Why is it important for the military to lift its ban on women in combat? Well, that's obvious. "Promotion and job opportunities have favored those with battlefield leadership credentials." Since women don't have battlefield opportunities, they don't have promotion and job opportunities, and that's bad. What we really need, you see, is to give women the opportunity to match what is worst in men. Now that will make a stronger military.
But, seriously, what is the problem, the goal? According to the report, "despite undeniable successes ... the armed forces have not yet succeeded in developing a continuing stream of leaders who are as diverse as the nation they serve." Success, then, would be defined as a military leadership that has the same racial and gender composition as the nation does. And I'm sure you can see the logic of that. I mean, how could anyone expect proper military leadership, effective strategies, and so on? According to the Army Leadership Manual, leadership in the military is "the process of influencing people by providing purpose, direction, and motivation while operating to accomplish the mission and improve the organization." And what right-thinking individual would think that this is even remotely possible if the gender and racial makeup of the upper echelons of military leadership don't match the gender and racial makeup of the nation? Ridiculous!
We've bought the lie. Men and women are equal. I am not questioning "equal in value" or "equal in importance". But we've bought the lie that there are no differences in gender. Well, not quite. I think there is a growing sense not that women are just as good as men (because they are), but that women are better than men. The idea, though, is that the only difference between males and females is primarily anatomy (and, oh, by the way, the transgender community will tell you that that can be changed as well). When it comes to the military, however, I find it really odd. I highly value the military. I respect what they do for this country. I appreciate their sacrifice and dedication. But I don't think (and I don't think many of them do either) that killing for the cause is a "good thing". It's a necessary evil, something that must be done. It cannot be done without damaging the one doing it, even for the best of reasons. It is indeed some of the best of men operating on the worst side of mankind. So the claim appears to be "You know, women can be just as bad as that. They should be allowed to absorb the same damage, engage in the same horror, indulge the same 'necessary evil' as men. They should not be protected or defended." It seems like a race to the lowest common denominator.
Look, what's the goal here? According to Mary Kassian on International Women's Day,
The message is that "true equality" requires that women be treated exactly the same as men. Women will not be equal until the sexes have interchangeable roles, interchangeable jobs, interchangeable responsibilities . . . and even an interchangeable identity. Equality means interchangeability. The sexes will not be "equal" until a man can metaphorically "cross-dress" as a woman, and a woman as a man—until husband and wife, mother and father are superfluous terms, and the world reflects a socialist, gender-neutral 50/50 division of labor in every sphere of life.(Just a question, here. Why is it that men aren't trying to become "equal" with women? Why are no men suing to get onto women's sports teams? Why aren't parents lobbying to get their little boys into Girl Scouts? If it's all interchangeable, what's up with that? I'm just asking.)
Of course, as for the ridiculous idea that the military is "too white" and "too male", until someone can offer a reason that race or gender makes for better military leadership, I would just beg them to please stop talking. (Because, of course, when they do make that argument, it will either be racist or sexist.) And who was it that decided that "diversity" was, in itself, such a grand thing? I see where we're going from here and I don't like it.
2 comments:
Where we're going is toward mediocrity. The military was unique for its quality of promotion according to ability alone. Though not perfectly applied I'm sure, try to find a black officer who didn't get his rank through his own effort and won't be pissed at the thought he got it because he is black.
If women and men are seen as absolutely the same, how would they deal with requirements that are difficult to achieve because of the differences of physiques? If women can be found to be superior for some military tasks than men, I would expect that those positions be filled mostly with women. But the case must first be made. The military has a specific job: to be the toughest bastards in the world in order to protect American interests. Shame on those who would mess with that for the sake of "diversity".
One off topic comment:
Due to my new job, which imposes over forty hours per five day week as a matter of routine, I am not always able to check in as often as I would like, much less leave responses to responses of yours or others. The thing is, some conversations I would like to see proceed to some conclusion before moving on. Thus, I may go back several posts to see how my last comment went over, and then add to that conversation.
This is easy enough for Stan to see, as he is the host and gets the notifications of new comments being posted. But for readers who cared enough to respond to me, they might want to keep it in mind. Could I have said all this in fewer words? Not sure.
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