Compulsory service exists in many parts of the world and it is rarely good.
Forcing people to do work they don’t want to do leads to very unproductive environments that are also very open to abuse. Being forced by law to do the work has a tendency to create super unhealthy power dynamics.
I’ve always found it super interesting that Disney made a kids’ thing out of that particular book. Because that’s a bleak fucking book full of nasty filthy disgusting terrible people doing nasty filthy disgusting terrible things. Someone went “you know the classic where a couple of city officials drool after a gypsy woman and violently rape her in a cathedral and then hang her in the street? And a grotesque monster rampages against them for it? Wouldn’t the kids just love that one but as a musical and instead of hanging her they burn her at the stake?”