Thread: Why go SF?
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Old 10-03-2004, 09:56   #1
odoylerules
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Join Date: Feb 2004
Location: CONUS
Posts: 37
Why go SF?

A lot of guys my age come through this site and SOCNET, interested in going SF. And I always think to myself "well, why do these guys want to be on an ODA?" Almost invariably, their reasoning seems to be very poor (movie inspired, cool sounding title, beret, tab, want to be Rambo, etc). As a result of this, I started to ask myself "why does SF interest you?"

I thought back as far as possible, and realized it was because of a math teacher I had, who'd been a 5th Grouper. Mind you, I was locked on to going to the 82d at this point in time. I spoke with him a lot about the Deuce, but he always seemed to have something "neato" to say about Group. So if not for him, I'd never have even looked into it. Which isn't to say if he'd been a Marine/SEAL/whatever that I'd be looking there, but he was the beginning of my research into SF.

I read a lot, studied a lot and liked what I saw a lot. Not wearing a beret & long tab, having unshined boots and long hair. Not even kicking down doors and doing HSLD Direct Action missions. What I really liked was empitomized by a couple of lines from the History Channel's "Complete History of the Green Berets."
1) "An SF soldier was not recruited for physical prowess. It's not about how many pushups you can do (although that's important), the SF community is comprised of some of the most intelligent individuals I know...that's what influences the cultures where we work."
2) "SF isn't about commando crap (though we can do it), it's about helping people...building schools, churches, teaching how to cultivate the land."

Then I came to SOCNET, and found a lot of guys my age were interested in the same road as I. However, by and large they seemed to want to be "hard" or "HSLD" or whatever you call it. I'm not saying they all were, I can think of a bunch who are great guys with the best of intentions, but in proportion, there seemed to be a lot more assclowns.

And that's where I got this question: why should an individual want to be SF? Why did you? What's a good reason.

As for research I put into this question, I PMed NDD first. He advised me to post here, so I guess you could say this question is approved by the People's Medic.

Thanks,
Doyle
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