Gender Integration in the Infantry, and how Robots fight Misogyny

a_skeleton_03

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The other part that makes me less annoyed that they're thinking about reducing a unit's efficacy with women is that I think our military is put in harm's way too frequently and the US public will be more affected by body bags coming home with young women in it than young men.

Maybe it's naive, but if Fox News shows a hot blonde woman that was KIA it might have a different effect than showing a typical male GI.

Then again, some 144 women have been KIA in the last couple decades and while I don't really follow this type of news I don't hear much about it:
GRIM TOLL OF MILITARY WOMEN KILLED IN WAR - News & Commentary - Center for Military Readiness
Nope didn't slow people a minute.

Jessica Lynch - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Yes they were concerned but didn't slow down that "Fox news" crowd you are talking about.
 

khorum

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Neither would reinstating the draft. Which is the project du jour or the antiwar SJW crowd.

That entire line of thinking is a symptom of the left's self-segregation from the military. It's exactly how Nate Flick predicted it would work out in his testimony to the house armed services committee: When the concern-troll university SJWs push out ROTC and military offices to make their campuses safe spaces for future generations of dickless millenial pussiesall they're actually guaranteeing is that the military will have fewer officers who share their views.
 

Big Phoenix

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The other part that makes me less annoyed that they're thinking about reducing a unit's efficacy with women is that I think our military is put in harm's way too frequently and the US public will be more affected by body bags coming home with young women in it than young men.

Maybe it's naive, but if Fox News shows a hot blonde woman that was KIA it might have a different effect than showing a typical male GI.

Then again, some 144 women have been KIA in the last couple decades and while I don't really follow this type of news I don't hear much about it:
GRIM TOLL OF MILITARY WOMEN KILLED IN WAR - News & Commentary - Center for Military Readiness
144? Thats it?
 

Mist

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Women always been able to join in these occupations Mist. The discussion is about combat arms, mainly infantry. It's not exactly an occupation where you can get a free pass because of a particular degree or skill-set.
No, I mean, backdooring them into combat roles if they have valuable skills that would warrant their leeway to retake the qualifications.
 

Big Phoenix

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Being able to carry 100 pounds and remain combat effective is the valuable skill when it comes to combat.
 

Tuco

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So you want to eliminate sexist tropes in the military so you can exploit sexist tropes to get civilians to turn against the military?
Yes, but not against the military, against the politicians trying to beat the drums of war to send our troops into a war.
 

Palum

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You are probably right, but if thqt 144 figure was closer to 1440 i wonder if it would impact the public's perception of the cost of war.
I don't think the deaths would change any perception. However, imagine all the PoW rape videos and burning alive infidel PoW babies and shit like that ISIS or similar forces would do.
 

a_skeleton_03

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What did you expect? We are 'only' talking some 10k casualities in those three wars, 1.4% of them being women sounds about right.
You are probably right, but if thqt 144 figure was closer to 1440 i wonder if it would impact the public's perception of the cost of war.
Your first post there shows you realize the percentage of men vs women in the military.

Then your second post assumes that once women are in combat roles they are going to increase significantly? Yeah that doesn't make a bit of sense.
 

Big Phoenix

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What did you expect? We are 'only' talking some 10k casualities in those three wars, 1.4% of them being women sounds about right.
Women make up like 15% of the armed forces, but only 1.4% of the deaths in two conflicts?

God damn patriarchy.
 

Mist

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Yes, but not against the military, against the politicians trying to beat the drums of war to send our troops into a war.
Tuco's got the right of this. With how little we've accomplished militarily in the past few decades, and at how high of a cost, we really need to be rethinking the role of our military overall.

The US military is the largest, best equipped humanitarian force in the world, and we should be focusing on that. Number of troops in combat roles should be cut drastically, leaving combat for those absolutely best trained for the task. And if that means not having women in those roles, that's fine.
 

khorum

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Yes, but not against the military, against the politicians trying to beat the drums of war to send our troops into a war.
That's an extension of the recent "reinstate the draft" movement that assumes that distributing the risk to more families would diminish public support for military action...and it's not surprising that MotherJones activists who have zero exposure to military culture were the ones who originally thought that bringing back the draft would scare the toxic patriarchy away from their toys.

Historically, growing casualties and conscription hasalwaysraised war-bonds sales and expanded support for further escalation. It's true generally but it'sparticularlytrue in the US, be it the Civil War or WW2. It was even more pronounced during the last war we had a draft. By the time Nixon had found a way to flip the Chinese to our side to negotiate an end to Vietnam, not only was he carpet-bombing Hanoi, we were at the verge of expanding the war to Laos and Cambodia---and the public even supported THAT.

The most common cases where war fatigue actually coincided with political abdication is when it's paired with ECONOMIC collapse, like in WW1 Germany and Russia. So if you want to end American adventurism, just crash the economy.
 

Lejina

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No, I mean, backdooring them into combat roles if they have valuable skills that would warrant their leeway to retake the qualifications.
There's plenty of people who fail infantry courses who get a second or even a third shot at taking the course. Large majority are people who get injured get another shot after they healed or if someone dropped out because their mother died or somesuch. Other times it's a he, she, zhe learned their lesson and will be a better candidate on the second try, we hope. But people don't get pushed thru infantry training because of other skill sets, being a brain surgeon who can code C++ and pilot dual engine airplanes doesn't do anything for you when it comes to kicking doors, clearing buildings and fight as part of a platoon.


