- Conservatives often stand accused these days of standing outside the "reality-based community." Yet liberals can be blinded by ideology, and nowhere is this more true than in the debate over women in combat.
So 1 and 2 are quantitative arguments which I don't know the actual numbers about. Read the thread though - kleinbl00 has made some fine posts with his take on this stuff. The story in 1 is still referring to technology and events from Vietnam, and I wish they'd pick something slightly more... relevant. 2 is salient but consider the physical feats of women athletes in professional leagues and things like the Olympics. I question whether the author wants to imply that the best women can't match the average male serviceman or what but I think it's grossly underestimating how much the bell curves of men and women's physical strength overlap. I'd like to see numbers on that but I can't provide them yet. I won't dismiss these points out of hand, and they may be reasonable, at least in some cases. After the physiology part of point 2 is where things start to take a turn for the offensive. Again, the author seems to ignore the fact that all men and all women do not react to the same stimuli as two monolithic groups. There is, in fact, a range of psychologies and emotional reactions for both men and women. The author suggests that the presence of testosterone is enough to drive machismo across the board - as though much of the macho attitude our writer seems to think all men have by nature isn't pretty heavily socially constructed. Frankly, I'm offended as a man that I'm being told how I act, and that if I don't "risk death rather than be seen by my peers to be flinching from a fight" then I'm somehow less of a man? Do I need to turn in my badge and my penis? But considerably more bothersome is the line "Women's courage takes very different forms," followed by nothing but stories of women being weepy and scared. Nothing about women, for example, in the Soviet military during WWII often being extremely highly-decorated and a vital part of the war effort. Or the successful role of women in the Israeli Defense Forces? But no, the best he comes up with is two truck drivers crying. As if men are somehow immune from emotional issues as a result of being in a combat zone. As for the point that the military seems to have different rules for men and women... Institutionalized sexism? Does this surprise anyone? That's a change that needs to come from within - if women are going to be able to be equal, they need to be allowed to be equal, rather than having "unwritten rules" about showering or court-martial. Why should the systemic sexism stop women from being able to serve in combat? Point 3 I will dismiss out-of-hand for reasons I'm embarrassed to have to explain. Do you remember that other military policy? The one that was around for a few years, made a few people pretty upset? The policy barring openly gay servicemen on the basis that it "would create an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion that are the essence of military capability". That people would be uncomfortable because of the feeling of "someone watching" in group shower situations, or that "Homosexuals are notoriously promiscuous". Saying men and women are not able to serve together because of sexual attraction is like saying gay men shouldn't be permitted because they can't contain their sexual urges. Yeah, I think that assuming that the men who are serving our country are so unable to contain their sexual lust that they will devolve into a pack of "snarling primates" is insanely offensive to everyone. The idea that women shouldn't be permitted into combat roles in the military because men might coerce (or rape, which is a serious, real problem in the military ) them is like telling women that they aren't allowed to walk in the bad side of town because they'll get raped - maybe instead of telling women they're not allowed, how about telling men to consider not raping? Point 4 is very similar. It is blaming women because men have been socially conditioned (had their brains naturally "hardwired", says Browne) to not be able to take orders from women. If a male soldier will not take orders from a female superior officer, it is the fault of the subordinate for not following orders, and it is the fault of the military system for failing to teach them proper respect for the chain of command. The thing is, I don't think that men are hardwired to react negatively to women superiors. Those who won't are prejudiced. It's that simple. Would we not allow a black CO because there might be some racists who won't take orders from or trust them? No. Will I accept this as an argument against women being able to serve in combat, as officers, and up into the highest ranks of the military? Fuck no. Any woman who can perform as well as a man should be allowed to advance all the same. I would really like to see what the article refers to when it offers A battery of studies cited by Browne confirms the reluctance of men to accept female leadership when the shooting starts. This reluctance actually increases the more that male soldiers experience female leadership, for reasons hard-wired into the male brain.
Sadly none of the details are linked to, otherwise I'd be able to make a cogent statement. This article certainly doesn't.
Interesting that they chose that clip from the Daily show, rather than this one, which ran immediately after. Pay close attention to the 'tard with the beard. Yep. Same 'tard that wrote the book.
