If you removed the Purple Heart, this could be straight from the show. There’s no way Rarity doesn’t have PTSD about falling (S1E16). You can see the terror in her expression in S8E17 when Rainbow Dash picks her up and it doesn’t subside until she is convinced that Dash’s grip is strong.
 
I really like the name “Ariel Incident Recovery Sisterhood” for that kind of support group. Not sure where stallions would go for similar counseling.

@PUBLIQclopAccountant  
Not to mention the disturbing logic of “its good that soldiers Suffer and die because it keeps us in line”

@hackbarth  
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a galaxy brain this large before: “PTSD is good because it limits imperialism”

@Prometheus labs CEO  

 
Wow.
 
That’s so tone deaf that I’m amazed.
 
 
Think a moment what reduction on casualties and PTSD cases that measure would result on every other nation that isn’t the US.

@PUBLIQclopAccountant  
If she’s older, then AJ apparently is too. They both served in the same war, with AJ being a war criminal.
 
That’s just from the Witchcraft is Magic canon though. Mostly, yo, I’m down with any interesting headcanons =3 .

Does she have PTSD from her heroic adventures in the show or is it from some other military misadventure? Perhaps she’s significantly older than the other M6 and it was from her time drafted before she retired to Ponyville

@Prometheus labs CEO  
Within proper circumstances, peace should always be made. In the modern world that we live in, war has a teetering effect that could totter us all to doom.
 
Keep in mind, I’m not saying that what I’m saying is realistic, only that it should be done.
 
Realistically, yeah, war will keep on waging for no reason other than people are stupid, pride runs high, and there are resources that those who don’t have them really wish the did.
 
For these reasons… I am a sad, sad man.

@Joseph Raszagal  
Because that only works if peace can actually be made

@Prometheus labs CEO  
The thing is, in this day and age, are wars really necessary beyond the desire to grope for resources?
 
Why fight when peace could be made?

@PUBLIQclopAccountant  
Hey, if you can’t stop the wars then make them less deadly, or at least make it so they end more quickly

@Prometheus labs CEO  
That’s sadly the more realistic solution than getting the politicians to stop starting new wars for no discernible reasons.

@hackbarth  
We need that, and we need to try and replace soldiers with drones and other forms of remote combat as much as we can. If we replace then with drones(automated, remote controlled, or both) that would mean less soldiers in combat, therefore less casualties and PTSD.

@Prometheus labs CEO  
First, the US already selects for psychopaths and sociopaths through the usage of “private defense contractors”.
 
Second, that always was an awful practice. It ends up with civilians and innocents being massacred. Unstable people have no place in any armed forces. It’s the kind of thing that end in war crimes courts.
 
Finally, the US must scale down the use of it’s war machine (already larger that the five next armed forces combined) and invest heavily in mental treatment of its veteran and civilian population.
 
1% of the current military budget invested in mental health programs for veterans could improve overall quality of life for veteran and civilians alike.

@PonyPon  
Good point, oh well. I guess we’ll just have to settle for a .mix of the two, at least until AI and robotics develop enough that we can replace them with fully autonomous death machines

@Prometheus labs CEO  
Yeah, but how are you gonna know they can follow orders?
 
Plus, I’m pretty sure they already do that.

One way to prevent soldiers from getting PTSD would be to recruit psychopaths and sociopaths, they wouldn’t get PSTD because they feel nothing and they can slaughter people in a way that benefits society

@MagnificentTrixie  

 
I’ve always had it in my mind that Rarity is the oldest of the Mane 6. Not a full generation older or anything, but a few years older than the next-oldest (who I assume to be Fluttershy)

“At least I don’t spent every Veterans’ Day sobbing on the floor!”

@Valikdu  
I think this is an appropriate song too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gV3g9LCvPc

@That one guy….
 
I have a lot of veterans in my family. This picture does things to me.

@Joseph Raszagal  
That was just downright beautiful. Well played my good man.

@That one guy….
 

 
“Oh how do you do,  
Young Sunny Seaside?  
Do you mind if I sit here,  
Down by your graveside?  
And rest for a while  
In the warm Summer Sun  
I’ve been walking all day,  
And I’m nearly done  
And I see by your gravestone  
You were only nineteen  
When you joined the great fallen  
In 1916  
Well, I hope you died quick  
And I hope you died clean  
Oh, Sunny Seaside,  
Was is it slow and obscene?
 
Did they beat the drums slowly?  
Did they play the fife lowly?  
Did they sound the death march,  
As they lowered you down?  
Did the band play the last post and chorus?  
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?
 
And did you leave a wife,  
Or a sweetheart behind?  
In some loyal heart,  
Is your memory enshrined?  
And though you died  
Back in 1916  
To that loyal heart  
You’re forever nineteen  
Or are you a stranger,  
Without even a name?  
Forever enshrined  
Behind some old glass pane  
In an old photograph  
Torn, tattered, and stained  
And faded to yellow  
In a brown leather frame
 
Did they beat the drums slowly?  
Did they play the fife lowly?  
Did they sound the death march,  
As they lowered you down?  
Did the band play the last post and chorus?  
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?
 
The Sun’s shining down  
On these green fields of Prance  
The warm wind blows gently  
And the red poppies dance  
The trenches have vanished  
Long under the plow  
No gas, no barbed wire  
No guns firing now  
But here in this graveyard  
That’s still No-Colt’s Land  
The countless white crosses  
In mute witness stand  
To ponykind’s blind indifference  
To our fellow kin  
And a whole generation  
Were butchered and damned
 
Did they beat the drums slowly?  
Did they play the fife lowly?  
Did they sound the death march,  
As they lowered you down?  
Did the band play the last post and chorus?  
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?
 
And I can’t help but wonder,  
Oh, Sunny Seaside,  
Do all those who lie here,  
Know why they died?  
Did you really believe them,  
When they told you the cause?  
Did you really believe,  
That this war would end wars?  
Well the suffering, the sorrow  
The glory, the shame  
The killing and dying  
It was all done in vain  
Oh, Sunny Seaside  
It all happened again  
And again, and again, and again, and again
 
Did they beat the drums slowly?  
Did they play the fife lowly?  
Did they sound the death march,  
As they lowered you down?  
Did the band play the last post and chorus?  
Did the pipes play the Flowers of the Forest?”

She was there. There at Canterlot fields. Where the Germane advance was halted. She saw that shire turn to a sea of mud and corpses. Vibrant forests turned to splinters. Saw many a good pony fall victim to the guns. The barking of machine gun fire and the stuttering rifles rapid rattle. No mockeries for them, nor any voice of mourning save the choir. the shrill, demented choir of wailing shells.

Goddammit, FiW, stop getting real on me. This is actually pretty sad.