Who says the military isn't sexist in some ways??
I do. You would not believe (and apparently don't) the lengths they've gone to to ensure equal treatment between male and female troops. We're trained ever year on it. Just to make sure nobody "forgets."
...And if society is bothered by violence to women, who sets the magic numbers as to what is the acceptable amount of women who can fall victim to violence?
That is a good question.
You most certainly are taught your "instincts" involving women...
No. You are not. You can be taught to be prejudiced against them, you can be taught discrimination or stereotypes. But you're not taught natural instincts. They're natural. By definition. But be in as much denial about science as you want. Let's all pretend that if no one was around to teach men and women about men and women we'd all go extinct because we'd just never figure it out.
...But they all fall into the TINY-TEENIE category of super-elite fighting forces. And you can't come up with even a SINGLE example outside of that tiny-teenie category.
I already said this. So you are again restating something I already said as if you are saying it for the first time and defeating my argument with it.
again, if you ban women from doing something, simply because they are women, that cuts to the very core of sexism.
It doesn't though. Look it up. Those three things I mentioned are the criteria for sexism and these examples no matter how small do not meet that criteria.
...We ban young people from certain things because we feel they are not capable of them, without being a risk to themselves and others...
Now replace "young people" with "women" and switch the last "and" to "and/or" and there you go.
..they are not permanently banned from them. They are allowed to do them, soon enough...
I said this too. Although more like "eventually" rather than "soon."
You mean like cops rely on instinct and training to keep from getting killed?? Oh, that's right, cops don't tend to get killed in large numbers. On the other hand there certainly aren't as many navy seals as there are regular soldiers
Or like how regular soldiers rely on instinct and training to keep from getting killed. And yet you are ok with females as regular soldiers. A dead female regular soldier is somehow acceptable, but a dead female navy seal, no way!!!!
This is getting tired. You can't even be particularly consistent with your argument, and you're not giving your argument enough thought to realize you're not being consistent.
And as I said before, you have no idea how sexist you are coming off; regardless of how much you are an advocate for a woman's right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. You know how to give lip service to the proper "slogans", I gotta give you that.
Unless you can come up with a more, consistent, and expansive argument, I am done with this.
You're not thinking this through. And I don't know if it's because you are ignorant or because you are so single minded in your "everybody do everything" belief that you are incapable of seeing outside of it. Either way my argument would probably make more sense to you if you were actually paying attention to it. But since you keep trying to use things I already said against me and omitting other points I've made you must not be interested in that.
There is a significant difference between cops and soldiers. And there is an equally significant difference between basic ground troops and these elite units.
When I say "margin for error" it's not just about loss of life but it's also about accomplishing whatever mission these people are being assigned. They're not tasked to go out and grab a pizza, these are *beep* we cannot fail this under any circumstances missions.
When I say "risk analysis" it's not just about loss of life. But it IS much harder to accomplish a mission if you are dead. Again, YOU are oversimplifying. There are A LOT of steps to go through when they ("the military") are evaluating the criteria for who can do what. It's not just a matter of "no girls allowed" like you want to pretend it is.
You'll also notice that I've already said I don't care either way. So don't try to make it about me like I'm against it (again, ignoring what I've said to support yourself.) What I've been telling you are the legitimate reasons why these things HAVEN'T been allowed. I've also already made the point that eventually the reasoning will become less and less valid as referenced by the fact that the curtain of "combat" positions is slowly being pulled back and made available for women to try out for. But they're not just doing it overnight. Again, everything runs through a process of review first.
"The Military" is not sexist. Are there sexist people in the military? Yes. Just like there are racists, homophobes, and every other kind of ignorant person. But that doesn't mean every decision made is based off of those things.
Look. I'm sure you're as tired of me repeating myself as I am of you repeating what I've already said as if I hadn't already said it. I don't actually have any intention of changing your mind as you are clearly very set in your belief regardless of facts. And that's your right. I honestly just think the subject is interesting and like discussing it. Personally, I am a logic/reasoning type of person, so if I find the reasoning behind a decision to be sound I'm more likely to agree with it over mere appeal to emotion.
