Women in combat, bad/good idea?

[Werthead]

I see no obstacle whatsoever to women playing any role in the armed forces as long as they meet the same qualifications as the male soldiers. One of my best friends is in her second year in the Royal Navy and quite enjoying the experience, although granted that the Navy has a much longer history of equality on board their ships.

In WWII the Russians used women as snipers, tankers, pilots, artillery gunners, and front line roles (medics, scouts). If a women can meet the physical requirements, there is no reason they cannot serve.

Yup, and it also confused the shit out of the Germans, since even after D-Day and with the Russians sweeping over the eastern border they still refused to let women serve in the military or even do a lot of work in factories (instead relying on slave labour, who, oddly in the face of impending liberation, had a fairly unproductive workrate). There's quite a few stories in various books on the Eastern Front about German soldiers (particularly the younger, newer recruits) hesitating upon discovering they're fighting Russian female soldiers and promptly getting killed due to that hesitation.

In WWII the Russians would've used fucking badgers if it gave them an edge over the nazis.

The Russians did not hesitate to employ canine assault units to destroy German tanks during WWII. Apparently badgers were considered too slow to effectively engage enemy armour.

Crazy as the tactic sounds, it was another threat that seriously confused the Germans, especially as the Russians mostly employed favoured German breeds like German shepherds and alsations, whom the Germans were especially unwilling to shoot. After watching some of their friends getting blown to smithereens by them, they generally lost this inhibition.

Fortunately (?) the effectiveness of the German anti-canine measures meant that they were removed from front-line service and were instead used to drop mines just ahead of German tank formations (particularly at Kursk), which had the superior benefit that they would survive the operation.

[Shryke]

One day Tempra is going to start a thread that says:

China is currently the most populous country in the world.

Yosemite is a National Park in California, USA.

The Pittsburgh Steelers won the Super Bowl.

Then everyone will be forced to agree with him. Oh, you'll pay then. Youll all pay.

This has already happened in this thread.

[S John]

This has already happened in this thread.

Precisely my point, old chap.

His initial post was in favor of women in combat roles, an opinion shared by a huge majority in this thread, and yet he has spent half the thread defending himself..... from what exactly? I was just pondering what kind of unequivocal statements he'd have to make before some people would admit that they agree with him on something instead of singling him out for attack on a slight deviation from what was pretty much the consensus. If youre going to call some people on thier positions... how about the obvious few that disagree with the majority? I don't get this board sometimes.

Edited to make sense.

[Max the Mostly Mediocre]

Yeah, and i already replied (you seem to have ignored it) that i was talking about the majority in regards to good intentions. If anyone's generalising, its you.

Galactus was talking about the historical reality that soldiers have been pretty fucking brutal. Now, maybe this doesn't apply to the modern American (or Western) military; but pick a nation, a kingdom, a fiefdom, an empire prior to, oh, 1914. Now, look at what their soldiers did. Sometimes under orders, sometimes not. Hell, if I'm not mistaken it was conventional wisdom--and actual practice--for a long time that when taking a city, well, you had to let the men blow off steam by raping and murdering and thieving their way through the populace.

[Guest Raidne]

Seeing as women are regularly exposed to the enemy, and have been captured, can someone please post a story of a woman who was raped by the enemy? And anyway, maybe people would disagree with me, but I'd rather be raped than beheaded. And if it has to both, well, at some point you can't really quantify bad, know what I'm sayin'?

It's war: there's unpleasant, deeply disturbing shit. I don't think anybody's confused about that.

You know, I've actually read more rape stories from men than women. For the record. Although I haven't read about anyone being raped by the enemy.

[zollo]

You know, I've actually read more rape stories from men than women. For the record. Although I haven't read about anyone being raped by the enemy.

Try Abu Ghraib.

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

For the fourth or fifth time, I think women should be able to go into combat roles if they want, despite this risk. I'm not suggesting that women should be prevented from taking up these roles. Here is my statement, including the section that Chad neglected to post:

"The chances of captured women being raped is likely higher than the rate at which captured men are raped. Now, I don't think that should prevent women from participating in combat roles, but I think that is something women should be (are) mindful of."

I'll say it outright, and gladly. I totally agree with you on this. The part of my post you quoted was trying to refute the idea that women can't go into combat roles because of this idea that they'll be raped. There's a realistic possibility that they'll be raped at home, too, meaning that the implication of "total safety (at home) -> high risk (in the military or combat areas)" is misleading at best.

I'm not sure exactly what you mean or where this comes from. People have suggested that we shouldn't worry about women being captured and raped by the enemy because women face "daily" threats of rape at home (in Oz/US). I'm not sure why people think this should be factored into our concern that women are more likely than men to be raped if captured.

