It is scary what a slick and captivating piece of progaganda this is.
Rather than try to hide the big reason not to join the National Guard, namely, that you will go to Iraq, this video instead glamorizes the war and links it (among other things) to the National Guard acting as militia in the Revolutionary War.
Um, that rather misses the fact that the Patriots were trying to keep an occupying army out, and the Iraqis are trying to throw an occupying army out.
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I saw this video in full theater glory before the showing of The Martian Child at our local multiplex last weekend.
It really struck me as odd at first, but when I think back, I remember lots of pre-movie advertisements for the US Marine Corp – mainly the guy fighting the dragon with a sword who transforms into a Marine in a dress uniform.
This video shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did a bit, coming before a movie based on a book that is based on a fictionalized, but semi-autobiographical book by a gay science fiction writer who adopts a kid. Clearly an audience that is eager to be won over by the military.
Techfum,
I saw it in a theater too, so I suspect that moviegoers like you have already been exposed to it. And the movie playing (Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead) was a rather intricate crime picture (not the cops shoot-em-up type). The audience was leaning toward the geriatric, and this being New York. someone yelled out a complaint after it finished and got a bit of applause.
As I said, it bothered me how seductive it was. It is actually a very good music video if you ignore the message. But if an old fart like me was intrigued and repelled by it, maybe it is too conventional to appeal to its target audience.
One can only hope.
The target audience is too young, innocent, and naive to understand that they’re being had. But it’s not a hell of lot different than the countless young men who yearn to play college football. Most of those guys skip class and study time to slave away on the “farm team” for the 1 in 100 chance to play pro ball. Few of them even pick their school based on the academic ranking, programs, or professors available.
I saw this last night with my children (too young to notice, really) before a showing of Bee Movie, of all things.
One line from the song struck me as a serious miscalculation: “We will always be there!”
The comments at the youtube site we’re as frightening as usual. Any dissenting post was met with swift and mindless vitriol.
Propaganda such as this is a very insidious and effective tool, especially on an undereducated, rigidly constructed consumer culture.