TikTok Munity!
I’m Not Happy!
US Army faces ‘TikTok mutiny’ as Gen Z recruits whine about low pay, ‘sh***y’ food and FITNESS TESTS while on bases in uniform
- Brazen posts represent audacious challenge to top brass amid recruitment crisis
- One of the posts by military influencer Anthony Laster slams Army life
- Says he spent whole day watching TikToks while supposedly fighting the Taliban
By ALICE WRIGHT FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
The US Army is facing a TikTok mutiny as Gen Z recruits are taking to social media to whine about low pay, ‘sh***y’ food and fitness tests.
The brazen posts – by uniformed troops on US bases – represent an audacious challenge to top brass amid a recruitment crisis. The Army fell short of its target by 25 percent last year.
One of the posts by military influencer Anthony Laster slams Army life for having ‘No Privacy, The Pay Sucks, Sh***y Food, Disrespectful Leadership, NO SLEEP!’ and has been viewed more than 600,000 times.
Laster, from Chicago, has more than a million followers on TikTok and made the public comments in uniform while on mission in the desert. In another post he claimed he spent his whole day watching TikToks while supposedly fighting the Taliban.
It gives a woeful impression of America’s fighting forces to potential recruits, which is likely to cause further animosity toward TikTok from critics.
Complaining in the ranks is a time-honored tradition going back to the history of forever. This is understood and expected- a bitching sailor is a happy sailor. Whining in uniform on a public forum is a symptom of leadership breakdown.
Tip of the hat to Anonymous for the link.
Category: Big Army, Morale, Reality Check, Schadenfreude
I don’t subscribe to Tok Toe or whatever it’s called, but I would love to see the comments section of that video.
Gee. The chicom propaganda channel is suborning mutiny.
Ban. Immediately. DoD wide.
Back to flip phones for any who can’t manage smartphones.
In the good old days some wall to wall counseling would have been a viable option.
^^^This!!!^^^
And a couple months of weekend duty, wash rack detail, hanger mopping and rock painting to make the lessons stick. Worked wonders for my stupid E-2 butt back in the day.
Making them mop the Motor Pool while it’s raining!
Dude is a bitch.
E-4 mafia type is my guess as well.
Clown needs to be slapped.
“Clown needs to be slapped.”… with a rifle butt…
Buttstroke to the head series…MOVE!
Nope. The E4 Mafia, if it existed, is far too smart and wily to draw attention to themselves like this.
How on God’s green earth are recruits allowed to post ANYTHING related to our Military on a Chinese intelligence controlled forum? To quote “Aliens”, “Did IQ’s just drop sharply while I was away”?
These ‘tards would’ve bought Japanese stuff and said cool things about Japan at the bar on Dec 5th, ’41.
Yes, please.
Kids today, they don’t know bad food until they’ve had a big can of monkey dicks, or a dehydrated pork patty. It was hard to tell which smelled worse going down or coming out the other end.
An E3 makes $28,000 a year plus housing and food allowance. Once you add the allowances it’s going to be between 34 and 40,000. That is without a bonus. There aren’t many jobs out there that a kid with just a high school diploma and no work experience is going to be able to get and make 35 to $40,000 a year.
I don’t think I’ve ever had an outright bad meal in a chow hall. Some days are better than others, but breakfast always seems to be pretty darn good. Hell, I remember when my wife and nephew came to visit me at Bliss before I went to Afghanistan, I paid for my nephew to eat at the DFAC and he was happy with the variety and quality of the food.
Concur. And I had some fantastic chow at Chinhae and Osan. But, since they’re those other services, they don’t count.
Chinhae!!??? I thought Donna’s Green House was just a soju induced dream.
Same here. MREs were okay, too (I was expecting C-rats) and they’ve only gotten better.
P.S. The pizza MRE is more of a thing that “could” than “should” be done though.
They don’t know what life is. My adult kids struggle, with live-in partners (well, my son just proposed to his long-term girlfriend, and she accepted, while my daughter is planning to get married in Vegas with or without her soy boyfriend who’s scared of flying). My son and his girlfriend work two jobs apiece, while my daughter is a Lead at Walmart and her boyfriend is a mechanic making super wise financial decisions like that $8k Snap-On toolbox.
I make around $35k at my job; $19 an hour is underselling myself, but I’ve got the disability and pension on top of that, so my family eats ramen only twice a week. Most here make substantially less, as there are only a handful of full-time positions. Pay starts at $14/hour, so an entry-level employee getting 30 hours a week is making just over $20k a year and likely working a second and maybe even a third job.
$8k snap-on tool boxes being sold on Craigslist and Facebook all the time by people who overbought or didn’t buy big enough. Unfortunately, they want what they paid for them. I have In my garage a harbor freight toolbox my son bought, filled with A/P tools his new job won’t let him use since they provide tools. And since he has a lot of specialized tools, the market narrows considerably if he were to try to sell (the tool portion). I already told him I would buy the box so I could consolidate my 2 boxes to 1.
My son’s former co workers all have snap on/matco tools, and the bills that go with them, but the tool truck makes it easy to buy the latest whiz bang gadget.
