It seems to me his comment was a tongue-in-cheek nod especially meant for people like you, who evidently can't see the military as being anything other than a 'violent organisation' whose enlistees must be violence-seekers themselves. I'm not surprised you missed the humour.
So is your local police force, in that it's an organisation with the capacity and authority to commit violent acts on behalf of the state. But neither the military nor the police have violence as their sole objective; it's merely a tool to be used in the attainment of certain goals and policies such as national defence or community safety.
But we're arguing semantics here. I wrote my response because the way in which joubert dismissed the possibility of the author's comment being sarcasm strongly implied that he regarded the military as an inherently violent organisation to which only violence-loving terrorist-killing wannabes would aspire. I resent that.
"So is your local police force, in that it's an organisation with the capacity and authority to commit violent acts on behalf of the state."
We agree so far. I don't think it's just semantics, but my "politics" probably differ radically from most of the crew here (and I don't expect to change anyone's mind), so I'll leave it at that.
I get that his list of reasons was largely sarcastic. But that suggests he's (at least somewhat) cynical about the military. Given that, I don't understand why he'd join up. Especially when he implies that he had/has specific knowledge that he'd likely be sent to Iraq and told to kill people. I just don't find it funny. Maybe I missed the point.
The military and war generally is "politics by other means". I don't think it is fair to say people who go into the military have a "need to shoot people", though I'm sure one could find those cases. I think a lot of people join the military just for the benefits - education opportunities, and so on. Broadly, from a public policy standpoint, for example with the Iraq war, that was not motivated by "violence per ce", though one could make the argument that everyone has a need for violence just from evolution.
Iraq is just an issue of economic control. Either Iraqi's can control Iraqi oil, or we can. In fact it has nothing at all to do with terrorism, that is just for the weak minded to buy into. What it has to do with his privatizing oil. American companies do not benefit from publicly owned oil in Iraq, but if multinational or American-owned corporations own Iraqi oil, then the American people benefit. Think about it: would you rather have the Iraqis own the Iraq oil, or would you rather have the benefit of American companies owning it instead? Personally, I have a slight moral gripe about taking away people's natural resources and giving it to multinational corporations, but hey, that's just politics. War is politics by other means. Always been that way, always will be that way.
Japan was right (from their point of view) to do Pearl Harbor, because it eliminated the threat caused by the American navy, and solidified their economic control of the Pacific rim. Similarly, the US was right (from our point of view) to do the Iraq war, because it got oil out of the hands of the indigenous peoples of that region and into our hands, benefiting us, not them, and eliminating the threat caused by Hussein at the same time. Please note I say "right" not as in morally right, but just right from the point of view of economic dominance.
Violence is incidental. It is just a necessary part of war. The real point is economic control. True with Japan. True with the United States. Is that "moral" or "just". I don't know. I would like to think not. But apparently the 50 million people who voted for President Bush would disagree with me.
Humor is a way of dealing with psychological inconsistencies. It can be an outlet to deal with the unpleasant. So killing in the military can becomes humorous. 1st year medical school students routinely joke about dead bodies in anatomy lab. Hackers have this site: http://thedailywtf.com/ .
