Topic > Serve Voluntarily or Be Forced to Serve

Imagine you are eighteen years old and you walk across the platform to meet the principal on stage to receive your diploma. Feelings of joy and hope for the future are normal emotions a person might experience after graduating from high school in the United States. This is not the case for young adults in 68 countries around the world who apply for military service or conscription after turning eighteen. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay It is vital that the outdated conscription method is never used again except in the most dire circumstances. This can affect all young people today and affect future generations if this practice is not stopped. There is a line of thought that thinks conscription has a place in today's society. On the surface it seems right! For less populated nations like North Korea, it can be a matter of national security as its population is unable to maintain an effective volunteer military force without it. Men are required to serve ten years before they can be exempted from service. Women are required to serve after high school until they turn 23. Along with national security, national unity is also given as a reason for the use of conscription. With compulsory conscription, people of all classes and economic conditions are enrolled in the armed forces. This has the effect of showing its population that no one is above the country and that everyone is in the same situation. Finally, one reason advocates cite is that a conscription-based military faces fewer deployments; for example, Israeli male soldiers are only given 3 years of minimum service and few normally have two years of service before being released back into society. On average, eighty percent of the Israeli population will respond to the call to service. The only people released from forced service are married women with children and/or an adult studying in the Orthodox religious faith. While these reasons seem logical to most, we are still not answering the question: How can we make them useful? How can we expect young adults to go against their belief system and voluntarily give up their personal freedom which is rooted in our Constitution with the right to freedom of religion and life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness? The idea that we will willingly send young adults to war against their will and perhaps to die is a violation of that. Conscription is disguised as a call to service. In simple terms it is a call for forced servitude or forced slavery. Someone can't just say “no, I won't serve”. In these countries conscription cannot be refused, as refusal for reasons other than religious, such as an Israeli citizen, can be placed in prison until he agrees to complete his service. For those who may be exempt from service such as the conscientious objector. These are the people who refuse to take up arms for moral and religious reasons. The basic belief of the conscientious objector is that he cannot serve and/or take up arms in the military due to conscious objection or religious teachings. One of the most popular objectors was Mohamed Ali. Ali was selected for conscription in 1964 for the Korean War. He expressed his objections to the service as it goes against the teachings of the Quran, as well as his general opposition to American involvement in the war. His rejection quote was as follows: “Dude, I don't have any..