I racked up some bills on the tool trucks back in the ’90s, but never bought a toolbox. I do have a Mac 3-tier 24″ stack…it was old as hell when I bought it in ’97 but it’s still holding up. I’d have to guess it’s 50 years old, at least, and the top chest has been welded due to the stress of riding in the back of my service truck all those years ago.
The toolbox crowd is kind of like the gun crowd, or the car crowd, or you name it. You can buy a US General box from Harbor Freight and it’ll work, just like a S&W or Ruger AR, or a stock Toyota Tacoma 4WD or Silverado 1500. But if you want to have some status, you’ll buy Snap-On or Matco, CMMG or Daniel Defense, or a Raptor or Ram TRX.
If you have half a brain and can pass the USPS test you can make $41,600 a year to start here in Western Massachusetts.
Due to the shortage of USPS workers here you can also get 10-20 hours a week OT which means you’re looking well north of $50k as a starting point without any college degree in a job that once you’re part of the union will take you to retirement much more comfortably than an enlisted career in the military.
Most places here in the Northeast competing for talent have starting wages in the $20/hr range….from fast food to manufacturing…which is why it’s damn hard to find workers for many companies here in the Northeast. Once the start point is $20 the “perk” factor becomes a real thing…
In NYC the competition for talent has always driven up wages, but now adding in perks it’s quite good for talented young people.
Dipshits will always struggle to find gainful employment, but these days even they are finding opportunities that prior to August of 2021 simply didn’t exist.
With the last of the baby boomers retiring partially or fully over the next 5-10 years it’s unlikely that environment will change for talented job seekers anytime soon.
When you say, “You can get overtime”; around that here that means “you will be working overtime”. I don’t know if working for the post office was ever a cushy job but it definitely is not now. That is one job you’re going to work your ass off for a long hours.
True, but there’s a pension and aren’t USPS employees exempt from Social Security? It’s a good paying gig if you can get in the door.
Maybe an explainer will help.
This traveling Minstrel believes that you should take responsibility for your own actions and not blame everybody else for your decisions. And if you choose to travel out into the world on adventures, viewing everything through a negative lens is really a “you” problem.
https://youtu.be/H4ifSrE8iSg?
While I thnk this clown is a bitch, leadership created this problem.
Just an observation.
Somebody needs to yank a knot in this kids ass, and others like him. Be they lowly privates or senior enlisted/ officers, it should make no difference.
Maybe they miss their moms hot pockets culinary skills 🙄
Get rid of Shark Attack and this is what you get. 🤣
Yeah, I know, some or most of these clowns came in before it was eliminated but it’s only going to get worse. Complaining about fitness tests? Yeah, I sorta get it, but honestly, this new ACFT is easy to pass. It’s basically a light callisthenics workout with a run tacked on the end. It only sucks if you have to do it outside in the rain or on the coldest day of the year (my two most recent).
This has been in the making since before they got rid of the shark attacks. The removal of the shark attack was a part of this ongoing process. It’s like how the Navy ended up allowing Sailors to walk from organized PT with their PT shirts not tucked in.
The younger generations were not brought up the way we were. So, when they get subjected to the style of leadership we learned to deal with, it ended up being twisted into “creating a hostile working environment.”
Responsibilities that we were on the gun for when going up the ranks are being spared of those that followed us. It doesn’t help that an increasing number of folk that are coming in weren’t held to the same home, school, and society standards that we were subjected to.
Granted, I’ve seen and heard people issue complaints similar to the above in the last century and early in this one, but they coped and many even reenlisted after declaring that they wouldn’t.
(Obligatory Full Metal Jacket clip.) Now “traumatic” in and of itself and worse than anything an enemy could possible ever do to us:
“Disrespectful Leadership”
If only they would learn to say please and thank you instead of
just ordering people around.
So, the Platoon Sergeant saying “Hey, f*cktard, get your sh*t done before put a boot in your *ss!” is out? (Asking for a friend, you know… )
You would curse at soldiers and demean them? That is completely against regulations. In the last decade a lot of people have been fired for that.
Gosh, you mean an NCO would never tell an ate-up troop to “un-f*ckulate” themself? I’m shocked, shocked! Bad language never happens in the military. 😉 /sarc
Unfuckulate. I’m learning this word far too late in life. I’m still stealing it.
This is why we have Prowords and Acronyms.
WTF, over? SNAFU. FUBAR. Etc.
“Sergeant Sutton would never say anything to humiliate and demean you soldiers. Because if he did, Sergeant Sutton would be wrong.”
Allegedly this was one of my brother’s drill sergeants at Ft. Lost in the Woods back in 1994.
Hey, it worked for Captain Kangaroo.
Seeing this post reminds of this past one:
https://valorguardians.com/blog/?p=106488
Excuse me while I go hug my DD214.
“I’m not Happy”.
Yep. You look more like Grumpy.
