just go home.” Although most people know that military drill sergeants are harsh, it's entirely different from realizing it’s something that is, well, real - and people have actually experienced
The time spent at training camp prepared the boys for what was to come, by making them tough and brutal, while at the same time creating an army that does not stop to question its orders.
“‘Instrumental’ violence, however, murder for a purpose, - political power, rape, sadistic pleasure, robbery, or some other base gratification – remains the domain of the male. After all, every male is a potential killer in the form of a warrior – and he only becomes a murderer when he misuses his innate physical and socialized capacity to kill for ignoble, immoral, and impolitic reason. While the male is built and programmed to destroy, the female nests, creates, and nurtures. Or so the story goes”.
Soldiers in training here prepare themselves for combat. What they experience in an actual battle is totally different. In the book “Sunrise over fallujah” Birdy realizes “training” really doesn’t compare to the actual reality of being in an iraqi war. Walter Dean Myers makes this clear to readers by expressing their “nervousness” before going into war. This occurs with soldiers in our time now as well. Birdy enrolls in the military as a way to show proud patriotism. When 9/11 had occurred he felt helpless and had a sense of patriotism come over him. Birdy wanted to contribute to his country in some way shape or form. He trained consistently to prepare himself for the civil affairs. Learning how to handle weapons and protection over himself. Birdy’s unit didn't expect to see a lot of battle since it was rumored that his unit wouldn't be involved in combat situations but they encountered a lot of unexpected hot zones.
Society has placed strict gender norms on both males and females and these norms are suppose to be rigid and fixed. Yet, when women become were fighting for the right to be a part of the military institution, they were challenging the gender norms. Throughout the readings in our class, one main and recurring drawback of why women have been excluded from combat roles is because these women were challenging the social gender norms. According to Segal, it is difficult to include women into the military because of social construction of gender; women have to be perceived as changing to fit the military. Dowler claims as well that women in combat roles are “out of place” from the acceptable gender norms. She claims that even today, combat roles are only defined as such if women aren’t in that specific role. Dombrowski as well says that it is fascinating how the male-dominated institution of the military expresses their fear of women inte...
War has always been an essential ingredient in the development of the human race. As a result of the battles fought in ancient times, up until modern warfare, millions of innocent lives have ended as a result of war crimes committed. In the article, “The My Lai Massacre: A Military Crime of Obedience,” Herbert C. Kelman and V.Lee Hamilton shows examples of moral decisions taken by people involved with war-related murders. This article details one of the worse atrocities committed during the Vietnam War in 1968 by the U.S. military: the My Lai Massacre. Through this incident, the question that really calls for psychological analysis is why so many people are willing to formulate , participate in, and condone policies that call for the mass killings of defenseless civilians such as the atrocities committed during the My Lai massacre. What influences these soldiers by applying different psychological theories that have been developed on human behavior.
Throughout history there are many events that fabricate the world we live in. Many of the turning points that are developed can be traced back to one source. War; it is something that seems to come natural to humankind. Or rather, more specifically, mankind. Throughout history we observe that generally men played a more prominent role in wars. While women were affected and did influence war. However, women's roles were more behind the scenes and didn't get as much recognition. To be more specific, in American history we see the roles that women play in the battles that founded this country. Often we see it through raising good young boys who would have enough bravery to fight for their country,
In the pursuit of safety, acceptance, and the public good, many atrocities have been committed in places such as Abu Ghraib and My Lai, where simple, generally harmless people became the wiling torturers and murderers of innocent people. Many claim to have just been following orders, which illustrates a disturbing trend in both the modern military and modern societies as a whole; when forced into an obedient mindset, many normal and everyday people can become tools of destruction and sorrow, uncaringly inflicting pain and death upon the innocent.
Clearly, the Sierra Leone army knows what strategies in order to recruit children into becoming soldiers through manipulations. For example, a long way gone, written by Ishmael Beah shows the process of a boy being manipulated into the Sierra Leone army, but the world has been corrupted for any years, and needless to say, enough is enough. Ishmael's decision have shown the importance of Maslow’s Hierarchy, and the ability to live life without manipulations and eventually reach the final goal a person
The male-dominated institution that is the U.S. military, through daily practice, has shown its implementing of hegemonic masculinity among ranks. As this institution relies on rigid masculine qualities, it feeds from the history of hyper-masculinity. Warfare and hegemonic masculinity go hand in hand, “for ages throughout countless societies the final initiation rite from boyhood to manhood has been an inclusion in the practice of war” (Morgan 125). Through this idea, “boys who aspire to manhood, and men seeking to express theirs, follow masculine scripts generated in and for particular milieus, but they must also negotiate their course in relation to the hegemonic forms of contemporary masculinity and femininity” (Nye 1940). This ideal of a strong and aggressive leader is emphasized through American war politics as well “where our major response to the indirect tactics of guerrilla warfare has been to rely upon more and bigger ‘strikes’ and ‘assaults’, despite all the evidence of their long-run ineffectiveness” (Mansfield 351). Essentially this idea that to prove oneself through the strength and refusal to retreat, regardless of the effectiveness of the strategy “seems to reflect a psychological reality” within the military: “to lose will be to unman us all” (Mansfield
From the daily conflict in Iraq to extreme incidents like the torture of prisoners at Abu Ghraib, dehumanization of the "enemy" and the influence of the environment in which they are encountered can explain how and why soldiers on both sides aggress. Social learning theory is at the root of the dehumanizing process, for as seen in "Faces of the Enemy," such behavior is consistently supported & rewarded by the media and by armed forces (Jersey & Friedman, 1987). Equally important is the role of cognitive neoassociation analysis by Berkowitz, which acknowledges the environment and situational influences that can lead to feelings of aggression. Through the intersections of these two theories emerges a more comprehensive analysis than would be possible from one alone.
Burke, Colleen. "Women and Militarism." Women and Militarism. Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. Web. 05 May 2012. .