Bring back National Service!

[AlternativelyWired]

This was often the cry of my late dad who did do his a National Service and my own thoughts wander in that direction at times and wonder if it would be a good thing?

To be fair I know next to nothing about it, I think it's just an automatic brief thought I have (thanks to my dad) when parts of society are behaving appallingly especially with antisocial behaviour locally. They'd have to start about age 10 or 11 in some cases though!

Is there a good and non-biased source of information on this? I'd love to know more about it and wish I could ask my dad about his experiences but sadly he's deceased.

We were a military family. My grandad served in WW2, my brothers were military, my dad did his National Service, uncle in the Army along with a cousin or two. Only the males of the family showed interest until I came along but I have bad asthma so couldn't join.

Part of me thinks the general concept of independence, discipline, respect, team work, learning skills etc would be a good thing and that's the reason for those brief thoughts.

On the other hand, on a very personal level, I would hate for my ds to be gone for 2 years at such a young age. They are still so young at 16. My brother joined up at 16 and broke my mother's heart and mine. I was only 2 and for years I would be deeply upset whenever he had to go back to wherever he was stationed around the world.

I also think that whilst many would benefit, far too many would find it traumatic to be away from their families and there be no choice about it.

Why just males too? If it were brought back (highly unlikely I would have thought) would females also be signed up?

I think my dad's generation saw it as doing their bit but I don't know what it involved so I'm going to go and find out more. If anyone can point me in the direction of a good book I'd be very grateful. I'd also love to hear the thoughts of others on this. Do other countries still have this? Why? What do they do?

A lot of questions, I know. I'm autistic and this has as of tonight become my latest special interest.

If there is a war, then those in National Service have to go and fight - they will be among the first to go and kill others and be killed themselves.

My Dad did National Service and was sent against his will to the war in Korea - he watched his best friend (also on National Service) get blown up and suffered what we would now call PTSD until his death aged 42. From what he said I am not sure many of the population of Korea especially the women thought the National Service soldiers there acted with discipline and respect.

Knowing how disproportionately former soldiers are represented in the prison population i would suspect it causes more harm than good.

DD is the same. It's not so much that the idea of GSCE and having subjects you learn for a wider education that is the problem, it is the ridiculous pressure the schools put up.

Mock week next week and instead of letting them revise the teachers are adding enormous amount of homework onto them.

I had to put my feet down when she was suppose to attend the whole of last weekend helping with an equipment sort out of her Scout pack. There was just no time for it, she needed to be at home with her books.

Get back to real life, let them get on with school at a normal level, give them space and activities to enjoy and you have teens who are happy and healthy.

I can see the value in this :) Although I think if you have worked in a customer service role you get even more frustrated with bad service because you know the staff have been told not to stand around chatting etc.

I've also long been a proponent of less homework so that the kids can take part in hobbies which may well involve helping others. Much more helpful to their lifelong goals than another hour's homework.

I think that there is some merit in a form of national service. Perhaps it would be for people aged 16 to 25 who are not in paid employment or studying who -

(1) Choose to do it
or
(2) Are not looking for work
or
(3) Have been convicted of a non-trivial crime

It could perhaps be run adjacent to the military (not part of the military) and focus on discipline, motivation, physical fitness, teamwork, and include working on environmental projects.

It could be a pathway into the army for those who choose to continue, and for those who meet a certain standard get some sort of a certificate (I am sure an employer would rather emply a young person who has never had a job if they had 6 months of proving that they have self-discipline, compared to a kid who has proven nothing.

Having said all that I have absolutely no doubt that if we did try something along this lines it would be done to punish poor people, save money (people on national service could live in huts and eat nothing but porridge - not need to pay them a penny), give free labour to companies owned by tory donors etc etc. In practice it would probably be horrific and benefit no-one other than a few rich people.

I think a form of National service would be good but not necessarily military based. Something like 1 year between secondary school and college/sixth form, and given a choice of military based (could be anything though, medical training, cookery, mechanics, electrician, etc) or simply more like community service work, cleaning up the country of litter, working for housing associations, decorating and maintaining properties, or similar.
The country would benefit, would have far more people that are proud of their country, many would come away with a life skill. 🤷‍♀️

@Mommabear20 wouldn't it be better for teens to be able to do those things at a younger age - like all the way through Secondary School. 16 is too late for a lot of teens.
They need the confidence, the skills, the sense of community much before then. Unfortunately the current education system doesn't seem to give opportunities for that.

