Here’s a couple of recent announcements from the Navy involving female achievements:
- The first female has supposedly graduated from the Navy’s special operations boat group (Special Warfare Combatant-craft Crewmen, SWCC).(1)
- Command Master Chief of USS Chung Hoon (DDG 93), Josephine Tauoa, was selected as the recipient of the 2021 Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy Delbert D. Black Leadership Award.(2)
I’d like to believe that these achievements were fairly earned and well deserved. However, given the prevalence of lowered standards, gender-norming, dual standards, and command-dictated achievements (looking at you, Rangers), one can’t help but wonder if either of these achievements are legitimate and that is the insidious problem with all attempts to impose equality of results without equality of standards. You can never be sure if the person actually earned the achievement or was simply given it to meet a quota or public relations requirement.
To these two women, I say, I doubt you. … … … … And that’s the shame of it – that I doubt what might be a real accomplishment but until standards are set high and uniformly applied, doubt will always exist. Women should be demanding uniform, high standards … but they’re not. Which leads to further doubt.
What a shame.
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(1)USNI News website, “First Female Navy Special Operations Sailor Graduates from Training”, Sam LaGrone, 15-Jul-2021,
https://news.usni.org/2021/07/15/first-female-navy-special-operations-sailor-graduates-from-training
(2)https://www.cpf.navy.mil/news.aspx/110975
Agree completely, and I'm married to a retired CDR!!
ReplyDeleteI will apologize ahead of time as I may wander off the topic at hand. Originally, I was not going to comment on this one, but I simply could not resist. First of all, I agree with you. I remember when it came down from up above that females were going to be integrated into the crews of surface combatants (I want to say 1992-1993 timeframe). I have always understood that change is inevitable but it is not immediate. There was no switch that could be flipped that was going to instantaneously change over 200 years of deeply rooted tradition (ways of doing things). When you force change, it going to meet a lot of resistance or blowback. Fat forward to now, standards are designed the way they are for a reason, especially when the potential for risk of injury, damage of equipment, or reduction in combat power or effectiveness is always there.
ReplyDeleteI really would hate to see what they have done to the Shellback/Crossing the Line ceremony.
When I went through Airborne School in the army, there were a couple of PT events each day that were disqualifiers.
ReplyDeleteThey were the morning formation run and the pull-ups.
These were done to ensure that we were physically fit enough to handle the impact of landing (the run) and had enough upper body strength to control the parachute by pulling on the lines to spill air out of the chute.
We would run in formation and if you fell out of the run (couldn't keep up) you were out of the school.
At the end or the run we would be lined up and would need to do nine correct pull-ups at the instructor's cadence.
However, the females would run in their own formation. They would run for the same amount of time as we males, but at a slower pace (thus a shorter distance and less strenuous run).
Instead of pull-ups, they would lie on their backs and reach up and grab a bar and do this thing where they would pull themselves up to the bar but with their heels still on the ground.
Was that equal?
Those physical fitness tests each morning were disqualifiers for some people.
Did the women earn the same parachutist badge as we did?
That was 1989 at Fort Benning, GA.
Lutefisk
I am totally opposed to separate standards for women. If they can meet the standards set for men, great. If they can't, that's great too, because it keeps people who can't hack it from getting into situations where they can get somebody killed.
ReplyDeleteI see no justifiable reason why we should have lower standards for women just so we can get women into this or that program. That's where the military went wrong, being driven by the desire to have women in all programs rather than the desire to win wars.
Has the name of the woman who passed been announced? The reason I ask is because an old fullback of mine has expressed her goal to be the first female SEAL. I have discussed this particular issue with her, and she has repeatedly said that she does not want any lowering of standards for women. She is from a several generations Navy family, and she grew up bull rassling on a ranch in South Texas, so she just might be able to do it.
I've worked with females in sports and seen, coached, and scrimmaged with the best of the best and there's simply no comparison. The best female I've ever encountered would be in the bottom 10% of men. Do you think a bottom 10% man would ever make SEALs? Would you want any woman next to you on log PT? Unless they change standards, no woman has any chance at SEALs. That's just the reality of it.
DeleteMaybe more importantly, what does having a woman aboard do to the Teams mentality??? Warrior types generally have a soft spot for women, and have a protector mentality, so that'll affect how they act in the field. Never mind if some fraternization activity takes place, which is awful common. Now im not saying she (and the guys) couldn't be totally professional and avoid that, but Ive seen way to many that didnt to have real high hopes there....
Delete"Unless they change standards, no woman has any chance at SEALs. That's just the reality of it."
DeleteAnd if that's the case, then we should have no women SEALs. Just as we should have no women in any other position where they cannot compete with men.
