A ROOM OF OUR OWN
Follette, Isabel B. La
A Room Of Our Own By Isabell B. La Follette IN a conversation some time ago with a psychologist he expressed the troubled query as to why there should be a much higher percentage of mental...
...that my friend's reply to the psychologist was a statement of fact but not an answer to his query, or rather to the problem involved...
...As I listen to idealistic people confidently damning anti-Nazi Germans for having remained in Germany during the Hitler regime, or pacifists berating those who feel it their duty to share the common experience of their fellows in bearing arms in a "war for survival," I am amazed at the apparent ease with which they dismiss the conflict involved for the other fellow's decision...
...How would he survive this personal revolution...
...Inseparable with this point, however, we must observe that Bob III came from the category of Americans who have been "well-fed, well-clothed, and well-housed" and so far as society was concerned, assumed freedom from fear...
...The armed services are maintained to perform a certain function and in pursuing that end quite naturally tend to lose sight of other essential values...
...Even under advantageous growing conditions there will be character-developing challenges along the way which with wise direction will establish the physical, mental, and moral stamina to which we Americans all aspire...
...Phil was a man of exceptional abilities and wide experience, and with all the risks I felt that he would navigate the vast Army sea as well as anyone could...
...at least, the basic problem facing members of a civilized society is how to...
...Of course it "disciplines" them, but the advocates of peacetime conscription who stress the value of "discipline" overlook the vital factor which operates in wartime, and cannot be manufactured artificially in peacetime, namely, as Bob put it, "the only reason I could stand it was I knew my life depended on learning it...
...In the debates I have read and listened to, most of the speakers have failed, it seemed to me, to go to the nub of the problem...
...Was it any wonder that he and others from like backgrounds protested good-naturedly when Bob and others probed into the world's why's and wherefore's, and joshed the truth-seekers with "You and your for'n policy...
...Phil's going into the Army with all that involved for both of us was hard enough, but our boy's going presented new aspects of the rack...
...And likewise it seems to me that this is the basic question underlying the debate on compulsory peacetime military training...
...For high-spirited lads who have grown up in American freedom, the adjustment is well-nigh shattering, mentally, emotionally, and physically...
...vied with each other to procure Army and Navy training programs in order to "keep our plant going," so now we see many educators espousing compulsory military training as strengthening the ramifications of institutionalized "education...
...Perhaps in the end it comes down to a question of one's temperament and conditioning: some people fix their gaze on the ultimate and view the conflict from afar, while others find themselves embroiled in the day-today fight...
...It seemed to me then, as it does now...
...Bob III...
...In Al Smith's famous words, concerning the experts, the armed services should, in my opinion, "be kept on tap and not on top...
...Naturally our youth does not adjust easily to wartime regimentation...
...Quite different are the boys who are enjoying for the first time in their lives adequate food, clothing, and shelter, and as one lad put it, "I worked from the time I was 14 and this is the easiest time I've ever had...
...To be personal for a moment, (because what we do indicates our real feeling far more than what we say), the past 3 years have presented me with plenty of personal tough nuts...
...The rigors of basic training did not hurt Bob III...
...Even in peacetime, ask yourself how many individuals in your locality will actually stand up and fight morally and verbally for what they believe...
...The intensified training in the infantry replacement centers which is supposed to prepare in 17 weeks the 18-year-olds to go into combat, is about as catastrophic and searing an experience for young Americans as we can imagine in a democracy...
...Those of us who are concerned with why people act as they do and with the problem of getting "the public" to act in an enlightened and wise manner in its own best interests, have a tough nut to crack these days...
...Granted that the Army is necessarily working in terms of developing fighting machines, what, we painfully ask ourselves, will be the total effect on these lads in the future...
...at the same time we increase in "specialization" which leads greater numbers in ever-widening fields to set themselves aside from the average, common experience...
...As a matter of fact, aside from the "conditioning" he received, 1 noted with keen interest that a taste of regimentation gave him a new appreciation of the freedom which he had always accepted with the air he breathed...
...They will question, debate, opine, and sign petitions but when it comes actually to getting into the scrap, there is so often some "reason" why they "must" evade that responsibility...
...Just as I am convinced that a "world organization supported by force" will not bring about "permanent peace," I do not believe that compulsory military training in peacetime can overcome the effects of an underprivileged childhood and youth which the draft has shown to be the lot of a shocking percentage of young Americans...
...Americans and British have been brought up in a democracy, while the Germans and Russians have been accustomed to being ordered around and told what to do from childhood...
...And yet just as in wartime most of our universities with a deprecatory aside of "That's the Army for you...
...Another member of our group confidently dismissed his question with the statement, "Why, of course...
...maintain the values that make life worth living to us, and at the same time survive...
...And when I have said "survive" I am not thinking in terms of physical survival alone...
...We must attack the problem at its source, and build the kind of timber that can weather any storm that may come...
...however, like all the other 18-year-olds, was green as grass...
...A Room Of Our Own By Isabell B. La Follette IN a conversation some time ago with a psychologist he expressed the troubled query as to why there should be a much higher percentage of mental breakdown among the Anglo-Saxon soldiers than among the German and Russian...
...Unfortunately, there seems to grow up along with this specialization a lack of personal identification with the group, which eventuates in little or no real sense of personal responsibility to the group...
...I would be opposed to compulsory peacetime training if only for the power given to bureaucracy over our country's youth...
...To me...
...More Than Physical Survival As society becomes more "civilized" and thus abhors war...
...Get At The Source Frankly, I do not see how compulsory military training in peacetime is going to accomplish the purpose its advocates espouse...
Vol. 9 • April 1945 • No. 18
