Unsurprisingly, our old friend “The Thinking Housewife” is aghast at the notion of women serving in combat. What is a little surprising is why. In one of her many recent posts on the subject she offers this unique take on the subject:
There are so many unexamined consequences of the full integration of women into the military that one barely knows where to start, but one of the obvious places is with the fact that the Armed Forces will be increasingly in the business of population control.
Yes, that’s right: women in combat means women using birth control. The horror!
You see, women who are nine momths pregnant can’t exactly serve on the front lines. So that means the military is going to have to get in the business of helping its women soldiers avoid becoming pregnant.
In addition to providing rations and equipment, troops in combat will need ample supplies of contraceptives — and under this mentality, it will be the military’s responsibility to prevent pregnancy. Given that pregnancies can be, even in the best of circumstances, “unintended,” a woman who becomes pregnant on tour after her unit runs out of birth control pills or condoms will now have cause to blame the military for her offspring’s existence. We will almost certainly see women suing the Army for damages after “unintended” pregnancy. And as a consequence, the military will need to become more and more involved in the effective sterilization of their female troops.
Um, what? Sterilization? When women stop using birth control, they can become pregnant. Heck, they can become pregnant while still using birth control. Calling female birth control “sterilization” is a bit like calling a condom a vasectomy.
She ends her piece with this doozy:
As I said before, women don’t join the military as equals of men in order to defend their country. They join it to destroy their country. An egalitarian military must embrace socially destructive ideals. What can be more emblematic of our times than a military unit equipped with guns to destroy the enemy and contraceptives to destroy future soldiers? We have lost both the will to fight and the will to live.
Time to pull out the Don Draper “what?” gif again.
Actually, I don’t think that will be adequate to convey the sheer WTFery of that conclusion. I’m pulling out the big guns this time.
On unrealistic expectations of women soldiers…
I was playing Dwarf Fortress this weekend, and bemoaning the fact that most of my useful military dwarves kept getting knocked up. Due to the wonky programming of the game, dwarf women are not affected by the pregnancy at all, but will carry their baby everywhere for the first couple years.
Even into combat.
This insane scenario is more likely to happen than America failing due to more women soldiers on contraception.
Catholics (like evangelicals) are a mixed lot. The Church’s position on the subject is confused (and confounded by the second order effects of Ex cathedra [which the Jesuits, in their role as theologians to the Pope said would {among other ill-effects} happen]).
The official position of the Church is that rhythm is the only sanctioned method of BC, outside medical necessity. This is not, however, an infallible teaching. Recent Encyclicals have weakened even that (by saying sex is more than just procreative, and is a good and wonderful thing, in it’s own right: inside of marriage).
On Abortion it’s more strident, but still not infallible. The public morality of the US Curia variable on the issue. When Kerry was running a stink was made about his votes on abortion. His bishop said that if Kerry brought himself to the rail he was going to administer the Eucharist, because Kerry was the only one who could know what he believed. Kerry had made the “render unto Caesar” argument: i.e. he voted in accord with the law, and left it to others to decide for themselves.
Scalia’s views on the death penalty (which is at least as strongly opposed by the Church) are different. He has made personal (not judicial) statements saying how much he approves of it. That means he ought to be counseled by his priest/bishop. He hasn’t been. (no, I’m not angry about this at all. Not in the least. Grrrrrr).
The majority of US Catholics use “artificial” birth control. A strong plurality of priests seems to not care. Abortion is trickier, but even that is far from monolithic (and that’s in the US. In Europe it’s even moreso).
The US public religious culture is, across the board, toxic. To be involved in public religion is to be hauled into any number of polarising debates (Israel, Abortion, Conformity), which are anathema to a pluralistic and tolerant society.
shigekuni: I get the first half, it’s a standard right wing way to frame discussions of the armed forces etc. But how do we get from there to instantly losing the will to live too?
All those women who are getting killed, are (even when they don’t get killed) being sterilised, ergo White Christians will be wiped out.
Never mind that not more than a fraction of 1 percent of the nation is in the military at one time. Never mind that not all of them are white. Never mind that not all of them are women. Never mind that not all of them are Christian. Never mind that some get pregnant while in the military.
Never mind all that.
Because the real problem is that women are going to be able (yet again) to show themselves just as capable as men, and it will undermine her* campaign to keep women subjected to male authority (Cassie, that is a function of patriarchy, and it’s oppression; even though she says it’s because she cares about the women not getting hurt. In fact because she says it’s not about them getting hurt. She wants to deny them agency. That’s oppressive)
*and all the rest of the misogynist morons, Meller I mean you.
lowquacks: I do have a very fancy fife I inherited and barely learnt to play, which I guess I could just flip upside-down and learn, but it’s got some similarity in fingering to the bagpipe and my primary school recorder days so it’d be trickier.