I believe that men and women are equals and should be treated as such, but just because people are equals does not mean that their capabilities are the same. In many areas, yes they may be, but in physical terms, the differences are obvious and undeniable. I'm glad to have read this article as I had no real idea of what was going on other than that the issue of females serving as combat infantry was on the table. Personally I do wonder what will happen if there is another ground war between the U.S. and another country. Given the unknown likelihood of needing to engage in a ground war, if things in the military are as this article says, then the military can't afford to risk having a culture of insubordination to officers, or soldiers raping or prostituting themselves to other soldiers. I guess I don't see why it's so important to some people that women be allowed to serve as combat infantry or how it would improve things. I'd also like to know why women fighting in their own all-female units is not being discussed.
The article is unmitigated tripe. 1) Using a plane built in 1963 as a reason for why you need big burly pilots is bullshit. The majority of aircraft flown in the armed forces are fly-by-wire. Besides which, the outcome would have been similar had the crew bailed out of the craft and allowed it to crash. 2) The mean height of a Chinese male is 5'5. The mean height of an American female is - wait for it - 5'4 1/2 - 5'5. If we're talking physical strength, there's a hell of a lot more to it than men are bigger. 3) Admissions standards for the military are not the same as specialist standards for the military. Yeah, a 17-year-old girl needs to be able to do 13 push-ups to enlist. That's very different from being able to do 13 push-ups to be able to join DEVGRU. 4) Yes, men and women respond differently to stress. This is stated as if diversity is a bad thing, or as if women will suddenly get all silly and weepy when being shot at. 5) "A battery of studies cited by Browne confirms the reluctance of men to accept female leadership when the shooting starts." A battery of studies also confirmed the reluctance of white people to Jackie Robinson playing baseball. That means they're prejudiced, not correct. Take a look at this photo. Take a good look at it: That's Dr. Ruth, IDF sniper. "When I was in my routine training for the Israeli army as a teenager, they discovered completely by chance that I was a lethal sniper. I could hit the target smack in the center further away than anyone could believe. Not just that, even though I was tiny and not even much of an athlete, +I was incredibly accurate throwing hand grenades too.+ Even today I can load a Sten automatic rifle in a single minute, blindfolded." David Frum needs to face up to the fact that women *not* serving in combat is the anomaly, not the norm. I would actually argue that as a general rule of thumb David Frum needs to STFU but that's too broad for this discussion. This is, after all, Mr. "Axis of Evil."
A battery of studies also showed that Jews were diseased and stupid and therefore should have strict immigration caps imposed in the late 19th century. Social scientific studies are often insidious, because all they typically do (numbers-wise) is confirm the psychological biases of the day, while also masquerading as actual, causative science. They therefore mislead the public into thinking the world is the way it is for some reason of physics or biology, and not because of historical contingency, which obviously could be altered with some effort. The only thing that makes me reluctant for the day when all these tired old hacks like Mr. Frum die is that by then I'll be the old, intransigent, out of touch windbag.
Sure, the mean height of a Chinese male may be 5'5, but what is the mean height of a Chinese male infantryman in the Chinese military? I have no idea what physical requirements the Chinese military has for men or women, so I'm not really sure why you're citing the mean height of a Chinese male. There are plenty of short guys in the U.S. military as well. Plus, I would be willing to bet that a lot of people going into the Chinese military don't come from cities and would be used to at least some physical labor as part of their everyday lives. This is not to say that people enlisting in the U.S. military are not, but for example, farming in China is conducted much differently than it is the U.S. Anyway, I understand your points and I think they're good, but the example of Dr. Ruth, who is as I understand, a short person is of a woman serving as a sniper. My main area of interest is the integration of women as combat infantry. I am of the understanding that snipers generally operate in pairs, not in units. Am I correct? Looking at the article you posted, I don't see anything about her role as a leader in the IDF. However, I think it would be worth looking at women in leadership roles in the IDF. You say that Frum's article is shit and that's fine. I am interested however to know more about the prevalence of rape in the U.S. military and why it's such a problem. Is it also a problem for other countries where women serving in combat is the norm? If we admit that there is a deeply entrenched culture of prejudice in the U.S. military, then what? Is the best way forward to simply add more women to the military in hopes that sheer numbers and presence will be enough to change the culture?
