Since there may be some of you not familiar with being 4F... It's a military classification meaning that you are, for some reason, unfit for military service. The opposite of 4F is 1A.
In regard to why Jack didn't get drafted (a fear of his) Annie tells us: "(Ennis is speaking)...Army didn?t get you?? The thunder sounded far to the east, moving from them in its red wreaths of light.
?They can?t get no use out a me. Got some crushed vertebrates. And a stress fracture, the arm bone here, you know how bull ridin you?re always leverin it off your thigh??she gives a little ever time you do it. Even if you tape it good you break it a little goddam bit at a time. Tell you what, hurts like a bitch afterward. Had a busted leg. Busted in three places. Come off the bull and it was a big bull with a lot a drop, he got rid a me in about three flat and he come after me and he was sure faster. Lucky enough. Friend a mine got his oil checked with a horn dipstick and that was all she wrote. Bunch a other things, fu**in busted ribs, sprains and pains, torn ligaments. See, it ain?t like it was in my daddy?s time. It?s guys with money go to college, trained athaletes. You got to have some money to rodeo now. Lureen?s old man wouldn?t give me a dime if I dropped it, except one way. And I know enough about the game now so I see that I ain?t never goin a be on the bubble. Other reasons. I?m gettin out while I still can walk.?
Ennis pulled Jack?s hand to his mouth, took a hit from the cigarette, exhaled. ?Sure as hell seem in one piece to me.
The screenplay puts it a bit more succinctly: Ennis: Army didn't get you? Jack: Nope, too busted up. And, the rodeo ani't like it was in my Daddy's time. Got out while I could still walk.
I find the litany of injuries that Jack offers in the story a little suspect (apparently Ennis does, too). I had my army physical at about the same time that Jack would have. I remember very clearly the written form you had to fill out, and I remember the "magic box," the one you checked if you had "homosexual tendencies." I remember thinking, "Hum? Tendencies. That doesn't sound too bad. I mean it asks if I have tendencies, not if I act on them." So, I checked the box. When the "nice man" went over my form with me, he stopped at the box. He said, "Did you mean to check that box?" and I said, "Yes." "Get your clothes on and wait over there," was his gruff (truly, gruff) response. Later I was trooped into a room with the other 4Fs. We were told how un-American that we were, that we could never hold public office, and that the information gathered on us that day could be used to "assist" us in finding employment at any time in our lives.
I think Jack would have read that box the same way I did. He surely recognized that he had "tendencies." I think that Jack checked the box... and that long list of injuries that he offers in response to a simple question is just a cover-up to keep from telling Ennis the truth.
