HW 46

I read a book about the biggest institution in America, the military. The book is called Jarhead, and if your talking institution wise, the military wanted well trained soldiers that doesn't mind being kept in the dark. For instance the soldiers in the book knew how to calculate the distance a bullet can travel, and work together, but without a reason other than fighting for America. If we look at how the military works, discipline is one of the main skills they want soldiers to learn. After discipline, they teach other skills along with loyalty, and how to act. But in the end, they don't just teach you how to act like a soldier but a decent civilian.
My topic was about how schools want to form their children into civilized adults. This is no different then what the military is trying to accomplish. For instant, they both teach about respect, and disipline while educating students the skills they need to "achieve" in life. Look at the "go-army" commercials, they make people believe that they teach people skills and knowlegde to help them better themselves, nothing more than what school is already doing. Every institution is trying to teach their people their way in acting in life, military and schools happen to be the same. They teach you the "proper" ways to act like a civilian and have people believe that thei progras can change people.
In Jarhead the soldiers in the beginning act like children. They are immature, play harsh pranks while showing they cannot complete a simple command. Though once they are in a battle, they all act as a unit, trying to keep each other alive while remaining calm in the most dangerous of task. The military has taught them the basic needs to survive in a fight, how to act in a fight, what to do and how to do it. Same goes for schools. In the beginning were suppose to arrive at this institution all gullible and stupid, and come out intellectual people with a college degree, dress well, eat well, and maintain a health body day after day. That is the goal of both these institution and their answer to maintain a number of health mentally stabled individuals