The film “Made in the Royal Navy” plays to the natural anxiety in boys and young men about how they are going to become a man and go out into the world. The message is that the Navy will remake the raw youth into a heroic version of the inadequate boy that they once were.
After a prologue suggesting a misspent youth*, the 60 second film is made up entirely of vivid action flashes including manhandling ammunition, saving the wounded, firing missiles, automatic weapons, handling small arms, “real” action involving an enemy ship with an explosion and a body in the water, all accompanied by menacing music.
Interspersed in this mix are the “rewards” such as worldwide travel, bonding with all-male shipmates and partying, but strangely all in the complete absence of women either socially or professionally.
The scenes, which appear for milliseconds, resemble the discredited subliminal advertising that companies such as CocaCola once used and several replays are necessary to unravel the message implanted in the minds of the viewer.
The title of the film exposes the aim of naval training, which is to break apart the natural human behaviour of a civilian and reform it ready for acts of extreme violence. Unlike other professions, the career path is very short and the return to civilian life entails being “Unmade after the Royal Navy” often leading to depression and regret.
Becoming a truly confident and fulfilled man in normal life normally builds from inside a person but if that person is simply a creation of the Royal Navy, then it can be a very fragile and temporary achievement.
* During the part covering the “bored” teenage years a word sounding like “bank” is used showing the actor against a view of a battered car. It seems to infer that the youth had narrowly avoided involvement in serious crime, but was saved by his desire to join the Navy. The clip is so short that it is impossible to be sure, which is probably the intention in the first place.
David Collins served in the Royal Marines and is a member of VFP UK
Veterans For Peace UK 
The new one for the Royal Marines is very disturbing,like a scene from a Vietnam war film.
I bloody despise this advertisement.. in the north of Ireland we have a slightly edited version of that. But from the minute I ever saw it ,it made my blood boil.. aye made in the royal navy..made in to a shell of a human, made in to an automaton that blindly follows orders without just cause or reason. Made in to a depressed, irrational, out of place civvy when your all used up and shat out on the scrap heap. Aye, it’s all so appealing to the young and the fearless. Until the reality kicks them square in the teeth. The lack of females is only telling us what we already know, that the forces bloat male superiority to the nth degree.
When will people be less willing to serve such bastards of a corrupt establishment? Government and monarchy. Don’t get me started on the monarchy!!
Agree 100%, I joined at 16 yrs in 1968 Guards Regiment time I finished training we were all brainwashed.(sadly some are still today)
Makes me cringe every time I see this advert, its bollocks on so many levels. Class has always played a big factor in the Forces, this epitomizes the class system, some poor kid on a run down council estate etc etc, whos only chance in life we are told is to “join up” its enough to make a pig sick!!
Made in Argos;
Unfortunately you guys ignore me to your own & our collective detriment. However that stated, I do understand the logic as to why you do so.
MoD-official recruitment ads are a drop in the ocean. The deliberate, classical & operant conditioning campaign by subliminal military recruitment – is so vast, it’s virtually invisible, except to the feel of it.
It’s been running concurrently with a National Service reintroduction narrative and a decade-long concentrated choking-off of economic opportunities (austerity) in tandem with a rise in media projected patriotism, not least in stadia.
It’s a joint State & corporate media military recruitment campaign channeling young men as ‘volunteers’. The only thing missing so far, is its militarising trigger.
Respectfully, the reason you guys, indeed the populous can’t/won’t acknowledge it, is housed in individual & collective cognitive dissonance rooted in preadolescent, patriotic programming;
Btw, I stick with it because I know I’m right;
Kind regards,
Johnny McNeill
Gaslighting Gilligan
@GasGilligan
‘War!’ What is it good for? Nothing!’
Let’s train our youth in life skills at home or in centres! We can give them everything they need for a right of passage to a creative life honed to their natures… with no requirement to kill. It is not rocket science – we just need to divert some money from those off shore tax havens, and get those National Investment Banks rolling, eh JJzzer?
the corollary of this kind of brainwashing is that the High and Mighty must provide an endless supply of Enemy Aliens so that they can be taught a good British lesson by “our boys”. All part of the legacy of empire and calculated indoctrination by slick “gentlemen” who find normal life (e.g, alongside the opposite sex) just too challenging. We are being progressively militarised on a scale to rival the worst excesses of the period c. 1898-1914. Consequences ?
Yep. Agreed. Entirely deliberate.
Kind regards,
Johnny McNeill
Gaslighting Gilligan
@GasGilligan