Controversial topic particularly given recent coverage of ptsd and suicides by former soldiers.
No matter what industry you work in, safe work (and post work care if injured) should not be questioned.
What are OzBargainers views on the attention generally given to veterans matters, particularly given conscription is no longer a thing.
Exactly! Might take two or four more generations to wipe out the cancer of Human (Religion)
Space Travel - where to ? Another Earth - there is only one Earth. Period.
Imagine what could have been achieved if Space money was spent finding cancer cures.
Where are all the moon rocks brought back ? What good were they and where are they now ? Cost per Kg ?
And what do they actually do on the ISS day after day after day, rotation after rotation, year after year ? Totally unproductive and please don’t mention Velcro.
If you go to Cape Canaveral and visit the Kennedy Space Centre you can touch a space rock, at least you could when i went there, it is on display and you can put your hand into a perspex box and touch a rock that is supposedly from the moon. There's a doco on Netflix at the moment called a year in space, watch that and see what they do on the ISS.
Cancer research, from what I've read is more held up with the beaurecratic testing process, with the number of expensive tests that need to be performed to make sure the new medicine is safe. The reason it is so expensive and that small drug companies have to sell out to larger pharma is because smaller companies cant pay for the testing. One one hand that's good because it protects all of us from potentially dangerous side effects, on the other hand you wonder what has been shelved because nobody wants to pay the hundreds of millions and wait the 10-15 years to find out if they will be allowed to eventually sell their new drug.
Do you have any idea of the number of technologies that have been spun out of military research? Ever been on a plane with a Jet engine? Ever used a computer? Enjoy using the Internet? Stupid comment!
While quite true, isn’t it sad for the human race that some of our greatest advances in tech came about because of war?
and humans' greatest crimes have came because of war,
i guess it's what you value more- i think technology develops regardless, you see accelerations during war times.
My comment was referring to investment in space travel instead of wars.
I have no issue with investment in science and technology (excluding space travel). It’s a pointless pursuit. Just why are we going back to the moon again? Because we can ?
Experiments on how spiders spin webs in zero gravity is pointless as is journeying into space as well as the expense.
NASA hasn’t even worked out how they’re going to get astronauts destined for Mars back yet, but sending them anyway.
Stupid idea - valid comment.
@2ndeffort FYI The jet engine was invented by an English civilian, not NASA or the US Army. Neither were computers or the internet. But feel free to list a technology spun out of the military. Nuclear weapons come to mind. Real useful.
Military weaponise new technology. Drones. Stealth. Radar. And create nothing.
You're doubling down on #fakenews. Here's some info on Jet engines for you https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-the-jet-engine-4067905 Air Commodore Sir Frank Whittle doesnt sound overly civilian!!! Both contenders for the title of inventor (UK and German) developed their prototypes in the late 1930's to early 1940's funded largely by the German and UK war effort for WW2. Amazingly there are people outside of the US doing research funded by the military.
Nuclear research led to Nuclear power plants, arguably nuclear medicine and a whole range of other technologies.
Most people credit ARPANET funded by the US Defence Advanced Projects Research Agency (DARPA) as being one of the key fore-runners of the Internet. To quote the History Channel's website:
"The first workable prototype of the Internet came in the late 1960s with the creation of ARPANET, or the Advanced Research Projects Agency Network. Originally funded by the U.S. Department of Defense, ARPANET used packet switching to allow multiple computers to communicate on a single network.
On October 29, 1969, ARPAnet delivered its first message: a “node-to-node” communication from one computer to another. (The first computer was located in a research lab at UCLA and the second was at Stanford; each one was the size of a small house.) The message—“LOGIN”—was short and simple, but it crashed the fledgling ARPA network anyway: The Stanford computer only received the note’s first two letters.
The technology continued to grow in the 1970s after scientists Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf developed Transmission Control Protocol and Internet Protocol, or TCP/IP, a communications model that set standards for how data could be transmitted between multiple networks. "
Plenty of people are looking for new ways to use drones, research previously funded heavily by the military for all sorts of useful civilian applications. I've read that you can now get a pizza delivered by drone in Canberra. I see there are kids doing drone racing as a hobby and I see you can now get action camera equipped drones that will follow you recording whilst you do your extreme sport (skiing, Mountain Biking etc).
