Boot camp, continued
So I was in the hospital from a Friday to a Monday. The food was good and watching TV was fun. I was prescribed antibiotics and while I was there, I had the doctor examine my foot because my ankle was somewhat injured from sprinting weeks prior. I thought I might have had a sprained ankle, but it was just a bruised ankle, so they also prescribed me some ibuprofen. Nowhere on the medical documents did it say that I had food poisoning or went to the ER because of vomiting. Sketchy.
So the cyberstalking didn’t stop. Somehow, the recruits in my division were allowed to have their cell phones so they were in communication with my family and others, and they would tell the recruits certain things to harass me. They were in communication with the RDCs as well and there was always something new to glass-light me with.
There was this guy in my division who seemed to know some of my relatives and was from an area where I have family I never met. Either way, one day we were practicing marching and he was lined up behind me, telling me what to do unnecessarily. He eventually aggressively pushed me and I shouted “WTF!” and looked towards the RDCs who said nothing. This guy said “Wow!… won’t do that again,” and then later politely tried to criticize me, and even though he was right, I was upset, and cursed at him aloud. The RDCs saw and heard this, but didn’t have an immediate reaction. My suspicions tell me that my father told these RDCs to have this guy push and bully me, probably because there were times we were actually cool with each other. There’s this idea that’s being promoted, and as soon as someone starts to like me and try to build a respectful relationship with me, there’s a group effort to put a “wedge” between me and that positive healthy relationship. I know that if it wasn’t for these “wedges,” I would have probably have made more than a few positive healthy relationships, but this is counter productive to the malicious motive. The reasons my suspicions tell me that my father told these RDCs to do this is because when I was a kid, I forget how old, my dad’s friend had a couple of sons, and one day one of the younger sons started to hit me, and actually started to hit my face. All I did was stick my arm out to keep him away from me, while my father and his friend were laughing. I think my father’s friend might have told his son to hit me, I’m not sure, but my dad told me to hit him back, but I didn’t and was confused why they didn’t discipline this kid or at least tell him to stop [To read more about this story, click this link]. So this guy aggressively pushing me was reminiscent of that day, and I’m sure the RDC told this guy to aggressively push me. Towards the end of boot camp, this guy gave me a Halls and the wrapper had some motivational statements. The one he have me said “Go get it!” or something like that. So, based off my suspicions, I think he was told to join the Navy to follow me and try to make me quit.
So the effort to try to break me was evident, and actually still continues today. There was this one day when I went to the bathroom during class and there was no more soap, so I could only rinse my hands with water, and I’m a germophobe so I thought this was kinda gross. So when I got back to my seat, I smelled my hands to make sure they were clean and told myself to buy some hand sanitizer the next time I went to the store. A couple of days pass and during marching drills, one of the RDCs asks one of the recruits “did you take care of that?” or something like that. I didn’t think much of it. So after the marching drill, we’re either told to hydrate, or we hydrated on our own, either way, we were hydrating. I get my water bottle and it’s about half full, and when I drink water, I tend to take big gulps. So since the water bottle was half full, I was able to finish the water in one go. When I finished, I tasted a bit of urine. I look into the water bottle and thought, “did I just drink some urine?” Then a couple of recruits were smirking, and based on other’s reactions, I was convinced that someone put urine in my water bottle. Then eventually the guy who put the urine in my water bottle, which was the same guy who was asked by the RDC “did you take care of that,” which sounds like something my dad would say, whispered “I did it,” and I said aloud, “I know.” Then another RDC said “pee” randomly, I guess to wipe any doubt I might have had, I guess to bring me down, but I was surprisingly composed. I actually couldn’t believe how bad these people were messing up. What’s more, I’m sure my dad gave them the idea because what RDC in their right mind would tell a recruit to put their urine in another recruits water bottle. At boot camp recruits are given a training guide and it covers a bunch of topics, including: navy history, nutrition, ship terminology, etc. One topic that is covered is Ethics and Toughness, and the chapter mentions ethical/personal/moral hits, which means that if you do something you know is wrong, you will feel bad about it. This was a major moral hit which is still felt today, like, as I’m typing this, the stalkers are oddly silent. I reviewed this chapter briefly and the content is really good: “An ethical hit is a violation of your own morals, of what you know to be right. When we do ethical training, we are training your soul. The Navy needs you to be individuals of character, persons who we can trust with our greatest assets and secrets. Without strong character, you are not a tough Sailor, and we cannot count on you. Your soul must be just as strong as your body and mind… no matter where you came from or what you believe, you have to match the Navy’s ethical standards.”
At boot camp we’re told to fill out a survey regarding our experience. There was pressure on me not to say anything. I wasn’t going to because surveys don’t work for me and my situation, just like police reports don’t necessarily work for me and my situation; the only benefit is leaving a paper trail. What works for me is writing to the internet. So for the very last survey, I wrote that I endured hazing and unfair treatment. This survey was addressed indirectly. So a couple of officers start to lecture us about a couple of things. Then one of the officers says, “equal treatment and fair treatment are not the same,” which is definitely something my dad would say. I was kinda shocked by this because under no circumstance is it acceptable to haze someone, and this officer was using some flawed logic to justify this.
So even though there was a constant effort to “break” me, make me turn gay or bisexual, make me quit, and set me back, I must say there were some good and neutral/civil moments. And yeah, there is some pressure for me to not write this and not say anything because certain people don’t want to look bad, others, I don’t see how it’s any of their business; people around me tend to say, “don’t talk.” But, it’s not my job to make anybody look good; it’s my job to do good, and therefore look good. Overall, I don’t regret joining the Navy and going through boot camp, it was a very unique and beneficial experience, I graduated on time, with my head held high.