Author: Hoplite0352 (Page 19 of 27)

I’ve always said you can replace “cowboy” with “jarhead” in any country song.

With all due respect for the general, who is twice the warfighter I’ll ever be:

In the 2010 Marine Corps Almanac, 6.7% of my Corps was female.  Just under 20% of the Corps was infantry.

Now, let us assume that women joined the infantry at the rate men do. (even though they wouldn’t).  This would mean that the Marine Corps would consist of 1.37% female infantry.

The average infantry battalion consists of very roughly 1000 Marines.  This means that a full battalion of infantry Marines will have 13.4 females.  One Squad.

Now, let us assume that women are not as good at being infantry as men.  This is probably true.  The end result is that women will not sign up for the infantry at the rate men will.  I’ve made this same argument for ending DADT.  But much like with the last conservative argument about the invisible hand I advanced last post with the race example, why too are conservatives abandoning the concept of small government and bottom up initiative in this case?  I believe that your average company commander is better able to gauge the abilities of his Marines (to include the females) than you, I, or Congress.  If a male infantry Marine is a nonhacker, there is still a place for him in the grunts.  He is put in the company office, or he becomes a police sergeant who manages the supplies.  Perhaps that Marine will be put into the armory.  Oftentimes, the people put in that role are either injured, being punished, or are about to leave, but those Marines are rarely given the combat duties of your average infantrymen.

Worst case scenario, a female infantry Marine who cannot handle her job can be FAP’ed out.  (Sorry, I couldn’t help myself.)

Another argument advanced in the video is that it destroys the concept of male bonding.  I don’t buy this argument.  The kind of bonding I have with fellow Marines is the kind that is very rarely able to be replicated by other men.  That bonding can absolutely be replicated when it is a woman shouldering a pack alongside you.  The love and respect I would have for a woman I shared a fighting hole with would easily outweigh the bonding I could have with another man.

This leaves us with the sexual aspect of things.  This will be a problem.  But it’s no reason to deny women equal rights. Now, on the upside of things, the type of woman that IS capable of doing a job men are better at is not going to be a 130lb beauty queen.  On the downside of things, well, Marines don’t always have the highest standards in women.  Additionally, even I would be inclined for fall for a woman I went to combat with.  But, like most Marines, I don’t exactly have a track record for picking my women well.

In the event we are fighting for the existence of the nation, all rules of fairness and PC will go away immediately.  But until that day comes, we must practice those principles we espouse.  We’re Americans.  We’re the good guys.  Let’s act like it.

The Corps is allowing women into infantry school.  Story here:

Now, first off, for all the whiners out there, they aren’t yet making them 03XX’s.  Women are simply going to infantry school.  They are not yet becoming infantry.  The opinion is pretty well against it, but the only constant is change, and the Corps has consistently been the branch most willing to embrace change.  Frankly, I think forcing Marines to go sleeves down is a bigger issue than this.

I think this is a really good thing, and will keep the Corps on the cutting edge of warfighting excellence.  Taking the issue of women in the infantry aside for the moment, this is still a good thing.  Women are occasionally finding themselves in combat.  Were my daughter, or my sister (as I consider a fellow Marine) to end up having to assault through a near ambush after losing her 7 ton in a convoy, or repel an attack at an Entry Control Checkpoint, I’d rather she were trained to the standards of an infantryman, rather than the sad 2-week basic course your average pogue (Personnel Other than Grunt) gets.

Secondly, perhaps this will strengthen the resolve of the men in infantry school.  Who is going to want to fall out of a hump or get choked out in front of a woman?

As to letting women into the infantry, it’s going to happen.  Would you rather it happen overnight where every girl who just saw the newest Katy Perry video wants to join the grunts, or with a break-in period preparing them for or giving them an idea of the rigors of infantry life to dissuade the weak of spirit?

Now, as a grunt (albeit principally mechanized) I’ll just out and say it:  women should be allowed in the infantry.

