Posted on 04/30/2014 1:50:15 AM PDT by Timber Rattler
Following an outcry by members of the Congressional Black Caucus, Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel is considering changing hairstyle regulations that affect female African-American servicemembers.
On Tuesday, Hagel sent a letter to lawmakers announcing that, within 30 days, each of the services will review the definitions of authorized and prohibited hairstyles contained in each of their respective policies and revise any language that might be considered offensive.
Caucus members had complained that a recently updated Army regulation governing troops’ hairstyles was racist and unfairly targeted African-American women.
(snip)
Hagel has also ordered the services to conduct a three-month review of their hairstyle policies as they pertain to African-American women. The purpose of the review is “to ensure standards are fair and respectful of our diverse force, while also meeting our military services’ requirements,” Hagel said in the letter, which was obtained by Stars and Stripes.
(Excerpt) Read more at stripes.com ...
Yeah, and we think we can help someone like the Ukraine. The military has been purged of leaders and we now look to expand hair styles. We in deep doo doo as they say.
In my military service 4 year stint, I had to shave every day, sometimes twice. The day after I got out, I did not shave, I’ve had a beard ever since.
Back then, if you disagreed with military grooming rules, they would eventually kick you out and good luck then trying to find a job with that on your record.
Dreadlocks and recreational reefers for the troops. It’s a style.
Good question - my personal experience dates to 1976 so I took it to Google. It appears the training is still done as there are recent YouTube pages of trainees exiting the chamber, slinging snot and some puking.
They don’t think and now the inmates are running the madhouse.
Destroy the military and build up Herr Obama SS truppen. I bet all those people will have short haircuts.
Good to see Hagel dealing with really important military issues...
RACISM!
The word opens all doors to special favors and goodies. The only problem is that the word “racism” does not open doors for the white population because only whites can be racists.
“fair” is how you get from lesser rights to equal rights,
but due to the human condition,
“equal” is never good enough,
and “fair” got us from one point to another,
so let’s keep using it.
It’s certainly a “magic word”, now, isn’t it?
Priorities:
Russia, retake old territory with military force
China, build large navy, develop missile technology
America, Gay service people and black women hair styles.
And never mind that ROEs in place are getting our troops killed, let’s worry about not offending A-A females in the military....
We are doomed.....
I don’t think they are trying to offend anyone. Most likely this is part of the push to put women in direct combat units in the not to distant future. They always seem to come up with stupid rules prior to a stupid policy.
I agree they are probably not TRYING to offend...but the race patrol team finds it anyway and so, once again, due to having to adhere to the PC Bible, the military is distracted from what they should really be doing...
Letting our troops go after the bad guys......
The black women may have a legitimate gripe though. A lot of the regs are a one size fit all that does not fit all.
I remember when the AF went to a measurement of hips minus neck size to determine body fat. Almost all the black females had to starve themselves to maintain the standards because they tend to have bigger hips/rear ends than the white females. (baby got back and all that)
They had issues with the uniforms because all the uniforms were designed for men at one time. Women complained and they fixed it by designing female specific unis.
The hair standards have always sucked for black women. The short haired look is functional but unattractive out of uniform.
But that’s the point....
How does any of this crap help the military prepare to defend our country?
Totally irrelevant, I say...And I served too.
The fear of being labeled a "racist" means that 12% of the population now DICTATE to the rest of us.
There have been other complaints, the military puts out these stupid regulations from time to time.
When the USAF went to the bike test instead of running all the fit people were failing or getting low scores. The coach potatoes and smokers were getting really good scores. A lot of fit airman were placed in mandatory physical fitness classes. Stupid and there was an outcry then.
They have went back to running. The reason the went to the bike test was they were losing a few of the coach potatoes every year due to heart attacks during the run.
I can name a ton of such incidents but only the ones where race is an issue makes the headlines. The regs were fine. Women have had their hairstyles thru a number of conflicts without any problems.
Some officer is trying to make a name for him or herself and not using common sense.
As a matter of POLICY, I think that MOST (not all) women should be excluded from the armed forces for the most part, with a few exceptions and COMPLETELY from combat and most combat support roles, particularly when the armed forces are a small percentage of the total population, as is the case now.
The use of significant numbers of women should be reserved for large scale mobilization as was the case in WWII. Despite the fact that the US had over 16 million personnel in uniform, and that over 400.000 members of the Armed Forces died in the line of duty, against what was probably the most formidable battlefield enemies that the US has ever fought, who regularly inflicted defeats upon our forces for much of the war NO ONE seriously considered putting women into combat units, even when the need to replace the staggering number of infantry casualties in NW Europe forced the experimentation with racially mixed infantry platoons. The population base is more than twice as large now as then and there would be no problem securing a sufficient number of qualified men with appropriate incentives for such a relatively small armed forces as we have today.
Even the WW II Soviet example must also consider the 8 MILLION Soviet military dead, and even then the women at the front were largely circumscribed to medical personnel, select few aviation units and anti aircraft artillery. Infantry assault units were all but non existent.
The advantages for the armed forces, particularly the Army would be greater flexibility as to how personnel can be deployed in combat emergencies and other contingincies and a lesser logistical strain as involves clothing, barracks and housing, and innumerable other considerations that are exclusive to the maintenence of large numbers of women. I think morale and discipline would also be improved as well.
This apparent imperative to place large percentages of women in the Armed Forces is completely unnecessary and impelled by reasons other than those that deal with combat efficiency.. It will not be long before sex/sexual orientation, and gender commissars are appointed at unit level.
The courts have repeatedly ruled that the armed forces are exempted from many of the equal opportunity requirements of the civillian world, and for the very good and sufficient requirements that are unique to the armed forces. This contretemps is being propelled largely by the cultural marxist wing of gender equity feminism who wish for the placement of a leftist Chairwoman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The resultant detriment of the ability of the armed forces to fight plays no consideration in their calculus, other than as an peripheral side benefit.
I know that women have played a vital role during guerrilla, partisan warfare and sabatoge/espionage activity. But to deliberately employ them in ground combat units or other units whose primary task is to close with, engage and destroy similar enemy units is the height of lunacy and madness given the effort required to identify the relative few who could qualify even if we ignore the potential detriments to morale and discipline.
I agree. Years ago they were restricted to medical and support fields. Now they are basically in almost all career fields.
It would be funny if it was not dangerous to see the new training standards for carrying a stretcher. It calls for four persons. This is because two average sized females cannot carry a average sized male.
Some are more equal than others.
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