Joining the Navy, continued
So realizing that this Navy friend of mine had a major influence on the Navy got me thinking ever since, and unfortunately, I don’t think the influence has been an entirely positive one. I encountered a couple of stories, where I could be over analyzing and where my suspicions could be wrong, but these stories got me raising one, or two, eyebrows.
So the first story is… I forget exactly when I saw this video, I think it was after I spoke with the Navy recruiters, but I saw this video where a higher ranked Navy official was lecturing a large group of sailors on drug usage. I can’t seem to find this video, but the reason the large group of sailors were being lectured is because I guess a lot of sailors started to test positive for drugs such as marijuana and cocaine. And it almost seemed like, and I’m not 100% sure, that there were so many sailors testing positive that they couldn’t kick out all of them, so that’s why they were lecturing the sailors, not to do drugs, because you will get kicked out. This got me thinking about this Navy friend of mine, and how he probably told people that he cheated and tested positive on the drug test, and the Navy still let him join. These sailors probably figured that since they gave this Navy friend a mine a chance and made an exception, that it would be okay for them. Anyway, my suspicions tell me that this had a negative influence on the Navy, but I could be over analyzing and could be wrong.
Another story, is some time ago, there was an Army ranger who was killed by a couple of Navy SEALs because they were stealing money from the Navy, and the Army ranger wasn’t willing to partake in the stealing, so the Navy SEALs were scared he was going to tell on them, so they asked him if he wanted to grapple, and they strangled him to death. There have been at least two times that I can easily recall where this story has been alluded to me. One is when I was in processing, and the other was here in the Navy. Here in the Navy, a couple of guys were grappling and asked me if I wanted to grapple. I said “no” because, I don’t play like that. Yeah, I can consider myself a martial artist at this point, but there’s a code of honor that I was taught to live by, and if I see that you’re not a true martial artist and don’t have respect for the art, I won’t play fight or spar because you can’t be trusted, in various ways: your control, your character, and you might just be out to hurt me. As a matter of fact, an old roommate of mine seemed quite knowledgeable of martial arts, and asked me if I wanted to practice, but he meant spar. It was definitely bait to take a cheap shot and I could tell by the way he was asking me. I told him no, because I didn’t trust him, and that we can practice forms, but that’s all, because if he takes a cheap shot, he could say that it was an accident. By the way, I’d much rather spar a black belt over a white belt and some people would think that makes no sense because a black belt is much more skilled than a white belt. What people don’t realize is that white belts are very unpredictable and haven’t mastered self control. On the other hand, a true black belt is a black belt in mind, spirit, and skill. So you can trust that a true black belt has self control over his ego and skill, and has respect for the art and wont abuse their skills, and wont take a cheap shot to hurt you. So when I encountered this news story, I was actually applying to the Army, and I figured it would be a great idea for me to join so I could promote this fighting/martial art philosophy. So when my roommate asked me if I wanted to spar, I was glad I was able to say no and explain my reasoning.