Cache: It's called karma. It's one of many concepts conservatives don't understand... like "no viable exit strategy."

Is it karma when someone gets HIV from ghey sex?
Yeah, thought so.
Typical hypocrite balllicker.

proteus_b

I am trying to keep it in context, aside from a few small contingents Iraq is Bush's/America's War. Also it's not really universal. Seems mostly to be the US & some Western European ones. I have seen live chickens and other smaller animals for sale that people take home and kill themselves. 90%+ of those buyers are not WASPS (White Anglo-Saxon Protestants). I also have a long list of other issues with WASP society.

/So where do you keep that gold again?

ironoctopus
of course anyone would be lucky to make a life for themselves in that city, cause if they did it would mean they were farking loaded. in one of the two common slang uses of that word.

i didn't realize that there was an english word with the same letter in 3 consecutive spots until i read "balllicker" above, although i have the impression that it should probably be hyphen-ated.

just came here to say what IAmRight said.

Semper Fi bud.

proteus_b
yeah, it's a city with a pretty high turnover rate. It is a great place to spend your 20's (assuming no children or mortgage) and I made a go of it for years living comfortably, working part-time for most of it, but i didn't save a farking dime. I plan to move back in a few years after I've got enough professional experience to go for the full adult package. Or perhaps earlier if I marry that wealthy heiress I've been stalking.

ranold "Is it karma when someone gets HIV from ghey sex?"

Yes it is. Just as it is America's karma when someone catches brain disease from conservatives.

Looks like you are grasping the concept.

this just in: war is [still] hell.

/that's why you're not supposed to go into it lightly
//or on the cheap

IAmRight: enjoy your freedom; it is only protected by those who sacrifice theirs to protect it.

I was with you up until that part. This war and the last one had nothing to do with freedom, and did nothing to protect or advance our freedom. Yes, some wars in the past have done so, and the soldiers who fought in those wars deserved the thanks that they got.

Furthermore, our country is powerful and free for a number of reasons, military being one of them.

This is terrible news for Pfizer, GSK, and Eli Lilly.

Cache: It's called karma. It's one of many concepts conservatives don't understand... like "no viable exit strategy."

Karma isn't a "concept," it's a religious belief that, in my opinion, is childish. If whole "point system" hasn't proven itself false to you by the time you're seven, you have a disability.

Me thinks that don't have a big enough sample.

"Karma isn't a "concept," it's a religious belief that, in my opinion, is childish. If whole "point system" hasn't proven itself false to you by the time you're seven, you have a disability."

I don't believe in karma either, but I think believers have a much longer time scale in mind than seven years.

being from San Francisco, I'm really getting a kick out of these replies.

/supports the soldiers, w/o them we would be farked
// i miss california

I wonder if I am the crazy one from my section? I'll have to keep an eye on one out of four people around here.

2007-03-13 04:41:06 AM Sun God
Napoleon's military doctor, I forget his name, was the first to recognize PTSD. His solution was to give a guy a few days of rest in a safe environment. And some hot food, safe water to drink, a hot bath, and recognizable icons from their motherland. After that, most men were ready to return to duty.

untrue. what we now know as PTSD was being "diagnosed" as far back as the 15th century. it has had different names, including "nostalgia", "soldier's heart," "battle fatigue," and "shell shock." the most recent iteration, PTSD, came about during and after the vietnam war. the medicalization of PTSD served important social purposes: namely to get soldiers the psychological help they needed when returning from war and to have the VA pay for it. this is not to say that it is a made-up condition; it's all too real. it's just a different name for trying to describe something that soldiers have been facing for a long time.

2007-03-13 08:40:04 AM Thisbymaster
Me thinks that don't have a big enough sample.

size doesn't matter. it's how you use it. ;)

yeah, I don't think I'd deem any place in California trust worthy. Unless you have at LEAST a BMW. :)

I really don't think anyone will ever be the same after living over there for a tour or two or three.

The administration and Repubs in Congress knew this was goingt to happen going in and repeatedly cut funding or voted down funding increases for the VA. I guess 2+2 does not equal four in their world.

When you start a war the VA use will increase. But then again these guys said it would be a cake walk that lasted a few weeks.

More and more I am starting to think the idea that Bushco is trying to purposely break the military might actually be a reality.

And thanks to the VA, they'll never receive help. I wonder who has killed more veterans, the Iraqis or our own system?