...and how much does it impact your ability to fire an AK-47 anyway? The point of raising the counter-argument is to illustrate that Mr. Frum has no leg to stand on. Your prevarication on "they're tough farm boys from the country" again presumes that combat is performed via baseball bat rather than heat-seeking missile. What does that have to do with anything? | I don't see anything about her role as a leader in the IDF.| Don't look now, but the head of my favorite branch of the shadow government is run by a woman. I am interested to know what gives you the right to curtail women's opportunities because of a culture of rape in the military. Seems to me we oughtta fix the rape, not the women, but I'm a radical. Why don't you investigate and report back? The reason we're having this discussion is that the US military recently allowed women to officially serve in combat roles, which caused David Frum to officially get sand in his vagina. This is someone arguing against the status quo, not for it. Then you work to change it, not to accommodate it. There's nothing new about this.Sure, the mean height of a Chinese male may be 5'5, but what is the mean height of a Chinese male infantryman in the Chinese military?
My main area of interest is the integration of women as combat infantry. I am of the understanding that snipers generally operate in pairs, not in units. Am I correct?
I am interested however to know more about the prevalence of rape in the U.S. military and why it's such a problem.
Is it also a problem for other countries where women serving in combat is the norm?
If we admit that there is a deeply entrenched culture of prejudice in the U.S. military, then what?
No, your attribution that I presume "that combat is performed via baseball bat rather than heat-seeking missile," among others, is incorrect. Furthermore, I was talking specifically about infantry to infantry engagement in my initial post. I see that you are more invested in this topic than I am. That is fine. I don't see how being smug and condescending helps to discuss the issue, but to each their own.
I'm still not 100% sure of how hubski works. I'm not the original poster of this article, but I did share it. Is that what you mean by saying I linked to the article? In any case, I've been wondering what people think about this because it does challenge what some think of as traditional gender roles among other things. As for the subject or article being worthy of smugness or condescension, that's a personal thing. I'm guilty of it in my day-to-day life and it's something that I recognize as a source of conflict that for me at least usually doesn't accomplish much, though I do think it can be used well in certain situations. In any event, I'm trying to be better about it. As the kids say, "whatevs."
"...and how much does it impact your ability to fire an AK-47 anyway?" Height doesn't affect it at all. But upper body strength does. If you are fighting in urban environment, your typical stance is to hold your weapon in firing position and walks slowly or jog smoothly. That's 4,3kg peace of metal you should be able to hold with extended arms in front of you. Personally I can do 20min with ease, but 40min is quite maximum or I start shaking. If you want to shoot burst with you AK47, you should know that the bastard shakes like a Polaroid picture. Shooting burst comes handy in close combat, as you are not satisfied with hitting your enemy, you actually want to take him down as quickly as possible. If you want to be more accurate while shooting burst, your friends are practice and upper body muscle mass. Women don't just have less muscle, they also develop slower. PS. I'm not against women in the army. I think they should do a fair share of the suffering if shit hits the fan. But I don't think you should put them in just any unit.
I bought an SKS at 17. I gave it to my then 13-year old sister to fire as quick as she could in semi-auto. She had no difficulty.
You are talking about single shots, I was talking about full auto. You show 1:30 second long video, I was talking about 15min to two hour house clearing session. I guess I was confusing. I did not mean to say that women or children would be useless. What I meant was that muscle matters even today. Shooting is just small part of it. I didn't talk about other stuff, because there is no need for everyone to be able to move Czech hedgehogs or pile up sandbags.