@Needmorelego possibly! I'm more thinking of the type of thing than a specific timeframe 🙂

@Mommabear20 there is currently the National Citizen Service that teens can participate in during the summer after their GCSEs. I don't know how popular it is. It's only been running for a few years. Alot of people have never seem to heard of it. I don't know if it is promoted well in schools.

OP, look up "The best years of their Lives" by Trevor Royle, it's a history of national service.
My dad would have done it, he wanted to join the RAF anyway, but he was deferred because he was doing an apprenticeship & they scrapped NS by the time he was finished.
One of his mates did it - he was an armourer on an RAF fighter squadron & spent his 2 years in Singapore.
My uncle did it with the Royal Engineers - he spent 2 years in Germany doing bomb and mine clearance.
It was of its time and you can no more bring it back than you can bring that time back. In 1945 - 60 there was the withdrawal from Empire & we needed people to cover the withdrawal as all the men who'd fought the war were demobbed between 1945-48.
No more Empire = no need for bigger armed forces.
Incidentally, I believe you had to do 2 years in the army or RAF but the navy was more popular, so you had to do 3 years.

My late father did National Service and was vehemently opposed to it.
In particular two young recruits couldn't stand it and killed themselves during the 6 weeks of basic training.
It is a ridiculous idea perpetrated by people with no knowledge of it.

@AllMyExesWearRolexes Not sure of the 2/3 years thing but the vast majority of naval national servicemen were those who were in the navy reserves anyway.

If I was PM, I'd bring in some National public service, and include military, health care, council, emergency services, education etc in this, possibly also some private services could be acceptable as well (like veterinary).

I'd make it compulsory that everyone would have to work a period of nights and weekends. So that they now what a sacrifice it is.

Yes, some kids don’t do well in school with peer groups - bullying etc. and are really relieved when they are finished with it. It would be horrible to then subject these kids to another year of it.

Young people have just been through nearly 3 years of a pandemic. I think they very well do understand what sacrifice is.

@Redfrangipani yes anxiety based school refusal is massively high among children and teens - even ones in primary school.
We (society, the government) need to find out what is making these children so desperately unhappy and anxious that they can't attend school.
(My daughter is one of those children - thankfully getting the help she needs now)

ive been reading about this @Needmorelego . I’m glad to hear your daughter is getting help for it now.

@EgonSpengler2020 may you never be Prime Minister. Honestly, what is it with people in the UK? Scratch the surface and you get so many people who are full on authoritarians, favouring corporal punishment in school, the death penalty and now this. Bloody clueless the lot of them.

@Flapjacker48 ,thanks for the clarification. I presume if the majority of the intake were RNR / RNVR they were already trained and could go straight to sea?

Wow, what a disgusting post. My family are all military and I lost my son whilst serving so that folk like you can make sickening posts like that. What in gods name gives you the right to speak of a whole generation like that. I am not advocating National Service but to make a statement like that says more about you than those ex-service veterans.

They have to do it in Greece and they can't find enough to occupy them at the best of times. A Greek friend told me he spent most of his national service working in a cafe.

@AllMyExesWearRolexes I don't think it was that common for RN national service men to work at sea! (some did of course) Most worked in the huge naval shore establishments (both home and overseas) in stores/clerks/cooks/stewards/communications.

But yes, most RN national service men had been in the naval reserves from 16 (and would be typically trained in the shore jobs as above) or while at university.

Obviously merchant seaman and officers (even those who were part of RNVR) were exempt from national service.

The army already has a poor record of safeguarding voluntary recuits. Imagine the potential for abuse and sexual assault if national service was made compulsory for both young men and women. I imagine it would be like #MeToo!, but on a much larger scale and less legal scrutiny (hierarchical power structures, threatened with prosecution for speaking out, isolated residential camps with no way for victims to escape their abusers).

It's horrifying isn't it, what the crazy authoritarians and the race to the bottom idiots - no wonder we never make any progress.

@AlternativelyWired - you think it's a good thing but you don't know anything about it?