That being said, no one is truly free to do as they please. "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" is a catchphrase. When I say I think people should have equal human rights I mean exactly that. "Human rights" as defined by civilization doesn't guarantee you access to whatever you want in life. It never did. "WE" put down rules based on majority reasoning and consensus all over the place and as long as the reasoning isn't based on a demeaning idealization of a particular demographic and is evaluated to be legitimate I don't have a problem with it.
But whatever man. To each their own.
Crying children will dry their eyes. Sleeping babies will awaken and take to the skies!
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kenneglds
11 years ago
>>> That is a good question.
Where is your good answer?
>>> But you can't be taught natural instincts
Our disagreement is in what those natural instincts entails (and the extent they entail)
>>> I already said this
You can't make some great, sweeping truth out of nothing but 1 teeny-tiny category. And yet, that is exactly what you are trying to do.
>>> They are allowed to do them soon enough
>>> I said that too. Although more like "eventually" rather then soon.
No. There is a HUGE difference in what I said, and what you are saying. They are not even a thousand miles within the same neighborhood. Almost all children will stop being banned from something the moment they reach a certain age. Whatever they are banned from, they will eventually be able to do it. So the person is not really banned from doing it; he/she is just temporarily "postponed" from doing it.
But you are advocating ALL FEMALES be banned from doing something (just because they are female), until some vague,
time (that you imagine will happen) comes around.
And while all children will eventually get to do what they are "banned" from as children. You are advocating for tens-of-millions of women being permanly banned from something, because your "imaginary" times will not have occurred within their window of oppurnity (or perhaps, even within their lifetime)
>>> What I have been telling you are the "legitimate reasons these things haven't occurred
I already knew what "the legitimate" reasons are. But "legitimate" reasons aint always so legimate. And you really haven't made a case that they are legimate.
Instead, what you've done is gone on a log-winded ramble of how important it is to accomplish your mission, and how that's hard to do if you're dead. Which is a bit strange because you have also admit that some women might be capable of being naval seals, and if they're capable of it, then they should be capable of taking part in a successful mission.
Oh, but that's right, the male seals will be distracted by them, hampering their ability to work as a unit. But cop get into dangerous situations, and somehow female cops don't hamper the males ability to operate.
But that's right, as you point out there is a difference between cops and seals. Your big argument here is that more female soldiers will die, then female cops will. Which bring us back to the question, who makes the magic number of how many female deaths are acceptable?? It's a question that you admitted was a good question, yet neglected to provide an answer for.
And along those lines, your big problem doesn't seem to be females dying, your big problem seems to be that people don't like the idea of women dying. Because when I brought up female spies, you answered that when a woman spy dies it happens out of public view, so people don't know about it.
So we are back to women shouldn't be seals, because people don't like the idea of them as seals. And because men are "distracted" by their instincts. So women should be denied it, simply because they are women. Which is kind of sexist.
You haven't expounded your argument. You've just rambled on about the importance of being able to complete your mission, without expounding (anymore then the tiny bit you previously had) on how women seals would prevent that.
And while you give lip service to the idea that you don't care, you certainly come squarely down on 1 side of the issue. So you actually do kind of care.
And while there might be legitimate reasons why women shouldn't be navy seals (I granted myself, it is questionable if they can, and it might be an exception to the "rule"), you ain't been making that case.
>>> Human rights as defined by civilization doesn't guarantee access to whatever you want in life.
We are not talking about "Human rights". There is always a limit to your rights as a human. For instance, it is not your human right to cold-bloodedly murder somebody.
We are talking about EQUAL RIGHTS. Which you say you are for. And the definition of equal rights, is having the same rights that others have.
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cloudslide
11 years ago
lol, I thought we were done talking about this.
When I say I don't care, I mean I literally don't care. They could pull the curtain back tomorrow and say sure whatever, women are allowed to do everything come hell or high water. And it would elicit at MOST a, "Meh. Okay." From me. I said the I found the topic interesting and liked talking about it, and when we're discussing viewpoints, I agree with the viewpoint AGAINST, but that doesn't mean I actually care one way or another.