Radar has helped for all sorts of things, how do you think Air Traffic Controllers avoid planes crashing into each other. Military weather research, GPS systems that we all now use in our cars, even charting the world's oceans and making maps of some of the worlds most remote places have all been Military Research projects by somebody at some time in history. The list just goes on and on. Your political bias is at odds with historical facts. You can hate all you like that's your right (won for you by the servicemen and women of yesteryear) but to twist historical fact to suit your conditioning is ridiculous.
@2ndeffort: what the yanks said
'On 25 November 2015, General John F. Campbell, the American commander in Afghanistan, spoke about the results of the investigation and described the incident as "the direct result of avoidable human error, compounded by process and equipment failures."[53] Campbell said that the investigation had showed that the AC-130 gunship crew misidentified the clinic as a nearby Taliban-controlled government building.[53] The American gunship had identified the building based on a visual description from Afghan troops, and did not consult their no-strike list, which included the co-ordinates of the hospital as provided by MSF.[53] Electronic equipment malfunctions on the gunship prevented it from accessing email and images, while a navigation error meant its targeting equipment also misidentified the target buildings.[54] The aircraft fired 211 shells at the building in 29 minutes, before American commanders realized the mistake and ordered the attack to stop.[54] The report found that the MSF facility "did not have an internationally-recognized symbol to identify it as a medical facility,".[55] This finding was contested by Joe Goldstein stating that the facility had a MSF symbol on it.[56] According to the report, 12 minutes into the operation, the US military was contacted by MSF, but the faulty electronics on the plane prevented the message from getting through until the attack was over.'
what the yanks did 'condolence payments had been made, $3,000 for wounded people and $6,000 for dead
42 x 6,000 = 250,000 for deliberately targeting a hospital, burning women and children to death in their beds etc and of course according to you and the yanks it wasn't a war crime.
you can label away like the troll u are but that gunship blew apart fleeing medical personnel and patients quite deliberately.
@petry: I'm hardly a Troll, I've answered your vague statements with reasoned, verifiable and intelligent responses. I'm not the one posting from feelings rather than evidence. Your response regarding the hospital is probably right, i concede to you, on this occasion your evidence looks legit. But by your own admission the whole event was therefore a catastrophic failure of process and a massive mistake. Hardly an intentional war crime, more a huge stuff-up by people that should know better. This is similar to any number of stuff ups like Chernobyl etc. Somebody in power made a huge mistake but hardly a state sponsored crime. I understand that this is moot to the victims but somebody making a mistake is different to somebody committing an intentional, reasoned, planned and state sponsored crime.
@2ndeffort: no you called me a hater in your opening response - that's personal abuse - If you think it ain't you're deluded self deception does not preclude you from being a troll
I have met several vetrans, and the thing that they all have in common is that they are young. They are not retirement age
Someone who spends 10, 15, 20 years in the service and returns to … nothing … is going to develop mental illness
We spend millions subsidizing the education of 18 y.o. students and expect nothing in return. Many of them will not make any use of their degrees - either by getting a job where the degree is not necessary, or getting further education.
There should be funding that allows vetrans a pathway into a new profession so that they can become integrated into civilian life. Reserved university places and tafe places for vetrans. We already do this for people of rural origin, and of aboriginal ancestry. I don't think it will be that controversial.
Poor mental health is a symptom of a poorly lived life. We can prevent suicide by helping vetrans have a meaningful life outside the service
And for all the shortsighted people here who think they don't deserve anything, poor health of our citizens has direct costs to medicare, and indirect costs in lost productivity.
Why do young discharged military personnel deserve mental health services at the expense of every other Australian? Why prioritise them over fire fighters police ambo's paramedic's and every other profession?
Your assertion that poor mental health is a symptom of a poorly lived life is garbage. Try having your head smashed in by a king hit and suffer brain damage and see how you get on or maybe watch a yank soldier put a gun in the mouth of your baby and blow its brains over the ceiling.
What an aweful post. You clearly have some problems. Killing babies? Disgraceful!!
yes because bombs don't kill babies, just the bad guys.
