Skit 4

(album: Soundtrack To The Struggle 2 - 2019)

July 4th, 2005, I joined the United States' military. I swore an oath to defend the constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. I went through basic training, I went through technical school. At the end of my technical school I was brought into the drone programme even though they didn't tell me what it was. They said, "You're gonna go to Nevada and you'll find out when you get there." And so I showed up and they put us in a theatre no bigger than this and they showed a montage video of drone strikes [*imitates gun fire*]... played to heavy metal music. And at the end of the video, a sergeant came down the centre and he stood in front of us and he said, "Your job is to kill people and break things." And I thought to myself, "This isn't why I joined; I joined for very patriotic reasons, to get me education (it's not free in America) and impress a pretty girl

So I went to my commander and I was like, "Sir, I'm not sure I can do this job. I'm not sure I could ever pull the trigger on somebody."
And he was like, "YOU swore an oath to defend the constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. You WILL obey the lawful orders of those appointed over you. You will do your job."
And I was trapped. My father my grandfather, actually, he's really my father figure. I didn't want to disappoint him; I wanted to be worth something. This is what all veterans want: they want to be worth something. They fight for a reason, they fight because they care. They don't want to look weak; they want to look strong. They want to fight for a noble cause, an honourable cause

And so I did it. I did it for five years and five days. I killed thirteen people and this is how you make life cheap. You show someone you can end a life by the push of a button. When I was younger, war had no meaning to me; it was something of distant lands and it was something of history. And here it was very real. I was a gamer, I was an athlete.