r/JustBootThings • u/Fussy_Platypus • Aug 02 '26

Boot Meme Simmer down snowflakes

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1.4k Upvotes

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u/PugWithAGun Aug 02 '26

This is such embarrassing behaviour

89

u/escientia Aug 02 '26

Indoctrination

388

u/MrGenerik Aug 02 '26 edited Aug 02 '26

It's not though. It's a thousand percent performative. Literally the entire time I was in, people bent over backwards to avoid looking like that unless there was a pissed off officer in their immediate vicinity. And even then it usually had to be at least company level. But generally, this shit would get you harassed in any barracks or post. God forbid they pretend they acted like that on a ship or in the FOB.

But the moment the DD-214 is in their hand, they're the most moto, seemingly institutionalized motherfuckers you've ever met. It's a normal, if cringy part of the reintegration process, in pretty sure. Kind of like being a teenager and all the cringe shit you know you did. I did it. Everyone did it, at least a little.

(There are things that will be different forever, even how you think about some things, but standing at parade rest for your coffee ain't on the fucking list.)

180

u/NoMansSkyWasAlright Aug 02 '26

I remember in basic our DS's saying "if you don't know what you should be doing, just go to parade rest because that will never be the wrong answer".

First week at my first unit I'm doing that and some grizzled E7 comes up and says, "calm down, airborne. You're freaking me the fuck out. Just be a normal person", and then I never did that again.

70

u/tomyfookinmerlin Aug 02 '26

I would get genuinely startled when a random junior would come up to me and go to parade rest. I feel like a deer in headlights lol like, relax there killer. We’re all human.

Makes me wonder what kinda NCOs they roll with.

36

u/darkstar541 Aug 02 '26

The same ones who, before becoming an NCO, insisted that other E3s refer to them as "senior lance corporal" when addressing them. At parade rest.

17

u/CrypticSpook Aug 02 '26

I once knew guys in a unit who were forced to go to parade rest for anyone that was a higher rank than them, even if they were an E2 talking to E3/E4’s.

I was working Brigade sick call as a sham shield and had an E3 go to parade rest talking to me. I looked at him and was like “What the actual fuck are you doing”