Anyone with one of those idiotic magnets on their car should have to house a traumatized veteran for a year, just so they can see what they're really supporting with that Chinese-made symbol of faux patriotism.

Bohemian: More and more I am starting to think the idea that Bushco is trying to purposely break the military might actually be a reality.



"Who do you think supplied Los Muertos? Who turned a blind eye to the Volk's activities?
The people had to know total chaos before they'd accept total control..."

****Looks around thread nervously****

choice and consequence: Uh, anybody compare this to civilian rates? To get, you know, a baseline?

RTFA - 1/4 of troops had a "mental diagnosis." Most of those are going to be, "Nervous around loud noises." "Slight PTSD." etc. Some will be more serious, but nothing like 1/4.

allanhowls
And thanks to the VA, they'll never receive help. I wonder who has killed more veterans, the Iraqis or our own system?

Anyone with one of those idiotic magnets on their car should have to house a traumatized veteran for a year...

As much as I agree with the sentiment, it is a violation of the 3rd amendment.

/not like the constitution has stopped Bush before

As a vet of the UEF campaign in Asscrackistan who served in the airborne infantry I can say that I have been noticably more aggresive since I left service. I don't know if this can be attributed to PTSD but I do know that prior to my military service I had never once gotten into a fight in public, since I've been out I have been in God knows how many fist fights. I think there is definately some validity to this article. That is all.

kekyurhi: I can say that I have been noticably more aggresive since I left service.

a) I wouldn't be surprised. My ex-wife used to serve as a prison guard, and I could see how much it changed her in just a short time. I'd imagine your experience to be magnified.

b) Here's hoping you can get decent help, if you feel it's warranted. Good luck to you, and thanks for your service.

Karma isn't a "concept," it's a religious belief that, in my opinion, is childish. If whole "point system" hasn't proven itself false to you by the time you're seven, you have a disability.

So the idea behind karma is that those who are generally positive, good, and productive people tend to reap more rewards than those who are bitter, negative, and defensive.

Which makes sense.

Take the person who acts frequently as a good samaritan. One may suggest that his frequent acts of good are "building karma." Of course this is not a tangible asset; it's more a philosophical observation, but one with value.

Why does it have value?

Because good people tend to experience good events more often than bad people (statistically). So, eventually (so say the odds) a good person should receive just reward simply for being a good person. It's not a contract with nature, but rather a case of probability.

Get it?

One of my friends has found his niche as a sniper in Iraq. He may be sociopathic but talented sociopaths are useful when waging war. He seemed fine when he was home for Christmas. We'll see if it bugs him ten years on I suppose. Says it isn't any different than shooting game animals, just concentrate on shot placement and conditions and make a clean kill, except for the fact that Iraqi "deer" shoot back sometimes and have killed a few of his friends. IEDs bug him more than insurgents with firearms.

The reason I suspect that this report is a lie is that it's the same lie that was told about Vietnam vets:




"Legions of homeless Vietnam veterans are in the street, hundreds of thousands of them are suffering from Agent Orange or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and more of them have died from suicide than died in the war....or so the social advocates and the media tell us.

B.G. Burkett, in over ten years of research in the National Archives, filing hundreds of requests for military documents under the Freedom of Information Act., uncovered a massive distortion of history, a distortion that has cost the U.S. taxpayers billions of dollars. Mr. Burkett's work has toppled national political leaders and put criminals in jail.

The authors show killers who have fooled the most astute prosecutors and gotten away with murder, phony heroes who have become the object of award-winning documentaries on national network television, and liars and fabricators who have flooded major publishing houses with false tales of heroism which have become best-selling biographies.

Not only do Burkett and Whitley show the price of the myth has been enormous for society, but they spotlight how it has severely denigrated the service, patriotism, and gallantry of the best warriors America ever produced."

A good friend was a spotter for a sniper team in Iraq. He came back and is really reserved, really quiet. He never wants to hit the bars, snowboard ... anything. He just sits in his shiatty apartment and goes to his shiatty job and then back home.

He's not like freaking out mental, but he's definitely nothing like when he left.

I'm intrigued by these people using the Starbucks definition of Karma.

Dorf11

Laugh now, but that one in four will go crazy and kill that one dentist who doesn't approve of Trident gum.

Thats what Trident wants. Then they can say 9 out of 9 dentists approve.

Baron Von Supercock

I hope your friend gets better.

