There are a lot of misconceptions about military service in the United States, many of which seem dictated by an individual's political bent as well as the national optempo (operational tempo; frequency of deployment/peacetime/wartime status). In times of peace, those who would like to call themselves 'liberal' popularly consider the Soldier (that is, all of them, as many are unaware of the distinction between the enlisted and the commissioned) someone who is by default woefully underqualified for 'real life' at best, and a brute who simply wishes for a legal venue to blow things up at worst. The conservative thinks little of the Soldier as an individual, but instead thinks of national defense - money for weapons systems, funding cuts for the Veterans' Administration.

In times of war, political necessity dictates that these perceptions change. Conservatives find their aggressive stances on national defense justified in the eyes of much of America, and so liberals must bend. The Soldier is no longer 'underqualified', but 'underserved' by his own government - sent into the war zone without proper supplies, sent out into civilian life without what he needs to educate himself. Peripheral association with the military or one who serves becomes a badge of honor and patriotism. Both parties clamor to become the one that "Supports the Troops" the hardest. Conservatives tend to be better at this because their constituents were already culturally poised to appear both ' practical' and 'blindly patriotic' as the situation demanded.

Therein lies the problem. Even in times of war, the Soldier as an individual is of no consequence. The Soldier is a symbol, a simple pawn in a culture war. The Soldier is either a villain, or a Hero. The Soldier always serves for the honor of his country, not his paycheck. The Soldier is faithful, as there are 'no atheists in the trenches'. The Soldier is Combat Arms. The Soldier is male, he married a young white girl, and he has a baby on the way, whom he has never met.

The Soldier is a romantic ideal.

If America really wanted to 'Support the Troops', the best way would be to eliminate the reason the majority of Soldiers enlist at all.

Enlisted Soldiers are quite poor, on the whole. A lot of people - conservatives in particular - seem to dislike this idea. As an enlisted person who has nearly completed their four-year term as an Active Duty Army 68W10 (Healthcare Specialist), I can assure you that rich kids don't enlist. Most middle-class Americans don't even view military service as a career path, especially not as enlisted personnel. What Americans do by and large seem to understand is that military service is difficult, demanding, and has a reputation for not paying as well as the equivalent occupation on the civilian side of the fence. Why, then, would any sane person with reasonably sane parents go into a career that, by its very nature, puts you at heightened risk for traumatic death, psychological trauma and disorders, suicide, and doesn't even make up for it with pay? How does a person who finds the depressing socioeconomic status of the enlisted Soldier inconvenient argue with the case of ZIP codes 77080 and 77024 in 2006?

2006. Hometown Recruiting.
In 2006, I completed Basic Training. The Army has a program that allows you to return to your 'hometown' for two weeks between Basic Training and Advanced Individual/Advanced Infantry Training (AIT) to assist your local recruiter and spend time with your family. This is known as the Hometown Recruiting program.

The recruiting office was located in Memorial City Mall - right next to I-10, the division between ZIP codes 77080 and 77024. I lived in 77080, while my now-husband and all of his friends lived in 77024. Having heard of the ' poverty draft' and curious, I asked the recruiter about how the numbers stacked in the two ZIP codes. 77080 is home to high schools that were 80% Free and Reduced Lunch, and 77024 is home to some of the largest houses in Texas. He laughed and told me that 77080 kids hardly had to be recruited - they'd come in on their own, often not even concerned about what MOS (occupation) they would be saddled with for the next four years. 77024? He told me that one person had enlisted out of the area in the last five years.

LOL.

How do rational people even begin to deny the reality of the poverty draft? For one thing, it seems to be politically inconvenient to begin the deconstruction of the Soldier as a symbol - to humanize the Soldier, to give him needs beyond that of serving God and Country makes him flawed and greedy, an imperfect pawn. It's not unlike one of the basic tenets of cartooning - the more detailed and specific a face becomes, the more difficult it is to relate to, and the smaller your audience may become.

What makes a better sell - a naive-but-likable young man with his too-young wife and his faceless baby and his blind jingoism, or a poor, bland and greasy second-generation Mexican immigrant who bitterly and desperately claws his way out of the maw of gang violence and drugs by enlisting, in order to get both stability and a GI Bill? What if enlisted Soldiers are occasionally angry with the country they serve? What if they are atheist? What if they are Satanists? Rapists? Murderers? What if our Soldiers are gay? Disagree with the war? Don't like children? Do a lot of drugs? Aren't good at their jobs? Beat their wives? Drink too much? Smoke flavored cigarettes? Like ethnic music? Look at bondage pornography using a proxy while on a military computer, in a public place? What if our Soldiers are human, not heroes?

What if we are knowingly making difficult, unfair, demanding military enlistment one of the only feasible options for our nation's poorest youth?