Retaking a course a second time isn't backdooring something. Backdooring would be allowing a MD to pass basic training in spite of them being a raging retard in the field. That kind of people will be pushed thru the training system no matter what. You don't see that in the infantry because there's no outside skill-set that warrants it.

Actually, if we want to be nit-picky, I've seen it done once: we had a police captain taking an infantry sniper course to bring knowledge to his police unit and use it to built a local training plan. Dude will never see combat or hold a sniper rifle outside of the course. He took the course to learn about the training environment and needed the qualification mostly to look credible for political reasons. That's an extreme example that doesn't apply to someone who actually intents to be infantryman.
 

Erronius

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That's an extension of the recent "reinstate the draft" movement that assumes that distributing the risk to more families would diminish public support for military action...and it's not surprising that MotherJones activists who have zero exposure to military culture were the ones who originally thought that bringing back the draft would scare the toxic patriarchy away from their toys.

Historically, growing casualties and conscription hasalwaysraised war-bonds sales and expanded support for further escalation. It's true generally but it'sparticularlytrue in the US, be it the Civil War or WW2. It was even more pronounced during the last war we had a draft. By the time Nixon had found a way to flip the Chinese to our side to negotiate an end to Vietnam, not only was he carpet-bombing Hanoi, we were at the verge of expanding the war to Laos and Cambodia---and the public even supported THAT.

The most common cases where war fatigue actually coincided with political abdication is when it's paired with ECONOMIC collapse, like in WW1 Germany and Russia. So if you want to end American adventurism, just crash the economy.
I feel like he was talking more about it making it less palatable to go to war in the first place, whereas you seem to be talking about war fatigue in wars that have already been going for a bit. Possibly apples and oranges.
 

Tuco

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Your first post there shows you realize the percentage of men vs women in the military.

Then your second post assumes that once women are in combat roles they are going to increase significantly? Yeah that doesn't make a bit of sense.
Here's the argument I have:

1. Women aren't frequently in the front line of combat ops.
2. Women who are already aminority in active duty enlisted (14%)represent a tiny minority (1%) of war casualties primarily because of #1.
3. If women were more frequently in the front line of combat ops, they would represent a larger minority of war casualties.
4. If a greater percent of casualties were women, war fatigue among the general population would be higher.
5. If war fatigue is higher, we will be less likely to invade the next country that doesn't pose a real threat to the US.


Probably the least defensible point is #4, which khorum made a strong case against. However I think it is still true. It would be convenient for me to simply disregard khorum's point that an increase in casualties have come with an increase in public support for escalation, but I think it's a clear causal relationship in many situations. Ex: Pearl harbor saw a massive spike in US casualties that was the casus belli for our intervention in WWII. However in other situations, those where the public see us as the aggressors or don't see a clear defense of US and our interests there isn't that causal relationship.

Does that mean we should start sending less effective female fighters into the worst combat situations? No. My stance on women in combat is clear: They shouldn't be given preferential treatment and shouldn't be integrated into units if they reduce that unit's efficacy, especially not for gender equality bullshit reasons. There are clear differences in a man's and woman's physicality that make forced equality in combat situations dangerous and ludicrous.There is a reason why mixed-gender professional sports are very rare. However, if it is done for whatever reason it may present an upside I didn't see mentioned in this thread yet.
 

Tuco

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I feel like he was talking more about it making it less palatable to go to war in the first place, whereas you seem to be talking about war fatigue in wars that have already been going for a bit. Possibly apples and oranges.
I'm talking about both, but since we're not really in an active war I'm more worried about the former. It's possible in the next few years (or really in the next year as the presidential debate heats up and the GOP could try to sell a war to get the white house) we see the war drums being beaten and I'd love to avoid another war.
 

Tuco

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Oh and since this thread is about robots, my argument for women in active combat is in stark contrast to an argument for more drones in the US military that I actually care about. The proliferation of less expensive and effective autonomy within the US military dramatically increases our force projection and reduces the political, financial and life cost of missions. Drones are modern society's response to insurgency warfare and I don't see that changing.
 

Lejina

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There's only a small percent of women dying oversea because they are virtually all part of the rear echelons, far from the combat zones. Opening combat occupations will increase the number of women seeing actual combat, yes. It's not going to increase it by much tho. Only a very small number of women will actually be interested to get in the rough, less will actually get qualified for it and a tiny number will see action.

You will be looking at not more than a handful getting shot in combat. Nobody flinches for the medics and clerks who get blown up driving to the base or got hit by mortar on the way to get their lunch; it's going to be a tiny number of combat casualty of top of that. You will get a media circus for the first few Gi Janes who get killed, but that's it really.

With that said, shit will hit the fan if ISIS get a hold of one and make a snuff video out of it.
 

Gravel

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First time chiming in for this thread: I'm surprised that people are questioning whether Ranger school would have different standards for women. Even over at SOCNET it doesn't seem like anyone's brought it up, but we send all kinds of foreign troops through Ranger school and basically do whatever we can to make them pass. It happens ALL the time.

I'm be shocked if theydidn'talter the course for these two. There's significantly more political pressure to pass two American soldiers than some foreign asshole.