The first half of the problem is standards. If those are set high and held firm then the female issue will resolve itself.
DeleteThe second half of the issue, however, is what if some [literal] one-in-a-million woman were to somehow complete one of these high standard trainings like SEAL? Do you then completely revise berthing, field hygiene, head facilities, and all the other gender accommodations just for one person? That's a massive cost to accommodate a single person who can be easily replaced by hundreds of guys. At some point, there's a cost/efficiency issue that overlays the gender equality issue. Again, this isn't corporate America, this is life and death combat. Even the slightest inefficiency is deadly. At some point you just have to say, yeah, you made it but it's not worth having you.
What I'm saying is that there comes an inefficiency and disruption point where achievement is overruled by practicalities. You don't conduct a hundred million dollar refit of a submarine just to accommodate a couple females. That would be absurd. Oh wait, we did that ...
"The first half of the problem is standards. If those are set high and held firm then the female issue will resolve itself."
DeleteAnd that's the way I would prefer to resolve it.
"And that's the way I would prefer to resolve it."
DeleteThere are two problems with that:
1. Practical - we're not doing that. In fact, we're doing the opposite.
2. Theoretical - If simple common sense combined with an entire history tell you with 100% certainty that something can't be done with any significant frequency, isn't it a waste of time, resources, and effort to go through the motions just for the sake of appearances?
And what I am saying is that I don't agree with the way we are doing it.
DeleteOkay, you're for high, uniform standards. Good. Now, does it make sense to you to expend inordinate amounts of resources to accommodate the very rare woman that would meet high, uniform standards? And, before you answer, recognize that there's yet another 'standard' beyond passing training standards and that is combat effectiveness. A person, meaning a woman, can pass all the training standards and still be a liability in combat due to mere presence in a unit due to cultural changes in the men's behavior such as overprotectiveness. That innate impact is yet another strike against women in combat.
DeleteNow, one solution would be to isolate women in their own, dedicated units (the Israelis do/did that, I believe) but if we have high, uniform standards, there would be too few women to form more than an occasional squad so, again, is it worth the effort?
Just as the US has a very had time recognizing the existence of true evil in the world and dealing with it in a brutal fashion, we also have a hard time recognizing the biological, physiological, and emotional differences between men and women and understanding the limits those differences impose.
I think we are in a position where our legal system imposes on us some level of requirement to accommodate women, and changing that is going to be rough row to hoe. So I think we have to make some allowances to comply with the law. But I see no reason to have dual standards.
DeleteI do think we would do well to have a better understanding of how Israel does it, but we don't live with the same existential threat that justifies an "all hands" approach for them.
"I think we are in a position where our legal system imposes on us some level of requirement to accommodate women"
DeleteThat wasn't the question. I'm well aware of current laws. I asked whether you think the accommodation makes sense.
If you are a girl who can compete with the guys, then you go girl. If you are a guy who can't, sucks to be you.
ReplyDeleteIve commented on this topic before, and hopefully things have improved since my time at sea. In retrospect, Id classified women aboard ship into three categories, and only one was flattering. Ill leave it at that, with the addition that the push for equity, rather than equality is a bad fit for the military, whether regarding gender, race, or any other subgroup. The military is the LAST place we want to see anyone but the best and brightest, and most qualified, in any position. CNO, your comments were harsh. But from personal experience, unless things have changed greatly, and I have my doubts, those comments were probably right on target.
ReplyDelete"CNO, your comments were harsh"
DeleteThe truth is often harsh. Combat is more harsh.
Agreed!!! Didnt mean that derogatorilly towards you, but was alluding towards exactly that...
DeleteI understood!
DeleteThe Navy has shown no ability to pick officers who are interested in serving in a fighting Navy, why should said
ReplyDeletepeople be any better at picking light infantry ?
CPO qualifications I've no idea on those, bullshit detection
and voice that carries a good distance ?
I have a somewhat related question. Forgive me if this hijacks the thread too far away from the original post.
ReplyDeleteWhat has really happened to the MCPO of the command? I thought the original idea was something like the submarine COB, who as some operational duties. I liked that idea, because I thought COB served a very useful purpose on subs.
But MCPOC seems to have become more an administrative overhead position, and seems to be the conduit for driving a lot of the touchy, feely stuff down into the ranks. And what's worse, it seems that the Navy is driving COB more toward an MCPOC type job than driving MCPOC more toward the COB concept. And if we followed the COB model, why would any shore command need a MCPOC?
"MCPOC"
Delete?? Are you referring to MCPON, Command Master Chief Petty Officer (CMCPO/CMDCM), or something else?
Command Master Chief.
Delete