好男不当兵，好铁不打钉

好铁不打钉，好男不当兵。"You don’t use good iron for nails; you don’t use good men for soldiers"

在中国漫长的封建社会，当兵被视为一种低贱的职业，所以好男儿是不会去当兵的，这反应出古人重文轻武的文化心理特征。In Chinese tradition, being a soldier is regarded as a lowly profession, so noble men wouldn't choose to become soldiers. This reflects the cultural mindset of ancient times, prioritizing civic over military pursuits.

但是二十世纪的中国，却有很长一段时间，军人地位飙升，与这种重文轻武的传统文化背道而驰。从清末民初开始，既有军阀割据混战，又有国民革命军北伐，后有抗日战争当然需要全面皆兵，但到了六七十年代，我刚认字的眼里常见“枪杆子里面出政权”、“兵民乃胜利之本”、“全民动员，打一场……的歼灭战”之类的墙上标语；另外，很多军事用语成了老百姓的日常用语，常见的有“队伍”（指集体、团队）、“兵” 或“战士”（指成员、工作人员）、“消灭”（指吃完、做完等，如“你把这个菜消灭了”）、“战斗力”（“你们没有战斗力呀”的意思是讥笑“你们这点儿酒都喝不完”）、“打扫战场”（指善后工作），等等。

In Chinese history, although it is obvious that not a few people over the time succeeded in seizing the throne by military means, they could not hope that governs such a big territory and a large population by force alone. In China it was soon the forces of culture would be triumph over the forces of arms.

However, twentieth-century’s China saw the rise of a military culture during a long period of time when the status of military personnel suddenly soared, which ran counter to the traditional culture that valued civilian bureaucracy over military ranks. Since the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, there had been The Warlords Fighting, the Northern Expedition of the National Revolutionary Arm, and later the Anti-Japanese War which certainly required all-round troops. But in the 1960s and 1970s, when I first learned to read, I could see lots of wall slogans such as "Political power emerges from the barrel of a gun", "Soldiering civilians are the foundation of victory", and "Mobilize the whole people to fight a war of annihilation against ...".