Women in Combat

942 Words2 Pages

Although it has a predominantly male identity, the military has many female characteristics. Being a member of the military requires “collective action, organization, submissiveness, obedience, fidelity, and cooperation” which are all considered to be feminine qualities (Matthews 2009). Women have indirectly been involved in combat for many years as nurses and other medical personnel which are all exposed to combat during war. The Army’s policy definition of direct combat includes “engaging an enemy,” “being exposed to direct enemy fire,” and “closing with the enemy” (Harrell). Women should not be excluded from any aspect, or only restricted to certain aspects of the military when they sign up to join. Women should be allowed to be assigned to military combat roles in active duty.
Not allowing women to participate in active combat duty is discrimination. The definition of discrimination according to Oxford Dictionary online is “The unjust or prejudicial treatment of different categories of people or things, especially on the grounds of race, age, or sex” (Oxford Dictionaries). Women are being treated differently because of their gender. People may argue that women are not strong enough to complete the tasks needed to fulfill a military position but females aren’t even given the same training, or even the same amount to time to prepare themselves to be able to keep up with the male units. They do their day to day jobs while the men are out training and preparing, and then are just randomly attached to the male unit sometime during the day for training (McNulty 2012). The men also had new, light weight versions of the necessary equipment to train with while the women were handed older versions of the gear that were heavier. Several...

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...ica, CA: RAND National Defense Research Institute.
Mather, M., Lighthall, N., Nga, L., & Gorlick, M. (2010, July 4). Sex differences in how stress affects brain activity during face viewing. Retrieved March 26, 2014, from http://www-scf.usc.edu/~nlightha/Mather_etal_NeuroReport.pdf
McNulty, S. S. (2012). MYTH BUSTED: WOMEN ARE SERVING IN GROUND COMBAT POSITIONS. Air Force Law Review, 68119-165.
Matthews, M. D., Ender, M. G., Laurence, J. H., & Rohall, D. E. (2009). Role of Group Affiliation and Gender on Attitudes Toward Women in the Military. Military Psychology (Taylor & Francis Ltd), 21(2), 241-251. doi:10.1080/08995600902768750
Oxford Dictionaries. Retrieved April 14, 2014, from http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/discrimination
U.S Army (n.d.). Army Careers: Ways to Serve in the Army. Retrieved April 12, 2014, from http://goarmy.com

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