No, I'm talking about women in combat roles. You're talking about a highly-gerrymandered, specific vision in which you get to exclude everyone on the basis that all soldiers everywhere may be forced to relive Blackhawk Down at any time. You weren't confusing. You were chauvinist. You argued that somehow, women lack the upper body strength for combat roles, which is ridiculous. More, you were arguing (as is everyone on this page) that somehow, women can't even train to be adequate for combat roles. Which is purest White Man's Burden bullshit considering A) Women are already in combat roles B) "combat roles" are being filled quite adequately by twelve-year-olds all over the world. I'm not sure what universe you live in, but in my universe if a woman wants to pile sandbags, and can prove her ability to pile sandbags, I'ma let the chick pile sandbags and good on her. I'm 6'1 and 195lbs with a fairly athletic build and I've met plenty of chicks that could kick my ass. You haven't? Here's where things get really offensive Our modern military is totally cool with women getting shot at and totally cool with women shooting back but up until last week, wasn't cool with making it official. Which means any woman anywhere could assume all the risks of combat roles, but could not reap the benefits - additional pay, avenues to promotion, etc. My uncle-in-law is vice-commander of a naval base. He'll never be commander for the simple reason that he didn't go to Annapolis, which means he didn't get to command a vessel, which means he'll never get a star, which means he'll never break O-6. And that's cool - there was nothing keeping him out of Annapolis. That was a choice. A vagina or lack thereof is not. So quit triangulating a universe in which women are unsuitable for combat. They aren't. History bears this out. When advancement in the military is determined by suitability for roles, women need to be allowed to do everything they can prove they can do. Period. Full stop. Making up some cockeyed claim about stiff-arming an assault rifle only makes you look like a sexist idiot.
"But I don't think you should put them in just any unit." = "You're talking about a highly-gerrymandered, specific vision in which you get to exclude everyone on the basis that all soldiers everywhere may be forced to relive Blackhawk Down at any time." You seem to know what I was saying better than I do myself. I was thinking about stuff like setting up a roadblock. Or operating as a grenade launcher squad. Or digging tank mines to frosty road. I can't say I would have first hand experience about the grenade launcher, but I do have experience about setting a road block. And those Czech hedgehogs weight a lot and that grenade launcher weights 500 kg (it's called light). As unimaginable as it might sound, I'm not from U.S. and I'm not particularly interested in female officer paychecks in U.S. military. In Finland it doesn't seem to be a problem, pay or position is not linked to danger as we are not fighting any wars. I was more interested discussing females in military in general. Personally this "are females officially allowed to die" is not very interesting. Of-course they are or at least should be. I think it would be interesting to hear how females would fair in all-female unit? Is it possible to have well functioning mixed unit and how is that possible? And to me it seems girls in camo are currently some sort of cannon fodder as they are usually the slowest and weakest. Could we find roles and technology that would allow women to fight without being cannon fodder?
"I didn't bother to read the implications of the article but I want to say things about AK-47s." I can't say this any more simply: you served in a conscript army where male participation is mandatory and female participation is volunteer-based. The United States fields a fully professional army where participation is wholly voluntary and there are no enlistments available of less than 24-month length. All the tasks you speak of in your 6, 9 or 12-month tour of duty? The United States handles the lion's share of them with contractors. Your experience does not align with the subject at hand, which is women in combat roles in the US military. I'm sorry you don't find that interesting, but it's the subject at hand. If you wish to discuss the upper body strength necessary to fire an AK-47 for 40 minutes, by all means do so. But do not expect me to consider it relevant to the discussion we're having here. By my count, Finland has fewer than 300 soldiers deployed in the world anywhere. The United States has more staff than that at the average black site.
"...and how much does it impact your ability to fire an AK-47 anyway?" Well you kind of asked for it. I actually read the whole article and it was quite crappy. But I'll leave you to discuss females in combat roles in U.S. military. It' wasn't that good discussion anyway. Originally all I wanted was to point out that strength plays a role in modern combat, and you managed to call me "chauvinist" and "sexist idiot". You could cool down a little.
People all over Europe were shocked when they saw Napoleons army for the first time. The soldiers were often on the border of emaciation, they were small in girth and height. By the time Napoleon was crushing all the armies of the continent the french had already gone through many lean decades. Like the citizens of modern North Korea, famine had wasted the men of Napoleons army down to the nubs. Despite this the French dominated pretty much all who stood before them. Superior strategy and to a lesser extent tactics more then made up for the French armies physical deficiencies. While I don't doubt that having physically powerful soldiers is a boon for any army, if you were to break down and quantify the factors that lead to victory I think physical strength would be way down the list. Pretending that a lack physical stature and strength is a reason that Women shouldn't serve in combat roles is nothing more then a misogynistic smoke screen. Factors like good optometry services, comprehensive, marksmanship programs, and quality logistics and maintenance of equipment are much bigger factors in the effectiveness of a soldier on the modern gunpowder infantry battlefield then raw physical strength.