The babykiller's name is Robert bales - he was protected by the US. He lives in a prison without bars and is appealing for a trump pardon
@petry: operative words being 'lives in a prison'. He plea-dealed his way in there as per the US legal system to avoid the death penalty just like any number of US Mass murderers. A rogue nut-case who went crazy with a gun, was captured and faced the full force of the US legal system. Unlike the Russian MH-17 Anti-Aircraft crew that shot down an airliner killing hundreds of civilians and were then hidden/protected by the corrupt regime that they serve.
@2ndeffort: corrupt? the president of the united states used a veterans charity - scomo's best bud - to fund his personal election expenses -that's corrupt - what a laugh the little fella was on remembrance day - that's what veterans are for in America and Australia - personal political gain.
Bales never faced the full force of any legal system - he was protected unlike the mentally ill, vets, the disabled, the handicapped, and children in America.
and since trump serves Russian interests very clearly you seem confused. Our alliance with the yanks is now supporting Russia…
It's a profession, it's just a career somebody choose
incredibly generous super, health. it's a choice they make. last time i looked Australia wasn't at war.
Absolutely pathetic, I can not believe what I am reading.
You are paying your precious tax dollars so housos and junkies can have free money from government without working whatsoever, making no contributions to the society, not to mention all these immigrants who drop their jobs (or their marriage partners) and get on the dole as soon as their permanent residency gets confirmed. And you think there is no problem with it.
Yet, you reckon the person who makes a free-will decision to sacrifice their young years to go to the army to protect Australia (including all those dole bludgers too!) in a worst-case scenario, to endure a lot of physical training, deserves no help from your tax dollars whatsoever?
In my opinion, as long as the government is wasting money on welfare, the veterans also have the right to get some of my tax dollars and should be getting some benefits.
get a grip. you can not seriously be comparing newstart allowance to what defence personnel are paid and given in benefits.
I dont think he is making a comparison of the benefits, merely pointing out that Defence Personnel make great sacrifices for the greater good and are paid for doing so. Clearly there are some in society that receive welfare who have selfish intentions that dont include doing anything to justify the help they receive. Not saying everyone, I'm currently unemployed myself but clearly there are some.
There’s always some abusing every system regardless of whether it’s welfare or something else. The good thing is that it’s there to support the vast majority without them missing out because the rules became too complex to weed out the minority.
I am confident to say there’s less monetary abuse of the welfare system than corporate conniving to minimise tax.
Are you referring to all military personell in general or just our veterans? I mean i agree with veterans but to join the army now is not "sacrificing your young years",
I am a veteran, a medic who served 7 years in the military and did a tour of Afghanistan. On my immediate return I had relationship breakdowns with my family, my fiance and also lost a job I cherished and loved for 7 years. PTSD is real, it's a challenge faced everyday and its sometimes the support of friends and family and even strangers that makes the difference when you are about to be pushed over the edge.
I am medically retired and don't ask for handouts. I manage my life as best I can and contribute as much as I can. For myself I am doing well off, but that is because I had to fight alot of bureaucracy to be in the position I am now. Many can't or don't fight.
We volunteer for sure, but no one, and I mean no one prepares you for the realities of humanitarian disasters or war. Same for all professions that deal with this which can be paramedice, policeman or firefighters. But if I was honestly told about how much I would lose out in my life, I would just be the silly bricklayer apprentice I was and not try and escape home for a better life.
I lost so many military friends as I came out with PTSD as many deny it, many try and forget. But it is real, everyday is real.
This post is silly, the remarks are silly and even my message is silly as it truly makes no difference.
Your story is all too familiar. The realities of post service life and challenges in simply getting some help to assist with the trauma are never disclosed at the beginning.
I wish you all the best with your recovery.
I know several people who worked with children who have ptsd - nothing prepared them for the horror of systemically protected child abuse, and the personal consequences for them of trying to stop it. The got paid bugger all, they got no recognition, they were targeted for abuse, professionally destroyed etc etc. Whistleblowers really who in Australia are legitimate targets for the government and military - they get nothing for doing the right thing. Pollies get special benefits and special pensions for targeting whistleblowers.