That said, I wonder how much of a correlation there is between leading sheltered lives (i.e. friends, bar, hometown (work eat sleep drink)) and not being able to handle the reality of war there is. It is probably damaging to someone's psyche to see the reality of the world after not having to deal with it for 16-28 years.

WAR IS TRAUMATIC, NEWSFLASH!

It used to rip me up knowing that a whole new generation of farked up vets was being turned out, and that these guys are mostly younger than me.

But then, I just got numb and quit letting it bother me. There's not a whole hell of a lot I can do about it, and so many of the guys in now joined knowing full well they'd be going to war.

Now I'm annoyed that the number of experienced killers out and about is increasing.

I love Fark.

my SO is ex-military. Ex going on 10 years maybe. He has ishoos, oh yes. He doens't talk about anything specifically terrible but the omni-present nightmares kind of give the game away.

IAmRight: wow, so of those who GO TO VA HEALTH CARE FACILITIES, 25% had mental issues. seems like an important sentence fragment.

So you're saying getting shot/ blown up makes you crazy, not being almost shot and blown up 100 times?

1 in 4 people in San Francisco are totally mental.

totally!

I have an idea. Don't join the army and/or marines if you don't want to be in a war. I'm going to the mall.

2007-03-13 10:03:36 AM Devo
I have an idea. Don't join the army and/or marines if you don't want to be in a war. I'm going to the mall.

No, don't go to the mall. that's where the recruiters sign you up. they get you by the chik-fil-a and old navy.

stay in bed, under the blankets.

Back in WWII, you didn't hear about all this mental weakness. Because liberalism hadn't yet become as pervasive in society as it is today, the soldiers weren't sheltered little snowflakes with an over-inflated sense of entitlement. They saw the necessity of their service, as did the rest of society. They did their duty, lost friends and comrades in a war that was more up close and personal than any today, finished the job, came home, and went back to their lives, all without complaint. They didn't seek out forums for validation of their inability to deal with reality; they put it in perspective and got over it. That was what was expected of an adult, back then.

Of course, this was back when life was harder and "sacrifice", a daily reality. No media telling them they should feel stressed out and anti-social. Nor was the media portraying them as killers and criminals in a cruel political game.

When I served in the Army, back in the mid 80's, Harry Brown, one of my Basic Training platoon members fell out during a run and died. He was anemic. The Army descended upon us with counsellors and interviews. When it was my turn, the doctor asked my how I felt about losing a fellow soldier. My reply, after obtaining permission to speak openly (he was a superior officer, after all): "Are you going to follow me everywhere I go in battle, and ask me the same question every 5 minutes or so? If so, you'd better bring a gun and make yourself usefull."

I never saw battle, but have seen a fair amount of death, dismemberment and destruction in my time as a volunteer firefighter. Still don't need no stinking shrink to encourage me to be weaker.

I've never trusted the city of Des Moines myself. French name.

/need i say more?

//not really

I never knew farkers to be in such self denial till now..

Hey Einstein, seeing your buddies limbs get torn out of his body and piles of human beings stack onto each other almost on a daily basis farks with ya brain aiite? and that's just the begining! Who gives a shiant if it came from VA or your local doc? You must be a total numbnuts to not even consider the adverse phychological effects of war on people.

SOB! I hate civilians stateside who live in such denials and think wars are so sterile and clean like they see on cnn or fox news. To those who thinks this is some made up story, and that vets coming back are all hunky dory I'll be a security guard and love my life fairy tale, I hope my brothers come back home and rape your wives and then plead insanity because they really are insane.

2007-03-13 06:44:55 AM IAmRight

"Seal's group based their findings on records of US veterans deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan who were seen at VA health care facilities between September 2001 and September 2005."

wow, so of those who GO TO VA HEALTH CARE FACILITIES, 25% had mental issues. seems like an important sentence fragment.

but continue arguing based on faulty representations of numbers.

That part you wrote in all caps is a figment of your imagination, and is a completely faulty representation of the numbers in the article. Nowhere in the article does it state that 25% of soldiers at VAs had these issues. It simply states that the 25% statistic is bases on VA records, meaning that they look at those records and extrapolate the number to apply to all returning vets. This is what scientists, doctors, and statisticians do.

platypusjones
stay in bed, under the blankets.

Hell yeah brother! There might be terrorists out there.

Neapoi, I don't understand the picture in the middle.

"In addition to the high rate of mental health disorders, about one in three (31 percent)"

I'm no Mathematician, but isn't that 33.33 recurring?