I'm arguing that: 1) physical strength matters a hell of a lot less than all the detractors want it to 2) the physical strength necessary for most combat roles is achievable by women 3) physical strength is a red herring used to mask other, more insidious objections raised by chauvinists 4) "combat role" means so many things more than "infantry with sandbags" that couching things in terms of "physical strength" is an obvious and disingenuous attempt to re-jigger the discussion onto irrelevant terms ...which should all be pretty obvious from everything I've said on this page.
But if physical strength matters at all should the military not disregard gender entirely and only allow strength as a qualification? A gender-blind strength-based army is probably going to be something like 80/20 male/female. Put another way, it's true that "combat role" means more than "brute strength is necessary all the time" -- but is having strength ever going to hurt? When lives are at stake I feel like erring on the side of caution is probably for the best. Equality for the sake of equality is all well and good until it costs lives.
Couple things: 1) Physical strength requirements are, like all things military, carefully and concisely laid out for all specialties within the military. That hasn't changed. No one has said it has, no one has said it will. 2) "Combat roles" are not related to strength, they are related to an expectancy of being shot at. Jessica Lynch wasn't in a "combat role" when an RPG blew up her truck in an ambush - she was an equipment specialist in a combat maintenance battalion that was part of a convoy that got lost. So riddle me this: how is a system where women can get blown up by RPGs (Pvt Lynch lost her best friend Lori to a head wound in the same engagement, in which eleven were killed and six were captured) is A-OK by you, but a system in which the "combative" nature of their enrollment verboten? Because that's what we're talking about here - not whether or not women can serve in the military. Not whether or not women can be deployed to a hostile theatre. Whether or not women can: Source This is literally a discussion of whether or not women can be special forces - which already have stringent physical fitness requirements. Rather than a flat "no" the answer is now "you'll have to work for it." Just like everyone else. TL;DR you're not even asking the right questions PS. Armor? Try and tell me women can't drive tanks because they aren't strong enough. Soviet tankers were limited to 5'9" because Soviet tanks were smaller as part of their strategic battlefield plan.be assigned below the brigade level -- a unit of about 3,500 troops -- to fight on the ground. Effectively, that has barred women from infantry, artillery, armor, combat engineers and special operations units of battalion size -- about 700 troops -- or lower.
From the Panetta article: Fine. Gender-neutral, gender-blind changes -- these cannot hurt the military if they are followed. But when affirmative action was introduced, if the supporters had been asked, "Will this at all lower the intelligence level of our higher education system by even once substituting someone less intelligent on the basis of his or her race?" -- what would they have said? Apparently I'm not asking the right questions. Here's one: will this at all lower the effectiveness of our military by even once substituting someone less combat effective on the basis of gender? I hope not, and from what you've written I guess you believe it won't.For instance, the defense official said, it's likely the Army will establish a set of physical requirements for infantry soldiers. The candidate, man or woman, will have to lift a certain amount of weight in order to qualify. The standards will be gender neutral.
PROTIP: The constitution does not apply to the armed forces. There is no habeas corpus. There is no 1st Amendment. There are none of the niceties we take for granted. So when the AEC tells you it's perfectly safe to charge into a nuclear blast, even when you prove in a court of law they were lying to you they get to say "too bad, so sad, shouldn't have joined the Army." Affirmative action has nothing to do with it - Affirmative Action is all about recognizing that some people face more hardship than others (theoretically). Al Franken's analogy is the best I've found for the theoretical basis for AA: "Women in the military" isn't about "women need a leg up in order to compete with men for military jobs" It's about "women need to not be dismissed by edict." To use the baseball analogy, it's allowing both people to run even though one of them is a girl.Consider two baseball players who tie in a race to first base. However, one runs with perfect form while the other runs awkwardly. Which do you choose? You choose the one who runs awkwardly because when you teach him good form, he’ll run faster than the other player. Black Americans are nothing but awkwardly running baseball players, so affirmative action is justified.
