Posted on May 28, 2014
How important is politics to the professional Soldier?
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In the current political environment, the military is a hot topic. Given that fact, how important is it for the professional Soldier to pay attention to or understand what's going on? On the one hand, we are all citizens but on the other hand, we are supposed to be apolitical, right? So, what obligation do we have to have an opinion one way or the other?
Politics
NCOs
Officers
Posted >1 y ago
Responses: 4
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There is nothing that says we are supposed to be apolitical, just a time and place for appropriate expression. And my opinion is that it is as important as ever for all Americans to be personally invested and educated on historical and current events.
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SFC (Join to see)
Why does a Soldier have to refrain from favoritism? I think you are referring to the Duty Place. It is not authorized to do so in the workplace, but not unauthorized to be openly supportive of one party over another, or one candidate over another. He or she is reasonably prohibited from things like bashing the President (or anyone else in the COC), from actively serving on a fundraising campaign, and from participating in political events and campaigning while in uniform or in any way that could be misconstrued as an endorsement in an official capacity. As long as your uniform is off and you aren't creating a hostile work environment while it is on, there is no problem with being a politically minded citizen. It is in fact encouraged. There is this dangerous misconception out there that leads me to believe some feel that we traded "don't ask don't tell" sexuality for "don't ask don't tell" religion and politics. This is simply not the case.
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Not so much our opinion, however, I do think that military should pay very close attention to politics. Simply because its the politicians that are making decisions that will affect the units they are in.
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Sgt Randy Hill
Great question. I used current events for two reasons: first, I used the knowledge for boards; second, I used the knowledge to basically try to anticipate changes in military policy and how I had to adapt. Smart service members will always be on top of this.
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Are politics important to service members? Absolutely! Political decisions can be, quite literally, life and death decisions for Service Members. Should we be apolitical? How can we be? We (for the most part) are citizens first. The most important right of citizenship is the right to vote. If you are truly apolitical, you wouldn't vote either; what would be the point. While we are limited in some respects on how, when and where we can participate in the political process, we still have the right to participate and we should.
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COL Vincent Stoneking
And remember, as an old dead guy said, just because you don't take an interest in politics, doesn't mean that politics won't take an interest in you.
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