Your statement was that "women aren't in combat zones unless they choose to be." Not military women, just "women". I was - hamfistedly, I admit, because I was mightily annoyed - trying to point out that there are, generally speaking, *always* women in these areas. Civilians, often, and thus not officially "the enemy". (I know that's idealistic; I believe it's pretty common to drum "us -v- them" into any group going into that sort of situation, and military/civilian lines can get blurred.) If you want to totally eliminate the risk of rape in a combat zone, you need to get rid of combat zones. Getting rid of women (or men, for that matter), won't cut it. I'm also not sure why rape of enemy military (never mind civilians) would not be something to be stamped out as well.

As for the second part, it's not that the rape at home somehow negates the higher risk of being raped in a combat zone, or a higher risk of rape of women than of men (if that's supported). It's that some of the arguments have gone beyond that, implying that women should stay home where nasty things like that won't happen to them. Except, of course, that they do still happen. Women have to be careful all of the time; being more careful elsewhere is notihng new, and shouldn't be an argument to keep women off of the front lines. (To state it explicitly, I know *you* don't think that, but I mean as a general point.)

Raidne - I believe I've heard of one or two cases of rape-by-enemy reported, but I'm having a hard time finding a record of them.

[Galactus]

To be honest, the entire "women will be raped in combat zones" is the same argument for not letting women go outdoors at all. (Which has beem, and sometimes still is, made)

[Filippa Eilhart]

you know, I was glad of the sexist laws that prevented me from doing my 2-year duty in the military like all the men my age were supposed to.

[Guest Raidne]

Raidne - I believe I've heard of one or two cases of rape-by-enemy reported, but I'm having a hard time finding a record of them.

Generally, I think my point is that to the extent that rape in the military is a problem - and it is - it is statistically a problem of being raped by other soldiers on your side, and from everything I've read, the military is the one place where it's not a gendered issue.

[Edda van Heefmstra Ruston]

Oh, absolutely. Almost all of what some quick Google searches turned up was a report that US female soldiers are far more likely to be raped by comrades than killed by the enemy. (Not sure on the source, so everyone please take that as a description of the report rather than a total statement of fact.)

There were a few pages about PFC Jessica Lynch, too, but most of those indicated that the rape reported in her biography was in question -- she doesn't remember any assault, and didn't want the statement she'd been raped included in the book, but her memory of the time is generally fuzzy, so it might have happened.

[Ouroboros]

I'm all for women being sent into combat, Australia doesn't have enough numbers when it comes to feet on the ground while relying on men alone, give the women a shot to prove themselves.

My Niece-In-Law (awkward way to refer to her) is joining the army, I'd hope she would get equal treatment to the male soldiers, which would entail equal responsibility as well.

[mormont]

I disagree that all aspects of life require gender equality.

Then you do not believe in gender equality. Conditional or partial equality is a contradiction in terms.

To put it simply, there are some things different genders are better equipped for.

And there are some things that young people are better equipped for, some things that tall people are better equipped for, some things that able-bodied people are better equipped for. But it doesn't follow that old people, short people or disabled people should automatically be prevented from doing them, surely? To rule out all members of a group from doing something because most members of that group aren't good at it makes no sense. In the end, it's unjustifiable.

Take a real-life example: most outfield football (soccer) players aren't physically able to compete in the top divisions after the age of, say, 35. Should we therefore ban all over-35s from playing in these leagues? What about those players who can compete? Should Tom Watson have been prevented from competing in (and almost winning) the last Open Championship because almost no over-50s are capable of doing so? If I have a disabled candidate for a job who is as good as any of the able-bodied candidates, should I rule them out because most disabled people couldn't do that job? In other words, if we want to decide whether someone can do something, should we look at their actual ability, or at the general ability of various groups they might happen to be a member of?

[Chaldanya]

Oh, where to start?

Retract your claws, drop the arrogance, and stop making silly assumptions.

Nope. When outright sexism is displayed in a thread then I'm not gonna do anything like retract my claws. But thanks for telling me how to behave.

First, I said that women should be allowed in combat roles assuming they meet the required physical standards. This is in accord with 99% of posters of this thread.

Cool. I'm down with that. Here's the problem, you then added a qualifier which is where I start to have a problem. My point was that in this world it doesn't matter where you are, as a woman you are in danger of getting raped or sexually assaulted so why bring it up at all unless you (general)/armed forces/government are going to do something about it.

Second, war is particularly bad when it comes to rape, as my example of rapes in the Bosnian war shows.