All right. We're worried about two different things here. To twist your analogy, I'm worried that when the running woman gets to first base behind the running man, she'll get chosen anyway. Being naturally cynical, I'm absolutely sure this will happen at some point, and when it does, it will decrease the effectiveness of our military by some iota. I agree that women should get the chance to run -- everyone should (although I find it bizarre that what I'm actually saying is "everyone should get a chance to be killed on foreign soil").
Nothing bizarre about it - you're recognizing that women are entitled to full citizenship. And that's what we're talking about here: the recognition that there is nothing inherently inferior about women. Skills- and strength-based occupations should (and are) remaining skills- and strength-based occupations, but there is no longer an arbitrary reason why half of all Americans cannot try out for those occupations. You see this in terms of affirmative action - which is all about providing opportunities for underserved minorities in order to equalize inequality across socioeconomic strata. This is very much not that. This is about desegregation, pure and simple - this is the National Guard in Alabama so that George Wallace doesn't turn the fire hose on those kids trying to go to high school. Are they guaranteed graduation? Fuck no. But they sure should be guaranteed the opportunity to fail.I agree that women should get the chance to run -- everyone should (although I find it bizarre that what I'm actually saying is "everyone should get a chance to be killed on foreign soil").
All fair. I do think that we sometimes forget that there are things inherently different about women and men, and that sometimes remembering that difference gets twisted into sexism. But perhaps that's a separate discussion. I always enjoy discussing things with you; thanks for the perspective.
"I'd also like to know why women fighting in their own all-female units is not being discussed." I'd like to know too. All-female unit would not have most of the bad stuff that comes from mixing sexes in military and it doesn't seem to bring in any bad things on it's own.
About to read the article, but isn't one of the primary arguments against women fighting in active combat alongside men the biological fact that men are somewhat predisposed to "protect" women? Therefore, it's been argued, men are influenced by a desire to risk their lives/battle security to save women who they perceive as being in danger. EDIT: the article doesn't mention this explicitly, which I found surprising (though the book may). But it does bring up a half-dozen other excellent points.
I wouldn't ever willingly join the military, and I'm on the wrong side of 30, so we'd have to have a pretty fuckin' serious war before my number gets called. My chances of ever fighting a war, therefore, are quite low, and I will never get to form a first hand opinion of whether I would like to fight along side a woman. That said, I challenge anyone to name a time (in the military or anywhere else) when hindsight revealed integration and more equality to be a bad thing. Not 'X may happen if we do Y', but an historical example of when integration turned out to be a mistake. On a personal level, I say if you want to fight, more power to you no matter who you are, because I sure as shit value my life way too much to fight some politicians' fabricated wars.
Finnish defense forces, military police of Kainuu brigade, winter batch of 2008. There we're around fifty people in my unit, three women. One of them stayed with the privates like me, two went to sub-officer school. The one who stayed with us was fine. Really nice and cool person and everybody liked her. She was slower in every respect than others. I was second slowest of the guys, but she was slowest. Personally I liked not to be the slowest so thats nice. But I guess in war people don't run these days that much, except when things go to shit. If mu unit ever goes to war, she is quite strong candidate to be the first one killed. One of the women started to train new recruits right after that sub-officer school session. The other and five guys came to lead us "old timers". It was a disaster from the beginning. They had some advice from the school to be extra rough at the beginning, because if you are too kind to recruits at first, it's hard to tighten up, but it's always easy to slacken the discipline a little. So all the new sergeants tried to yell at us, but we already knew how things worked and didn't care much. The sergeants got called for bad leadership by our captain and we got no punishment. I guess this female sergeant tried to compensate her lack of balls by being extra mean at first. So she was most upset when it didn't work out. After this none of the sergeants really trusted us to do what was needed. But we we're weird ass privates and actually liked to drill the real stuff, not some parade marching. Most sergeant guys quickly learned to give as as much slack discipline-wise as we wanted and in return we performed quite well when it was really needed. At the same time our female sergeant started to feel depressed because she failed at this. That depression had it's cost in all her performance, and soon she didn't perform even when leadership was not needed. Some guys really had hard time taking commands from women. Yes it's a shame and it should not be that way. But the military is there to defend our country, not to make us better people. And nine months is not enough for everything right now, so some kind of "equality training" is not very good idea to do in the force. I think best they can do in the military is to try to form groups that naturally bond and function. I can't see why they could not make all-female unit.