I could be wrong here… but around the George W. Bush administration + 9/11 and the government painting everything they do as something to protect “against the terrorists!!!” that’s when a lot of things started happening.
That’s when the view of the military seemed to flip and it’s just been stuck that way. Movies like Top Gun were made as a PR stunt to make the military look better. The same is for basically every cop show out there: make cops look like the good guys. Anywho, every company went out of their way to really show “how much they support the troops” by giving a discount. And every smooth-brain started saying “THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE” every single time. The hero worship was/is real, and it shouldn’t be, and it’s a real problem. (Totally different conversation, but it’s led to an influx of people joining the military, or trying to, who really shouldn’t). Before Bush + 9/11, I don’t recall military discounts outside of, like, businesses that were owned/operated by vets.
I’ve heard that some food joints would offer military discounts back when people were figuring out how bad Vietnam was especially with how many vets were coming back broken and homeless. Theres at least one place near me that’s had a veterans discount as far back as '78, they also let folks camp out in their parking lot since it was a bit bigger to accommodate the firetrucks since they were in a more central location than the fire station at the time.
Rambling aside, veterans discount started out as a way to help conscripted veterans during and after the fustercluck that was Vietnam and then was hijacked at some point.
Ah. So possible it was cranked up to 11 (no pun intended) after 9/11. That, or its frequency illusion, and I just never noticed really before a certain point.
I could be wrong here… but around the George W. Bush administration + 9/11 and the government painting everything they do as something to protect “against the terrorists!!!” that’s when a lot of things started happening.
That’s when the view of the military seemed to flip and it’s just been stuck that way. Movies like Top Gun were made as a PR stunt to make the military look better. The same is for basically every cop show out there: make cops look like the good guys. Anywho, every company went out of their way to really show “how much they support the troops” by giving a discount. And every smooth-brain started saying “THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE” every single time. The hero worship was/is real, and it shouldn’t be, and it’s a real problem. (Totally different conversation, but it’s led to an influx of people joining the military, or trying to, who really shouldn’t). Before Bush + 9/11, I don’t recall military discounts outside of, like, businesses that were owned/operated by vets.
I’ve heard that some food joints would offer military discounts back when people were figuring out how bad Vietnam was especially with how many vets were coming back broken and homeless. Theres at least one place near me that’s had a veterans discount as far back as '78, they also let folks camp out in their parking lot since it was a bit bigger to accommodate the firetrucks since they were in a more central location than the fire station at the time.
Rambling aside, veterans discount started out as a way to help conscripted veterans during and after the fustercluck that was Vietnam and then was hijacked at some point.
Ah. So possible it was cranked up to 11 (no pun intended) after 9/11. That, or its frequency illusion, and I just never noticed really before a certain point.
Hard to say without digging up when different places adopted it but I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.
Military discounts have been a thing for longer than that. Couldn’t tell you when it started.