Your fife should have no problem reversed. The fingering is a lot more straightforward than recorder or bagpipes. There isn’t any cross-fingering in the home key until the second octave. I really need to get back to work on the pipes.
The worst (from a shooter’s POV) cross-dominant situation is to have the hand/eye be different. This is the real reason people have a hard time switching hands (it’s worse with rifles). I’m moderately ambidexterous in lots of things, but I have almost no ability to tell my left eye to dominant when aiming.
If I want to do that I have to close my right (I shoot with both eyes open), which has it’s own disruptions to the process.
One of my kids is ginger, the other is left-handed. Both of which are fine by me.
I’m not ginger, though a grandmother was, so I’m clearly a carrier.
Hm. I had a sip of coffee and I’ve been staring at this entry for a bit. Few things pop up:
Most bits of “color” are poly genetic. I forget the exact term, sadly, but they’re also poly genetic and mixable, as “Flaming Red” is really more like a final phenotype result of… X amount of varying genes that then finally end up with red, because they all add a bit
That’s why people all look so very different (No shit, Fibi)
Incidentally, that’s also why different things are attractive and why fashion exists – there’s a huge range of expression, and anyone who goes “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” have clearly never really thought about it, what with the sheer number of possible shades of “blond” to begin with. Also, what about the gentlemen that prefer swarthy, swedish sailors? With red hair?
Hogwash.
Secondly, I’v always wondered about ideal that “Women Can’t Do Combat”, and perhaps pecunium [You seem to/definitively do know more about armed services] can get at where that comes from? I mean – no, I get the “Ha ha, they are inferior”, but it just seems to me that if women -are- inferior, weak and stupid why not send them to the front lines so they can die to protect the clearly “Superior” others. Since that doesn’t happen, since no one says it and since the idea is abhorrent, then what? Does it just boil down to that icky, underlying trend you can read in Thinking Housewife’s writing (“Babies babies babies!”)? Because that’s misogyny, yes. And if it’s the other way around, women are too preciouuuusss to risk and swarthy, manly swedish sailors must don the llamar armor and stride forth, then Housewifey (and Spearhead) are indirectly saying that dying is apparently preferable to any sort of female thing…. how nice.
I’ll tell you why I know soldiers, who happen to be female, kick ass. I signed up for the intelligence services once. The thing I applied for was one of the hardest branches possible. Not the most complex education in the country (space neurosurgeon wins that every time) but certainly one of, if not the, hardest in terms of sheer material, level and expected final degree of competence. Not to mention it being a 2½ year thing, so everything you’d normally do over 6 years had been boiled down. Needless to say, I did not get in. Who did, though? Well first of all, out of the approximately 100 candidates, 72 were female (So the female instructor told us). Secondly, out of the <100 new aspirants, the ones that got accepted were also female in the majority that year.
Not because of Magic Vagina Powers, but because they demonstrated (in the three day psych interview) the skillset and mental fortitude required for the job. Anecdotes the lot of it, though, so this won't convince anyone who doesn't already know.
"Hilariously" ,on the trainride home again, I ended up next to two people having a discussion about how weak women were compared to men. The Universe is funny sometimes.
So my final conclusion: You only think "females" are useless as soldiers and will require "extra care" because of "Any stupid, shortsighted reason" until you actually think for a second about the fact that men and women have been killing each other for literally our entire existence as a species – oh, and when your argument then is "This isn't real equality until they have 20 % of the deaths, too!" you… should probably just stop. If it's "What can be more emblematic of our times than a military unit equipped with guns to destroy the enemy and contraceptives to destroy future soldiers?" you aren't even wrong. You're in another universe, floating freely, associating with nothing of the same basic understanding, sense and coherency of statements that we, in this neighboring province of reality, can understand or relate too. Your fractal wrongness has pulled in on itself at some twisted corner of its core, and if we were all so inclined, we could use the sheer Wrong in your sentence to tap into Things That Should Not Be and finally, speak in technocolour and listen to the whalesong of the Far Stars.
Hogwash, is what I'm getting at.
And, as an amusement, before I head to work… today would have been the day I could retire from the Army. It was about this time of day, 20 years ago, I raised my hand at the LA MEPS and took the oath.
Hard to believe it’s been that long.
So was Clinton!