Yes it is bad when it comes to war but if you think that is anything other than stemming from rape culture that this society is awash with they you're nuts. You gotta try to tackle the roots of the problem.

And some of us *are* concerned with women being raped/abused and actually "do something positive about the sexual and rape culture women live in every day of their lives." And I hope it wouldn't come as a shock to you that someone who does something *positive* about the problem of rape in our culture is troubled by the prospect of sending women into a situation where they face a very real possibility of being raped.

As I've said before, there's a very real possibility (like 1 in 4) of a woman being raped every time she gets up out of bed.

That's rather unfortunate.

Yeah, I'm sure you're just crying yourself to sleep at night over the fact that I don't agree with you.

The only American women who are under threat of rape by the enemy

I'll put it to you that from the woman's perspective anyone who rapes her is the enemy...

Here is my statement, including the section that Chad neglected to post:

It's 'Chal' but nevermind. And the reason I neglected to post that part is because I agreed with it. I didn't agree with you bringing rape into it.

And for the rest, let's just say I agree with Eefa and be done with it...

One thing:

They fall under the same umbrella, yet de-humanising or not one has good intentions, so its unfair to put them in the same group.

As has been said before, intentions don't matter so yeah, I'm putting them in the same group.

N

[Lyanna Stark]

Stego is right in one way, this argument is silly from a feminist perspective. This is an 'equal right' you don't want tbh.

Maybe you should let the women who actually WANT to be in the army be the judges of that?

Being all protective of "weak" women really riles me up. Let women be adults and make their own choices, ok? You have NO RIGHT to tell any woman which part of equality she wants or doesn't want.

I disagree that all aspects of life require gender equality. To put it simply, there are some things different genders are better equipped for.

Oh really? Which ones? Can you please specify what these things are. I'd like to know.

The rest has already been answered by Galactus, Chaldanya et.

Raidne:

Seeing as women are regularly exposed to the enemy, and have been captured, can someone please post a story of a woman who was raped by the enemy? And anyway, maybe people would disagree with me, but I'd rather be raped than beheaded. And if it has to both, well, at some point you can't really quantify bad, know what I'm sayin'?

Precisely.

Tempra:

And I hope it wouldn't come as a shock to you that someone who does something *positive* about the problem of rape in our culture is troubled by the prospect of sending women into a situation where they face a very real possibility of being raped.

LOL

The largest risk women ever run of being raped is in their own homes, by somebody they know. This is the largest risk BY FAR. Maybe we should never go home?

Again, if women apply for the army and want to go to war, perhaps you should actually get it into your head that they know the risks with this and they don't care that you're wringing your hands in the background.

For all you know, and very likely, a couple of these women have *already been raped* since it is, after all, quite common.

[Fleeing Finn]

As I've said before, there's a very real possibility (like 1 in 4) of a woman being raped every time she gets up out of bed.

What? Does this mean quarter of the women I see every day have been raped?

[Young Wolf]

Stego is right in one way, this argument is silly from a feminist perspective. This is an 'equal right' you don't want tbh.

This is just outright stupid. War is something that nobody wants regardless of gender. Again, if a woman feels compelled to join the military and can meet the requirements that men are forced to make for an infantry/forward unit there is no reason they should not be allowed to serve.

Maybe this argument is for a small percentage of woman who want to do this and can, but regardless just because the majority of woman dont want to do this and cant...by no means should we exclude that small minority who have a desire to serve like some of us did.

This whole "saving women from war" is bullshit. Men arent the only humans who can act like "animals". Women had their share of handing out torture at Abu Ghraib.

Its bullshit to say they cant and then hide behind this coat of chivalry by suggesting that you are saving them from themselves.

[Xray the Enforcer]

What? Does this mean quarter of the women I see every day have been raped?

It's possible, yes.

These statistics vary a bit, depending on the demographics and the country. It's 1 in 4 for US college-age women, 1 in 6 for the US as a whole. Worse, rape is underreported (some 48% of all rapes are reported), which means that the actual numbers are much higher. I've seen some estimates that 1 in 3 women has survived a rape or attempted rape.

[Lyanna Stark]

What? Does this mean quarter of the women I see every day have been raped?

Yup, quite likely, in one form or another.

Sometimes the women themselves don't call it rape due to various factors ("I was drunk", "I had sex with him before", "We were married when it happened" etc).

[ljkeane]

What? Does this mean quarter of the women I see every day have been raped?

I seen some things that suggest that the one in four statistic might be a bit dubious but the alternative figures offered are still quite disturbing (in the range of 10-15%).