It's not really rambling if you can clearly list off bullet points. I could just call what you've been doing "rambling" but it wouldn't invalidate anything you've said, so I don't know why you think it will do the same for me.
What it all comes down to is it's not a half-hearted or prejudicial decision. All of the things I've mentioned are factors for why "they" (Higher HQ) have decided against it at this time. And I agree with them. And to me, they don't meet the definition of "sexist." If it was just one of those aspects or if the reasoning behind it was weak then that would be a different story, but I don't believe it is. I think that YOU think that. But then again, I don't think you really know what you are talking about when it comes to the military, based on things that you've said or implied about it that are ridiculous to me as someone actually IN it and understands how it works.
The reasons are what they are. There's nothing to expound upon and I see no reason to make up new reasons. You disagree with the reasons and that's your right but they've been laid out as plain as day. I don't know why you think anyone in the world is going to have hard numbers about a situation that doesn't exist. For instance, there is no "magical number" for acceptable death. We simply avoid a situation where we'll ever have to find out. So that is a stupid question.
Again, I already agreed that these types of jobs are extremely rare cases and I can't think of anything else other than that that would fit that same bill.
I see what you're saying about the difference as far as age limitations. But I still disagree that it's not an apt comparison. It has more to do with the reasoning behind the decisions we make based on criteria. And usually when something becomes unanimously legal everyone gets in on it at the same time. The major difference is time scale. And you're right. There's no guarantee that everyone will see every change in society in their lifetime.
The equal rights you are being granted ARE equal "human" rights. There are many rights afforded to you based on status (i.e. money) but those rights have nothing to do with your "humanity." Everyone should have equal human rights. But everyone does NOT have "equal [infinite] rights." They never have and I don't believe there's ever been a system that has genuinely tried it. There are those that claim that that is the intent, but they've all ended up being hierarchical in the end (to my knowledge. Looking at YOU Animal Farm.)
But that is a bit besides the point isn't it? I really think it all comes down to the reasons. Either you think they are *beep* or not. In my opinion if they are good reasons they don't meet the criteria for sexism. And again, I know for a fact that it's a discussion they are having and by "discussion" I mean they are spending time and money on it. It's not a case of "women are banned forever coz they're super weak and we don't like them. Boys 4 life. Generals out!" Which is the impression I get from you on what you think they must be thinking. Or maybe you think they should just "make it work" just for the sake of it.
Something I did think about though. What if there were SEAL teams that were all girls. I mean, if you could even fill a unit (God only knows with the requirements.) It sounds like a plot to a movie. And I'm sure they've got a list of reasons for why they haven't even bothered attempting that, but I'd be interested in hearing them...
Anyway. Why are we still talking about this?
Crying children will dry their eyes. Sleeping babies will awaken and take to the skies!
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kenneglds
11 years ago
>>> it's not really rambling if you can clearly list of bullet points.
If you look at my post again you will see that what I refer to as your "ramble" was that part of your post in which you ramble about how important it is to successfully complete your mission. And in that part of your post, rambling was pretty much all you were doing.
The bullet points I was listing off, are the main points of what your overall argument has been. And they have been more conflicting, inconsistent, and contradictory, then they've been rambling.
But I would agree that it's time to agree to disagree.
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cloudslide
11 years ago
As I said. The reasons are what they are. Just because you say they contradict doesn't mean that they do. And they are consistent (Perhaps you are still confused as to the difference between what I believe, what I agree with, and what is.) Just because you refuse to understand them because they violate your world view doesn't invalidate them or somehow make them nonsense. But I'm sure you already knew that.
Dismissing something as "rambling" is a weak retort. Considering for it to be rambling it would have to have had nothing to do with what we were talking about which was not the case.
But, hey. You're not going to see it that way because you don't want to. And I get that. So for your own sake. I'd just leave it alone.
Crying children will dry their eyes. Sleeping babies will awaken and take to the skies!
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kenneglds
11 years ago
LOL- Now it's my turn to say
Why are we still talking about this?
But here is where it stops.
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cloudslide
11 years ago
Last word off? Last Word off.
Crying children will dry their eyes. Sleeping babies will awaken and take to the skies!
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