National Privacy Day 2024 is on Saturday, October 26, 2024: Is National American Miss (NAM) a scam and how much does it cost?
Saturday, October 26, 2024 is National Privacy Day 2024. RAINN's Top Five Ways to Stay Safe Online January is National Cyber
Sponsored Deals
As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
"The National American Miss pushes girls to go out and get ‘sponsors’ to raise the $440 they want as an entry fee. In this day and age, should girls as young as 6 really go out into the public community to ask for money and reveal their personal information, age, and hobbies? And tell people they will be at this pageant event on certain days? That goes against everything we teach young people about social privacy and common sense. If you have a rich uncle that wants to sponsor you, then more power to you, but beware of hitting the streets telling strangers your personal information and personal plans. NAM is collecting a huge amount of money with the ‘sponsor’ fees-just do the math. If 150 girls enter the pageant, which would be a small number for them, that would bring in $66,000 gross profit for a 3 day event. And that doesn’t count the hidden extras like tickets, t-shirts, etc. I doubt it costs anywhere near that to produce. Another link to look into-one of NAM’s biggest corporate sponsors of their national pageant is the National Honor Roll-just google them and see what you find out! It’s another scam to obtain school children’s personal information that is sold to 3rd parties."
"I had received an invitation to the missouri state pageant and was considering it for the the college scholarship offer mentioned in the invitation for contestants who get into the national pageant, but then i read the opinions and facts posted on www.national-american-miss-scam.com/, the exspenses is what made me realize it's not worth considering. I know my family cant afford it. Plus the prize money, if you take into consideration the amount spent, is close to nothing."
"civil liberties VS national security outside the US" What does this mean?
Civil liberties would include every citizens right to privacy. Our liberty keeps the government out of our day to day business, and each of us free to live our own lives.
Keeping the nation secure often means having to sacrifice some of these liberties. Because the government needs to be able to prevent attacks, they must pry into people's lives to find out if anything suspicious is going on.
An example is how before 9/11, it was illegal for the government to read our e-mails and record our phone calls without a warrent. After 9/11, the Partiot Act allowed the government to read emails and record phone calls freely......While some argue the government reading my private e-mail is a violation of my civil liberty, others argue that it is necessary so the government can find out about people planning terror attacks, and stop them.
It is a constant battle over how much the government should be able to invade our personal lives in order to keep the public safe.
i pre enlisted for the national guard?
The initial training - basic and advanced individual training is not that bad. You have to learn to work with a team and how to accept responsibility for your actions. The problem that some teens have is that they are not used to being told what to do. Many teens have the habit of asking why and in the military you do not do this. You do what you are told to do, when you are told to do it and how you are told to do it. If you can do this, basic will not be much of a problem. The other issue that you have to deal with is the lack of privacy. When you are in basic, you will be in barracks. You might be in a bay with 30 or more people or you might be in a squad room with 4 or five other people. It can take a couple of days for everyone to realize that they have to work together. In addition, you have to give up habits like constant cell phone use or smoking.
Things lighten up a little when you go to ait (your job training). You will still have drill sgts but you will have a little more free time. What gets some people in this phase is the academic portion of the training. People think that you just join the army and that you do not have to read or study and it is just the opposite. You will be taught by sgts and you will be expected to know the material and you will be tested on it. It is not impossible to pass ait but you will have to do some work.
After your training is done, you will go back home and drill with your NG unit. You will be assigned to either a platoon or section depending on your mos (military occupational skill). Your drill weekend is basically broken into 4 - 4 hour blocks of training with lunch in the middle. You will have mos training, section training (for instance you might be assigned to a motor pool and you will help with preventative maintenance on vehicles), collective training and individual training. Collective training is training that you unit needs to do as a unit in order to be mission capable. Individual training or common skills training refers to soldier skills. For instance, your unit may schedule gas mask training during a drill weekend. If your unit is scheduled to go the riffle range, you will do weapons training. Training is actually planned out a year ahead of time and you can look at your units training schedule to see what training will take place. It is actually a good idea to check the schedule so you can also plan accordingly. Remember that some weekends will also include Friday nights. This usually only happens once or twice during a training year. Keep in mind that a training year runs from October to September.
Every year you will attend a two week annual training. This is where your unit goes to a training facility that may be in your state or it could be else where. I was with a unit that went overseas to places like Korea, Turkey and Panama. Most guard units stay state side. Annual training is between 12 to 14 days. If you are traveling far away, it may be a little longer to accommodate travel time. While you are on annual training, you are treated as if you are on active duty. That means that you are held to personal grooming standards and military courtesy standards. You are also subject to military law during these periods. If you have a major life event that would take place during annual training, getting married, having a child or a major business deal your unit might let you do a home station annual training. You would stay at home and you would do tasks that are assigned to you. In all honesty, home station annual trainings are boring.
You do understand that you can and probably will be activated during your initial contract. Currently, the NG is deployed all over the place in support of Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. These are federal operations. What happens is that your unit is activated and it falls under federal control. Typically these deployments are 12 months but you can be extended if the mission requires it. The NG and reserves do a much better job in preparing soldiers for activation now than 10 years ago. Your unit is typically put on alert a year of more before deploying and that means that your training will revolve around getting you and your unit ready to deploy. You are paid for the time that you are activated and you also get a retirement point for each day served on active duty.
The NG can also be activated by the state for emergencies. For instance, much of the east coast had huge snow storms. Most of the state's activated their NG units. Soldiers helped with snow removal, emergency medical services and search and recovery missions. You also get paid for state service and you get a retirement point for each day served.
I have probably gone over a lot in a little space but the best advice that I have for you is that you need to be flexible. Things will change and you will have to adapt. You will need to not be overly sensitive either. You will make mistakes in basic and ait and even when you train with your unit. The best thing that you should do is to learn from your mistakes and move on. The few people who I knew who fa
