Claire, the Lean, Mean, Killing Machine: This Woman's Army

Toogood Reports ^ | 4 May 2003 | Nicholas Stix

[mrustow]

FYI

[tmg]

Just a question to all of you who say a woman can't meet the physical fitness standards.

When you see a woman in the gym who's muscular, and works hard to be strong and tough, what do you call her? Most of the guys I know snigger behind their backs and call her a dyke. I frequently feel that no matter how hard I work, I can't win. I lift weights 3 times a week, work on my cardio, and have a blue belt in Kenpo. I'm strong, confident, and a good fighter. Do you know what I get in return? I get "dyke" jokes. (For the record, I'm not, and never have been.) So, gentlemen, the next time you want to jump on the "women are physically inferior" train, ask yourself how you would treat one who works hard to make herself the physical equal of a man. If she asked you to spot her in the weight room would you? What if she could lift more than you? If she needed a sparring partner would you spar with her?

As for men in combat situations not performing as well because a woman is around, that's your problem buster, not mine. You think you need to protect poor little us from being raped or beaten? News flash: that can and does happen at home all the time. Up until the last century, it could be done legally done by a husband in the US. Women have been brutalized in their very own homes for most of history, why is it so much more abhorrent when it happens in war?

[mrustow]

FYI

[mrustow]

From the article:

"Adopting a male standard of fitness at West Point would mean 70 percent of the women he studied would be separated as failures at the end of their junior year, only three percent would be eligible for the Recondo badge, and not one would receive the Army Physical Fitness badge.."

Reed quoted from a conversation with his friend, Catherine Asby, a Harvard graduate who enlisted in the Army in 1995.

"The Army was a vast day-care center, full of unmarried teen-age mothers using it as a welfare home. I took training seriously and really tried to keep up with the men. I found I couldn't. It wasn't even close. I had no idea the difference in physical ability was so huge. There were always crowds of women sitting out exercises or on crutches from training injuries.

[mrustow]

P.S. I was once a member of a gym, and I know I didn't snigger and tell "dyke" jokes about muscular women, but then, I don't recall seeing any particularly muscular women at that gym. And I find gyms a waste of time for me, anyway. All that time walking there, changing, and afterwards, changing again. It killed my interest in working out, which wasn't huge to begin with. (The membership was my ex's to begin with, so she could get a lower rate.) These days, I work out at home.

However, if I saw a woman with really huge muscles, like the cover girls on those weightlifting mags, I would snigger behind her back, but it wouldn't be about who she was sleeping with. It would be the "s" word, just as with guys who are too big to be true.

[mrustow]

FYI

[mrustow]

FYI

[PLMerite]

"I lift weights 3 times a week, work on my cardio, and have a blue belt in Kenpo. I'm strong, confident, and a good fighter."

I'm sure you're in great shape. Can you pass the PT Test for a male soldier your age?

Would you really want to get into a knock-down, drag-out fight with a man of similar weight and skill?

And the final question - assuming that standards were equalized for men and women (to the higher level), would the minute number of women who could meet those standards be worth the allowances that would have to be made for them?

[mrustow]

FYI

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Hey, Fedayeen! Our women can beat your men without smearing their mascara! Haha!

Luv it!!!!

[mrustow]

FYI

[mrustow]

Would you really want to get into a knock-down, drag-out fight with a man of similar weight and skill?

And of course, there's no guarantee her opponent won't be much bigger and heavier.

[TheSpottedOwl]

I agree that women don't have the same body strength as men; however we are more resolved. We are also meaner than guys. A woman can machine gun the enemy, she can fly a plane, she can drive a tank, so even though I don't approve of women fighting on the front lines, I know that we can do the job.

As for the other stuff, why not segregate men from women? Ooooops, nevermind....

[dark_lord]

Ah, mrustow;
Your narrow perspective is exceeded only by your lack of manners. You know nothing of me, my IQ, or anything else; but you feel free to call me stupid and dishonest.
Presumably you learned how to communicate on teenage IM boards where lack of ability to make a point is covered up by your deep mastery of the casual insult.

[honeygrl]

"Just something to consider. I think there's a world of things women can take that men can't even conceive of. We're a lot stronger than men think. Jessica Lynch is someone I see as a role model for women in the military, not a reason to exclude us. "

I know this is going to get me flamed but I plan to say it anyway :) Men are still trying to get that clubhouse back that they had as little boys with the sign "No Girls Allowed!" outside.

[OOPisforLiberals]

A friend of mine was telling me a story he heard about psy-ops in action during the war. Essentially, US forces cranked up the loudspeakers on their vehicles - asserting essentially that Iraqi men were "impotent", or something to that effect.

Apparently it would cause Iraqi soldiers to just fly into an undisciplined rage : losing all sense of formation/order/tactics. They'd simply rush right into the guns. Even guys trying to use human shields would just drop them in anger and charge.

Talk about outclassed.

[honeygrl]

well said.

[ppaul]

BTTT

[George Frm Br00klyn Park]

To: mrustow
Blow it out your ear, moron........ In your ignorance.......
15 posted on 05/02/2003 12:02 PM PDT by dark_lord
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To: dark_lord
Being ex-service gives you no free ride, for your stupidity and dishonesty!
20 posted on 05/02/2003 1:11 PM PDT by mrustow
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To: mrustow
Ah, mrustow;
Your narrow perspective is exceeded only by your lack of manners. You know nothing of me, my IQ, or anything else; but you feel free to call me stupid and dishonest. Presumably you learned how to communicate on teenage IM boards where lack of ability to make a point is covered up by your deep mastery of the casual insult.
34 posted on 05/02/2003 9:31 PM PDT by dark_lord
=============================

Guys, I always find it interesting when the initiators of flame wars are the first to cry fowl. Peace and love, George.

[dark_lord]

Ah, but I was not the initiator, and I quote: "I hope you're really young...but youth is no excuse for having strong opinions on a subject, without doing any of your homework. Facts are helpful things."
(a) I am not young.
(b) He posted no "facts" and then chided me for failure to do so. His clear implication is that I know not of what I speak.

But in fact I spent 6 years in the service, and there are many, many, many roles that women can fill. Heck, practically the whole airforce, with all their bases here in the US, consists of roles that women can easily fill. And there are a lot of other US bases, or bases in Europe, with paper pushing, computer monitoring, intelligence data processing, and other tech/tweek/clerk roles that can easily and cost effectively be filled by women; and these are roles that will never come within a thousand miles of screaming boneheads waving Kalashnikovs.

Here are some facts. The Department of Defense employs 1.4 million people on active duty. The Pentagon alone has about 23,000 personnel assigned. And regarding US bases alone, check out this:

And this:

And this:

Now do you really think that all those people at all those bases (and by the way, there are a completely separate set of maps for reserve bases) all deploy? Well they don't!!!!!!

So I stick to my point --- there are a ton of roles for women in the US military.