As expected, the usual naysayers have come out.  And they’re the same ones that said we should keep blacks out.  They’re the same ones who not a year ago said letting the gays be in openly would destroy the Corps.  Where’d that get us?  Letting gays in made us even LESS fashionable as we went sleeves down.

I fail to understand how the conservative argument that the invisible hand would end discrimination doesn’t apply to women in combat.  The argument goes thusly:  Let us assume just for argument that the average white man is 90% superior to the average black man in any given area.  If an employer hired all whites, he would lose out on the 10% of black people that are better than the average white person.  Therefore, his business would fail in a competitive marketplace that hired the best workers independent of discrimination.

I’ll be the first person to say that the average man makes a better grunt than the average woman.  But there are women that CAN do the job, and do it damn well.  The Corps is poorer for filling a boat space with a weak man while leaving a strong woman behind a desk down at admin.

I can hear you already, “But Jefferson, what about how they water down the standards for women?”  Well, don’t!  Look, two wrongs don’t make a right.  Women overwhelmingly vote in a manner contrary to the principles of liberty, small government, and the rights of man.  Would you then propose we take away women’s suffrage?  A woman has the right to vote; that she uses that right irresponsibly is of no relevance.

The same point stands for the idea that men would rush into danger recklessly out of some sense of chivalry to protect a woman.  You do not deny women equal rights because men cannot handle it responsibly.  Besides, men will throw themselves into the grinder one after the other to protect their fellow male Marine.

People fear/reject that which they don’t understand.  Just as with any minority group, once a woman takes that M240 off of your back on a 20 mile hump, your respect for her will increase several times faster than seeing her sitting behind the admin desk screwing up your paperwork while everyone assumes she picked up NCO because she was, “blowing the 1stSgt.”

To be perfectly honest, I think that’s what most of these people fear:  the shame of being shown up by a woman.  Nonhackers will still be able to strut around thinking they’re badasses if a man relieves their burden, but their own weakness will be undeniable to their insecure selves once a woman proves herself a superior warfighter.

That isn’t to say that I don’t have my own fears.  As with ending DADT, which I supported, I’m concerned with an erosion of my Corps’s culture.  The first female to complain because she overhead a Marine call another a pussy, or that he’s acting like a girl, needs a quick trip to the company office for a talking to.  But, as with most things, people simply fear change and the impact of women into the infantry will be a non-issue a year after it’s implemented.

By the way, here’s that video:

I’m a sentimental man.  Always have been.  But one of the things you develop in the Corps is the loss of feeling for the special significance of days.  When you’re spending half your life in the field, days just sort of fade into one another.

I recall one time in particular at the Jungle Warfare Training Center in Okinawa. (see a few posts back for the video)  One of my buddies snorted and said, “Look at this milk they give us!  It’s been expired for 2 weeks!”  I flipped mine over and saw that it was indeed expired for 2 weeks.  I also noticed that same 2 weeks ago had been my 22nd birthday.

I do like to commemorate minor days, But 3 days have always had special significance to me:

April 19th

July 4th

November 10th

Of the 3, today is the single most important day of the year.  Today is the anniversary of the “Shot Heard ‘Round the World”.  It’s Lexington and Concord Day, known as Patriot Day (though that term is mostly out of vogue when we discovered that getting blown up by Hajji makes you a patriot somehow on the recently christened “Patriots” day, Semptember 11th.  I guess there was only 1 patriot at Lexington Green as opposed to the thousands of patriots in the Twin Towers)

Now, being the sentimental fool I am, I added to the value of the day.  Seeing her being a patriot, powerful woman, and kindred spirit, I proposed to my ex wife on a small bridge (think Concord bridge) on April 19th.  The day I proposed and the risk and fear involved in it made the day much more valuable than my wedding day to me.  Interestingly, my favorite Professor and personal hero, Dr. William Ramsey, did the same.  My daughter was also conceived on this day.

