"You can't handle the truth!"

Contributed by SOC 1013 student, Benito Almaguer.  

"A Few Good Men" well illustrates the completely authoritarian hierarchy embodied in the U,S, Marine Corps. In particular, sociological concepts relevant to military socialization and culture abound in the movie's courtroom scene, "You can't handle the truth!". In this finale, Col. Nathan R. Jessup, played spot on by Jack Nicholson, is being cross-examined by defense lawyer, Lt. Daniel Kaffee, played by Tom Cruise, during the court martial of two U.S. Marines who inadvertently killed Private William Santiago. Prior to the case going to trial, Lt. Kaffee negotiates a plea bargain on behalf of the two, but they refuse to take it, insisting they were only following the order of a superior, one Col. Jessup. In this case, the order is a "Code Red," the Marine term for hazing, which in sociological terms involves a degradation ceremony that incorporates identity assault and mortification, and reduces the victim to complete humiliation. The specific order was to shave Santiago's head, but during its execution, the rag shoved into his mouth to prevent him from screaming, chokes and kills him.

The scene effectively dramatizes how successful the Marine Corps is in resocializing its members, officers and non-coms alike, to ensure total obedience. To "Disobey a Direct Order" carries grave consequences. The Corps redefines morality to suit the "Needs of The Corps," meaning that full compliance is obligatory, regardless of the fact that doing so may seriously deviate from precepts of conventional morality and civilian law. On the witness stand, Jessup contemptuously declares to Kaffee that "You want me on that wall! You need me on that wall!" reflecting the boastful pride that comes from the esprit de corps engrained in every Marine. He embodies the complete transformation that occurs with Corps resocialization. Indeed, in the climactic end, his arrogance trumps self-preservation, as he proudly screams out his response to the question of ordering the Code Red: "YOU'RE GODDAMN RIGHT I DID!”

Nov 11: class, war, and dying (updated Nov 11, 2022)

Veterans' Day is a most appropriate time to reflect on the relation between social class and military service. In particular need of reflection is the fact that those from the lower reaches of the stratification order typically bear the brunt of casualties during war. Poor and working-class men are more often killed because they are more likely to serve in harm's way as non-commissioned front-line soldiers, but they also have been less able to avoid conscription by either paying another to serve as in the Civil War or receiving college deferment as in the Vietnam War (see MacLean, 2012). Today's military is exclusively comprised of volunteers who often join because they lack viable employment alternatives, and this has only heightened the class-biased composition of casualties from recent wars in the Middle East. Moreover, poor and working-class men are also more likely to feel the continuing effects of war in terms of psychiatric distress as they transition out of the service and try to adapt to civilian life.

Army and Marine suicide rates increased sharply between 2001-2020 and today are about twice that for the U.S. population (US Dept of Veterans Affairs 2022) . During the heigth of war in the Middle East, more active-duty military personnel took their lives than died on the battlefield (Williams, 2012). However, suicide among veterans is of even far greater magnitude. According to Veterans Affairs, although about 1 percent of adults served in the military over the past decade, veterans represented 20 percent of all U.S. suicides. As discussed in the above Democracy Now! interviews with Aaron Glantz and others knowledgeable about the issue, the extreme suicide problem among military personnel and veterans reflects several key factors, including multiple deployments to the Middle East and an inadequate government treatment response to depression and PTSD.

For an excellent description of how war produces mental disorders and other adjustment problems, view the PBS Frontline documentary, The Wounded Platoon, which follows soldiers in an Army infantry unit from Fort Riley to deployment in Iraq and then back to the U.S.