Ann advanced society should look after its vulnerable.
The poll question is binary and flawed.
It's for the greater benefit of society that vulnerable groups are treated and looked after so they can lead some semblance to a normal everyday life. It's a question of equity rather than equality.
Some groups such as veterans, paramedics etc. have much much higher rates of mental illness. So treating them differently is equitable because the underlying issue is that we are trying to look after society's vulnerable.
A debate on veterans vs paramedics vs firefighters or whether joining armed forces is voluntary and well paid is not helpful and frankly the wrong argument.
I think you’ll find the purpose of the discussion is around the attention given to veterans (all types of attention, not just health). I’ve intentionally framed it to include health to broaden the discussion given the recent significant focus on veteran well being compared to attention to general community?
Is there a romance associated with veterans or police or ambos or paid firies where in reality it’s just a career path someone chose?
The recent political and media attention on discounts for veterans is bringing the wrong attention and wrong debate to the detriment to the real issues.
I personally feel it's trying to solve a complex, long term challenge for us in a overly simplistic manner and potentially drawing attention in the wrong way.
For example if I proposed this: given home ownership is out of reach for many Millennials, let's give everyone between age 20 and 30 a taxpayer funded public transport so they can live furthest away where house prices are cheaper.
With my good intentions, I've suddenly created a spotlight on Millennials and the unfairness of rewarding Millennials vs other people who face the same issue. I've potentially started anecdotal debate on how Millennials prefer to eat avo on toast, go on foreign holidays rather than save up, sacrifice and work hard compared to other groups. Surely everyone should get the same benefits?
Great question OP - My views remain that there is a complex problem (mental health issues for veterans) and the debate that had been stirred up by good intentions has done more harm than good.
In response to your second question, should there be romance associated with certain career paths…
I think there should be respect. Emergency services work as well as military service keeps us safe directly and indirectly. People that have put their bodies in the line should be paid, yes. They should also be respected for doing so.
I also think teachers, nurses, doctors should also be given respect.
I believe everyone should be given respect.
By and large, in our society we do individually believe we respect each other well.
But doesn't real respect mean that if Ambos and war veterans are suffering high degrees of PTSD, mental illness - our institutions should look after them in this regard? Why are there not enough resources and support available? Isn't it our responsibility to fix this? And isn't the "institution" made up of individuals who all believe that they are fair and reasonable like you and me.
Should there be romance? Again the wrong question. Drummed up by US tv and movies. Creating a false sense that veterans are actually put on a pedestal. When in reality the institution fails them but gives them a pat on the back and says "good job son - you're awesome"
You see, that’s exactly what I’m talking about. ‘They should be respected for keeping us safe’ is really putting them up on a pedestal above all others even though later you say everyone everyone should be respected equally.
We see the politics play out all the time when pollies (Both sides) try to outmanoeuvre each other to demonstrate greater respect for former soldiers… all in the name of votes.
I consider all paid service (Military, police, ambos etc) a career choice. Those that should be put on a pedestal are the volunteers. Those who do it because they believe in it and believe in it so much that they don’t need to be paid for it.
@Vote for Pedro: Respecting and giving credit where credit is due does not take away credit for others. It's not a zero sum game.
To me talk respect is to look after them in the right way. Through investing in mental health issues. Not ass kissing, which achieves nothing.
You're quite right about pollies! It's like watching 2 grown men argue about who loves their dad the most! Is quite sickening and cheapens the work the service they the vets have given.
I believe you see what I see in a similar way but are expressing differently.
@darkchoc: every Australian has a right to a decent mental health system - the mentally ill all deserve help and care because they are not protected by the law like children, they are even more disadvantaged. 2 tier mental health programmes and funding is just evidence of how little really is done here besides compulsory drug therapy which kills many of them after 10- 15 years. Effectively there is little or no care - only a long slow dehumanising euthanasia.
Imagine how much the world would of Advanced in Technology and Science and space travel,
if we had not wasted $$$ Trillions of money put into military from the racially retard views of the previous generations?!?
Yes this might be ageism & what not, but how much of this older gen/Racist/religious backward crap must we continue to endure? rant over But still annoyed -_-