Here’s a tic toc to bring a smile to your face. Bravo to this young lady!!
https://theferalirishman.blogspot.com/2023/12/damn-there-still-might-be-hope-watch-it.html?m=1
And Gammage here is an ROTC cadet out at an active unit on Cadet Troop Leadership Training (CTLT) or “3rd Lieutenant” as it was called in the Starship Troopers novel a semester or two prior to being commissioned, or doing Simultaneous Membership Program (SMP) with an NG unit prior to said commissioning.. (The round disk rank is the “c/2LT”– Cadet/2nd Lieutenant– ROTC rank that signifies they’re neither fish nor fowl yet they wear on CTLT or at SMP.) Given the timing, she was probably on CTLT. And she can’t keep off TikTok.
Nothing some Article 134 can’t fix.
But, their commanders won’t. Which is why the problem exists to begin with.
It would be considered a “command failure” to separate this useless dead wood from the Army. Much the same way booting an overweight Soldier was looked at as a black mark against the NCO support channel. Some folks you just can’t reach. Those folks gotta go.
Neither their parents nor their military leadership whupped some ass at the appropriate time.
Just the facts, Jack!
Social media behavior is regulated under UCMJ.
So, let’s use the tools we have.
I support banning TikTok because of the Chinese connection, but, the youngsters are not going to give up social media. They will all flow to YouTube Shorts, which is probably a better option than TikTok but will not fix their stupid behavior and violations of OPSEC.
The UCMJ is worthless if commanders don’t use it.
You should’ve seen the look on one of my Soldier’s faces when I told her she was getting a command-directed drug test after an incident that occurred while she was on orders. She tried to play barracks lawer but, unbeknownst to her, I already had spoken to the Staff Judge Advocate at Brigade and had all my ducks in a row. At that point, it was either take the test or deal with UCMJ.
How come we didn’t have these problems when I was in the Navy the last century…
I have no idea what Tik Tok is but the phrase reminds me of
those wooden toys that came in a box consisting of sticks
and round wheels with holes drilled about the circumference.
You could insert the sticks into the holes and make all kinds
of weird things. Had a similiar name that escapes me.
Probably banned now.
TikTok is certainly less constructive/educational in value though.
Thanks Anonymous, was going to name the toy and saw you had it on already.
Yeah, that’s the toy. Thanks Anonymous.
We also had the “erector set”.
here ya go:
How about the gilbert chemistry set which I had plus the erector set which I see on the below pic
Today that would be classified as a bomb making kit. Especially if you had both.
I took a technical writing course in college. Final exam was to build a simple structure with Tinkertoys, then write directions on how to assemble it. No pictures or diagrams allowed. Hardest C I ever earned.
As soon as I started to google it, tinker toy came into my head and I just saw Anonymous has a pic of it. My Cousin used them when he was going into engineering and also worked his summers under Doc Teller and also aboard the USS Iwo Jima LPH 2 during hydrogen bomb tests as an observer.
Do they even make tinker toys, executor sets or lincoln logs anymore?
Had I just googled the above toys, I would have found they are still made. Quality unknown.
Must be a shortage of cheese to go with all of this whine. The purpose of the US Military is to defend OUR Country…it is NOT a “Social Justice Warrior Society”, nor should it be a “Nation Building Experiment”. Break things and make that other poor son of a bitch die for his country.
“I yield to no man in sympathy for the gallant men under my command; but I am obliged to sweat them tonight, so that I may save their blood tomorrow.”
– General Thomas Stonewall Jackson
Failure of command issues?
“Don’t say it’s impossible! Turn your command over to the next officer. If he can’t do it, I’ll find someone who can, even if I have to take him from the ranks!”
– General Thomas Stonewall Jackson
“Bombs Away” LeMay.
LeMay was a deity in my house growing up. As was Billy Mitchell.
“War means fightin’ and fightin’ means killin'” Nathan (Get there furstest with the mostest) Bedford Forrest
And, of course…
“Whining in uniform on a public forum is a symptom of leadership breakdown.” Disagree, for the most part. Whining in uniform may stem from conditions set by the leadership (which are far easier than anybody with real service used to experience), but this whining is really the result of failures of adults, schools, life, culture, etc. to instill a sense of maturity, responsibility, self discipline, service, or the ability to deal with the slightest adversity, compounded by an insistence on “look at me!” by a narcissistic and immature generation that failed to grow up, around which military leadership now has to tip-toe to save themselves. Patton himself couldn’t put the whiny genie back into the bottle of Bud Light.
And… Attention dumb kids (get off my lawn!),
You cellphone or iPad’s camera that faces toward you is set, by default, to reverse the image like a mirror (as in Narcissus in the mythology you didn’t read because it was “lame,” ironically) for aiming your vain selfies. (Yes, tech companies who make phones assume you’re self-involved dipsticks.) Please find the feature and turn it off (see helpful video below) so it records selfie images rightwards and we don’t see “YRMA .S.U” when you make TikTok videos– take pride in your work that gets you an Article 15.
Thank you.
Yours,
Grouchy Old Duffer
Somebody tell me again how today’s volunteer military are so much better than whiny draftees who do not want to be there.
They’re too young to say “What’re they gonna do, send me to Viet Nam?”
Truth be told.
Take them to a gravel parking lot and have them pick up the “big” rocks and place them in their pockets until they are full.