[CapricornNoble]

There's a ton of prior-Army Youtubers complaining about the same trends in their branch. Even the Marine Corps is getting the infection lately; a Gunnery Sergeant I worked with who used to be a very successful recruiter talks about it often, and how it is impacting motivation for the young first-timers. But also many mid-career officers (my peer group) and Staff NCOs are getting out as they can see which way the wind is blowing and don't want to be a part of it.

[grogenaut]

How much of it is what your friend is ostensibly saying and how much of it is just the ever existent complaint about the laziness of the youth (lets face it you also sucked as a teen) meeting with the inflexibility of the aging? Aka the source of strife between generations since time immemorial?

[CapricornNoble]

Of anyone that I've worked with, he's been the most empathetic to the situations and life challenges of an 18-year old (like I said, he was REALLY good recruiter, which usually comes with understanding people well). Most of the problems are systemic and leadership failures. Even the Marines with completely screwed up personal lives and drama, he largely faults societal failures as #2 behind just generally shit decision-making (females engaging in prostitution in the barracks, depression and confusion over gender identity, Marines thinking Uncle Sam won't notice them scamming the system for pay/entitlements, etc... etc...).

Of course there has always been some baseline level of dysfunction in young adults away from home for the first time, but the trend we are seeing is that the various factors are definitely tipping towards an institutional breaking point. Even the great "spice epidemic" around 2012 didn't stress the system this badly, IMO.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/bath-salts-spice-us-military-servi...

[grogenaut]

Thanks for the reply and further details!