Oh brother. If boys who bang whores at brothels are the best we got where "real men" are concerned, I see no reason for defending the country ... er, the "wife and kids" back home.
I thought real men just drank like fish and started fights and left to the imagination their exploits with prostitutes who may or may not be sending home a little veneral disease or worse for the wife or girlfriend on whom he's screwing around. For all the talk of not wanting to cuddle or sleep with your bunkmate, it sounds as though none has a problem with sharing the "sock" as long as it's part of a female bod.
You hearken to these "volunteers" who committed to defend the country. What about their freely obligating themselves to wives or girlfriends? Unless these "Real Men" can't score "Real Women" it's obvious they couldn't make or keep a commitment if they tried. Little wonder there are so few "Real Marriages" surviving these days.
All of this is talk best left to the smoker or the boys bathroom. Though it's hard to make that argument now that folks like A+Bert (who had no problems holding forth on what "real men" were capable of in combat where women -- willing or otherwise -- were concerned) are long gone for talking such trash.
Maybe this too is different now that it's "war-time". Perhaps all women need to understand that implicit in hooking up with our nation's finest is the real threat of infidelity and sexually transmitted disease because that's not only what "Real Men" do, that's what "Real Men" defend as a perfectly legitimate and honorable activity.
Of course, on the flip side, perhaps the women back home could just take a page from the "Real Men" and, emulating their sense of duty, relieve with a little sex on the side the stress of holding down the fort alone. Chances are they would't even have to pay for it like their husbands or boyfriends do and might even score dinner, drinks and entertainment as a bonus!
I'm sure any "Real Man" would understand perfectly. It's doubtful these strapping virile sorts are attracted to or hook up with frigid women. What do they expect if they leave her home alone -- possibly cooped up in some can with the kids -- for months on end? Why shouldn't she get the same leeway with her vows or commitment as he?
A+Bert is not here to defend himself, if that needed to be done.
See my post above re the wives. I glossed over the details.
Your sanctimonious rant has been duly noted and accepted. I will certainly give it every consideration that I think it deserves.
BTW, did you hear the one about the sailor who fell in love with a world class swimmer? She had trained all of her adult life as a streetwalker in Venice.
I didn't think you saw any reason for defending the country against terrorism anyway. It is really, really cheap to push your view by dumping on men whose dangers and difficulties you have not shared.
We have never had an army or navy, not even back when Pat Buchanan was a boy, in which this sort of thing did not happen. There has never been an army in the entire history of human civilization in which this sort of thing did not happen.
So go ahead, extend your contempt to the men of 1776, to the American G.I. in WWII, to the sailors who turned back the Turks under Don John of Austria. Why, I'll bet some of those New York firemen who ran into the flames to rescue others probably TOLD DIRTY JOKES IN BARS from time to time. So you could even work up a mild contempt for them, if you tried.
I believe that sex apart from marriage is always wrong, but for a young man coming back from his first experience of combat to seek comfort and release with a woman, even in this very empty way, is very, very human. The classical Christian tradition would certainly treat this as a sin, but as a far less grave sin than spiritual pride and denigration of others.