I was still trying to figure out how to talk to girls and wondering why it seemed so hard, 20 years ago. Eighth grade.
Where does the time go?
Fibinachi: I am now wondering about the topological properties of MRA thought processes. 😛
Ginger is a mutation. It’s totally possible to have medium brown skin and ginger hair and maybe blue eyes.
@leftwingfox
I tried playing some of the Virtual Villagers games recently, but I got so annoyed with how useless they made women after giving birth. They don’t do anything other than take care of the baby for the first year. It’s especially trying in the second game, where there are only two adults looking after a bunch of kids (only one of them who can actually do any work). The tutorial tells me to get one of the workers pregnant, and I’m all, “You expect me to do without my only scavenger/builder/scientist for an entire year just to make another mouth to feed when we can’t even keep enough food coming in as is? Hells to the no.”
@Starla: if you ever want to find that article again, I’m almost entirely certain it’s Libby Anne’s post from Love, Joy, Feminism called something along the lines of “How I Lost Faith in the Pro-Life Movement”. I`d link to it but cheap crappy phone is both cheap and crappy.
Well we know that our family has the ginger gene ‘cos both my younger nephew and I are redheads. Tempted to see which particular mutation, though…
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-20237511
And just to confuse things, Mum’s a leftie, Dad’s a rightie. My brother writes with his left hand but sews and uses scissors with his right. I write with my right but sew and use scissors with my left.
@Amnesia
I started playing that exact game the other week. We all died within half a hour.
Amnesia: Haven’t tried those yet, actually.
Dwarven biology is the opposite. The birth is marked by cancelling whatever job they were doing just long enough to pick of the child, then they go right about their business. I just wish they had a place to put the kid before entering combat, instead of using the little bundle of joy as an ablative meat shield.
Last thing you want in that game is one of your legendary, heavily armed soldiers go mad with grief over the death of their child and turn those skills against their fellow dwarves. Hell, I lost half a fortress once to an angry unarmed potter.
It’s funny that you can’t set up a nursery or designated area to put kids in DF. Lord knows you can set up a designated spot for everything else.
I think it’s a poor mechanic that dwarves bonding and forming relationships is essentially a bad thing. It needs to have benefits to outweigh the consequences of a beloved dwarf dying.
Flooding the fort with mostly-useless children isn’t enough of a benefit for you, katz? Tsk, tsk.
Married dwarves at least get children, but dwarves who are friends get fuck-all.
Thanks Starla. 🙂
The last time I played Dwarf Fortress, I got a map that had all kinds of gold veins on it, but no iron.
All right, you think, just make golden trade goods and buy all the iron you need, and bob’s your uncle.
Turns out the game’s difficulty ramps up according to the value of everything you’ve produced so far….
So, in addition to the hand-holding and the actual lack of control over the dwarfs, I stopped playing DF. Probably I will go back to it at some point, when time has fogged memory and I start to think, hey, it wasn’t all that bad.
Ayup. Heck I only started playing it again myself because of the one hour time limit on the open beta for a… similarly themed game I was otherwise involved in this weekend. (Stupid NDA)
Oh, and absolutely amen on the relative disadvantage of relationships in DF. Sometimes I think the real joy of the game is as an Unintended Consequence Generator for the developer. “Ok, let’s make the bodies react to heat, let’s make this the temperature scale, whoops, left out a 0… now dwarf fat melts in the rain.”
Hi again, peeps. TTH does my head in so I just dove straight into the comments here. 😛 Left handedness! Interesting! Must be very irritating – the thing that stuck out to me was a woman ordering a product for us explaining in frustration how much ring binders suck for left handed people. Oh man, I had never thought of that!
I am strongly left-eye dominant. When I first shot a rifle right handed I suuuucked. I was not happy. 😛 When I learnt archery and they got me to shoot left handed I was pretty good. This followed on to rifles later. Phew! Along with that I learnt to fight (muay thai) left handed, basically as an experiment on my coach’s part, and it’s awesome I must say though my left kicks will never be my strength. I also used to play left forward in football (so shoot goals from the left), and didn’t have strong opinions either way on snowboarding left vs right footed. So I do some things naturally lefty yet I am definitely right handed.
I don’t think playing keyboards is related to being ambidextrous, it’s just part of the challenge. I have played piano since I was 5, but it hasn’t made me any better at fine motor skills on the left hand side for anything *but* piano. 😀
My partner is fairly strongly right handed, yet when he was little he distinctly remembered writing with his left and right hands, and being made to choose. He was indifferent, so they got him to write right handed.