[bely832new]

Did the Buddha beat the crap out of Angulimala to get him to change his ways? I left my home town for a couple of years about fifteen years ago when I came back I found some old friends who I used to smoke weed with had got into doing heroin. One time I went to see them and a heroin dealer was bullying them over a debt, I beat the crap out of the guy - it didn't stop him selling heroin, it didn't stop my friend and his wife from doing heroin and it didn't make me feel any better either. Your miiltary may protect you from outside rule but is what it does to the minds of its soldiers in terms of the psychological dehumanisation of a perceived enemy and the mental health problems of those who have seen combat worth it?

I lived on the streets in London - a good 30% of the homeless people I met were combat veterans who had served in Northern Ireland - most had mental health problems and alcoholism.

Go out and commit a serious act of violence in the defence of something you care about and then come back and tell yourself it was justified. It doesn't work and unless your either a very special person or a sociopath you'll be living with a life sentence.