The Billions of dollars spent on advertising could be used for scholarships and other youth programs....

Under the supervision of Clinical Professor Penny Venetis, the following students and interns contributed to writing this report: Heidi Alexander, Avi Appel, Erica Askin, Amy Brown, Eric Bueide, Matthew Coleman, Randle DeFalco, Jason Fertakos, Lisa Hansen, Safia Hussain, Michael Isaac, Syrion Jack, Daniel Louis, Devi Shah, Nadia Rollins, and Robert Ulon.

Indeed, under 10 U.S.C.A. § 503, the “Secretary of Defense is required by law to enhance the effectiveness of DOD’s recruitment programs through an aggressive program of advertising and market research targeted at prospective recruits and those who may influence them.”...

The military has conducted extensive research into the psychological and behavioral factors that influence teenagers to enlist in the military....The Defense Manpower Data Center (DMDC) administers the YATS to students annually so that changes in youth “demographic trends, cultural characteristics, attitudes, and educational attainments” can be tracked by the DOD to formulate recruiting strategies....

The military’s marketing campaigns emphasize patriotic themes and tales of adventure that appeal to teenage sensitivities, while downplaying the actual risks of war....

[I]n teens, the judgment, insight and reasoning power of the frontal cortex is not being brought to bear on the task as it is in adults.

The United States Supreme Court has also recognized the psychological vulnerability of children and teenagers in several landmark decisions. In 2005, in discussing why the execution of juveniles is unconstitutional, the Supreme Court cited “[s]cientific and sociological studies documenting the tendency of adolescents to make “impetuous and ill-considered decisions”; their susceptibility to “negative influences and outside pressures": and the "transitory" nature of their character traits....

September 20, 2007 / VFP Chapter 56 / Counterrecruitment.net - Veterans For Peace Humboldt Bay Chapter 56 recently announced the publication of Advice from Veterans on Military Service and Recruiting Practices: A Resource Guide for Young People Considering Enlistment.

After more than a year of development, the chapter’s Veterans Educational Outreach Program Committee published the first edition of the 32-page tabloid, according to a Veterans For Peace news release. It has also been posted in PDF format.

Aimed at helping individuals fully understand military recruitment and military life, the publication begins by explaining the recruitment process, paying special attention to recruiter fraud, the GI Bill for education, the enlistment agreement, the Delayed Entry Program, the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery test, the No Child Left Behind Act and opting out, military job training and conscientious objection, the release stated.

The guide also details possible physical and mental health hazards of life in the military, including depleted uranium exposure, post-traumatic stress disorder, racism, discrimination, and sexual harassment and abuse of women. The document ends with local and national resources and a list of references.

The guide is not an attempt to provide legal advice, but is a researched and referenced document drawing from many sources, including the personal experiences of the veterans who participated in writing the guide, according to the release.

Copies of the resource guide can be obtained by e-mailing This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. The publication may also be downloaded free at https://www.vfp56.org/VEOP.html

Resources:

• Veterans Education and Outreach
• Military Recruiters in Schools
• VFP National Report on Military Recruiter Abuses
• Proposed Military Draft
• Conscientious Objector Status
• Violence Against Women in the Military
• VEOP in the Community
• War Unvarnished
• Educational Resource Links

Source: https://www.vfp56.org/VEOP.html

 Please consider supporting The National Network Opposing the Militarization of Youth
and our work to demilitarize our schools and youth by sending a check to our fiscal sponsor "in our name" at the
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Updated on 7/27/2025 - GDG

español -

NOTE: This article on the NNOMY website is not an endorsement of the NGYCP but rather an illustration of how marginalized U.S. American youth are directly profiled to fill the ranks of the military  services based on their vulnerability to the criminal and military societal complexes that exist within a vigorous financially based culture. Additionally, as indicated in this Brookings report, they are deemed available and thus "economically indispensable," for militarized vocations due to low achievement levels and their socio-economic conditions.

May 1, 2007 / Hugh B. Price / The Brookings Institution - Executive Summary: A decade ago, the National Commission on Teaching and America’s Future issued a prescient warning in its report, entitled What Matters Most:

“There has been no previous time in history when the success, indeed the survival, of nations and people has been tied so tightly to their ability to learn. Today’s society has little room for those who cannot read, write and compute proficiently; find and use resources; frame and solve problems; and continually learn new technologies, skills, and occupations. . . . In contrast to 20 years ago, individuals who do not succeed in school have little chance of finding a job or contributing to society—and societies that do not succeed at education have little chance of success in a global economy.”

Demographic trends indicate that the U.S. economy will rely increasingly upon Latinos and African Americans because together they, and especially the former, will comprise a steadily growing proportion of the adult workforce. By 2020, roughly 30 percent of the working-age population in the United States will be Latino and African American. Yet these economically indispensable population groups, along with low-income youngsters, consistently lag farthest behind academically.

As recently as 2005, roughly half of fourth and eighth grade black and Latino students performed Below Basic in reading and math according to the National Assessment of Educational Progress. Actually, the imperative of boosting achievement transcends ethnicity. White students far outnumber those from other ethnic groups and constitute over one-third of all youngsters scoring in the lowest quintile. Compounding these academic gaps, distressingly large numbers of Latino and African-American youngsters drop out of high school.

 Pat Elder -

The mainstream peace and justice movement is beginning to see that countering military recruitment deserves a higher priority and should be viewed in strategic, rather than tactical terms. Resisting the unprecedented and relentless militarization of American youth transcends the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Countering military recruitment confronts an ugly mix of a distinctively American brand of institutionalized violence, racism, militarism, nationalism, classism, and sexism.  It gets to the root of the problem.

Confronting the work of military recruiters, particularly in the nation’s public schools will provide a catalyst for activists to shift gears from the traditional antiwar tactics of vigils, protests, sit-ins, and CD actions to the long-term strategy of opposing the militarization of youth.  The two are not necessarily mutually exclusive. One however, treats symptoms; the other addresses causes.

Simply put, the strategy of the counter-recruiting movement is to put the imperial armed forces of the United States into a kind of vice that squeezes new recruits from the ranks.  One end of the vice is the near universal rejection of the return of the military draft.  Remember how the House voted 402-2 against reinstating the draft back in October of 2004?  Bringing back the draft is unthinkable.  Conscription would result in demonstrations of millions that would ultimately end the war and result in a political revolution.  The crushing steel on the opposite side of the vice is the counter-recruitment movement, aided by an American public that increasingly recognizes illegal and immoral wars.

Counter recruitment activists are putting on the squeeze.  They’re doing it by learning about high school policies that favor military recruiters and they’re organizing their communities to change it.  They’re providing youth with training, employment and educational alternatives to military service.  They’re engaged with community leaders and the press in promoting a greater awareness of encroaching militarism.  And they’re being successful across the country.