So today means a lot to me.  It’s a day of bold decisions and great men doing their duty.  I had intended in fact to make a large effort to recover my ex-wife’s heart today.  I’ve had a few ideas pouring in my head for a few months and decided last night I was going to go for it.  Then I was struck square in the heart harder than with a musket ball.  As a wedding gift, a friend had purchased us some Tannerite.  I still remember the joy of coming home and finding an unexpected box labeled ORM-D on my doorstep.  For the last several years, regardless of the what day of the week it was, I would make British soldier mockups and load them with the Tannerite.  It started as boxes with red felt and paper tricorns and progressed to paper mache’.  We’d celebrate this holy day by blowing those redcoats straight to hell.  Me with my M1A, her with her AR-15.

Well, a few months following the divorce she called me up and asked if I had that Tannerite.  Apparently she felt our wedding present, which we saved for this sacred day was better spent shot up with her new boyfriend.  I’ve pursued her in excess of 4 months.  I’m done.  I’m done chasing; in the event she ever wants to reconcile, she can come to me.  And if that day is to come, it’ll come with a very long talk.  This April 19th?  I’m taking it back. (NSFW)

……

……

……

…….

It ISN’T COOL!  As the top commenter on YouTube so eloquently said, “Congratulations America, you’ve officially given up!”

This is hardly my best work, but it’ll make do for a blog post:

Harrison Bergeron, Title VII and the ADA (or Science Fiction and the Law)

Scores from the Multistate Professional Responsibility Examination (MPRE) are in.  The Learned Sergeant has dominated.  Bamcis!

Now, I’m delighted that I’ve scored as highly as I have, but I’m doubly happy because I had intended this post for a while and didn’t want to sound like the whiny kid who failed and instead lashed out. That was an exceptionally hard test and as the days counted by I was more certain than ever I would find myself taking the exam again.  I wasn’t even marginally close to failure.  2 weeks of study, watching videos on my telephone (I had n0 internet), with my little little girl on my back, arms around my throat screaming, “Your backpack wants you to jump!  Your backpack wants you to get down!”

The MPRE is one of the requirements pressed upon law students prior to their acceptance to the state Bar in addition to graduation by an ABA accredited school, passing the actual Bar exam and passing muster of the Bar association itself.  Now, the MPRE is hardly the inconvenience to practice that the actual Bar exam is, but it is still an odious and unjust flexing of muscle by the Bar Association.  It is them tugging on your leash, lest you get the foolish idea that you’re a free man, able to make a living through consensual  contract between yourself and your client.

Beyond the fact that the Bar Association has no right to exist, the idea that a group of people can come together and dictate ethics of those they will allow or disallow to work in their sector is nothing short of bullying.  This is not to say that there should be no rules, only that those rules should be laws, just like those any person must follow.  For example, a lawyer surely should not be allowed to tamper with jurors. Then there are those rules that can qualify as either empty or immoral.  For example, a lawyer must not overcharge their clients.  Now, in my mind you cannot overcharge a client.  Whether you charge him $10/hr or $1,000/hr, it is not overcharging someone if he freely and with knowledge accepts your offer.

Part of the problem comes from the the concept that those rules you are tested on are of two separate categories:  MUST rules and SHOULD rules.  MUST rules, whether I agree with the rule, or the right to impose the rule, at least make sense.  SHOULD rules have no place in a test.  To do so is very nearly to legislate morality.  At the least, you are being asked to give your time and effort to memorize and thus internalize the moral edicts of those who immorally limit access to the law in a protection racket.

But this problem will not correct itself.  So long as law schools continue to indoctrinate students into the belief that they are some form of “elite” they will continue to believe they should have the power not just over law, but over morality as well.

A video you ask?  Of course!  Check out this video from the Jungle Warfare Training Center in Okinawa, Japan.  This was from the cycle just before we showed up the first time.