# Should women have to REGISTER for the draft? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [January 21, 2007, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776 "2007-01-21T00:48:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![e-bow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ba9def/32.png) [@e-bow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/e-bow)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2007, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/41 "2007-01-23T16:26:42Z")
[QUOTE=DMark] The first people who should HAVE TO register for any future draft are the male and female children and grandchildren of the people in Congress and the House of Representatives who would re-instate the draft. No exceptions. [/QUOTE] Uh-huh, sins of the father and all that. I’d also like to point out to all those “women can just get pregnant” folks that under current law, men can just go get sodomized. Both genders have a not inaccesible exit-route. ---
**Author:** ![Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/4da419/32.png) [@Gala\_Matrix\_Fire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gala_Matrix_Fire)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2007, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/42 "2007-01-23T23:50:18Z")
[QUOTE=Stonebow] And I don’t think you can underestimate the psychological impact or rape on the public or the military. It really is seen as a fate worse than death, and the worst form of torture, to many men. Silly, perhaps. But it’s there. Of course, this would only really come into play if women were sent to the front lines. [/QUOTE] A woman was captured and raped by Iraqi soldiers during the Gulf War in 1991. Here’s some info on that story: > [@](#): > > But Cornum does warn against focusing too much attention on the issue of rape when it comes to female POWs. > > “It’s just another bad thing that can happen to you,” she says. > > The only publicly available information Cornum could offer is her guide to military health care workers. In it she stresses that “the emphasis on female sexual abuse is primarily cultural,” and that that approach “is based on the model of civilian women.” Servicewomen, Cornum argues “have a different willingness to take risks” and different priorities. > > “While I was subjected to an unpleasant episode of sexual abuse during my captivity,” she writes, “it did not represent a threat to life, limb or chance of being released, and therefore occupied a much lower level of concern than it might have under other circumstances.” > > A flight surgeon on a 1991 search and rescue mission in Iraq, Cornum was captured when her helicopter was shot down. She took a bullet in the shoulder, had a shattered knee and could not move her badly broken arms. Cornum says her main concern when an Iraqi soldier began to unzip her pants in the truck that picked her up was whether the pending assault would aggravate her grievous injuries. The rest of the story [here](http://www.feminist.com/news/news181.html). This was indeed in the news a decade and a half ago, and it looks like America got over it. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [January 23, 2007, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/43 "2007-01-23T23:57:11Z")
[QUOTE=e-bow] Uh-huh, sins of the father and all that. I’d also like to point out to all those “women can just get pregnant” folks that under current law, men can just go get sodomized. Both genders have a not inaccesible exit-route. [/QUOTE] Well in that case I’m already exempt from the draft 😉 . Of course being sodomized doesn’t incapacitate one for at least 9 months or cause someone else to be dependent on you. Also does anyone really thing the Army could get away with excluding gays if the draft was reinstated? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![Rodgers01](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/b19c9b/32.png) [@Rodgers01](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rodgers01)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2007, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/44 "2007-01-24T00:30:57Z")
[QUOTE=Stonebow] I’m opposed to anyone having to register (especially since there are 1000 other ways for the gov to track you if they need you later), but I do think that it would be bad law to add women to the draft pool, if only because they have a ‘get out of jail card’ built in- pregnancy. I’ve spoken to several women who said they’d have no problem with getting pregnant in order to avoid having to go to war. I have an issue with laws that are, by nature, going to be impossible to enforce, or allow for such an easy means of civil disobedience. And good luck with trying to enlist them right after the baby is born- if you can get any politico or the public to back this, we’re either in real trouble as a nation militarily, or we’ve devolved into a totally fascist state. [/QUOTE] Even a pregnant women can be drafted to do military desk work for much of her pregnancy. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2007, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/45 "2007-01-24T19:51:53Z")
[QUOTE=aclubs] What if, in the United States, only white people were eligible for the draft? Or only Latinos, or African Americans, or whatever? Would you therefore still oppose the broadening of the draft to all races on the grounds that “two wrongs don’t make a right”? [/QUOTE] Interesting point, but I’ll say yes, I’d oppose it. Discriminatory or not, drafts are still wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Lemur866](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lemur866/32/434_2.png) [@Lemur866](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lemur866)\ **Post date:** [January 24, 2007, 8:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/46 "2007-01-24T20:47:58Z")
[QUOTE=olivesmarch4th] I hate that the draft exists and I always will… but as long as it does exist, everyone should be required to register. [/QUOTE] Except that it doesn’t exist. There is no draft. ---
**Author:** ![Sleel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/73ab20/32.png) [@Sleel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sleel)\ **Post date:** [January 25, 2007, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776/47 "2007-01-25T04:10:19Z")
I oppose any kind of draft. Volunteer armies are the only ones I think should exist. If you can’t get enough volunteers to enlist, maybe you should get a clue from that. I wish that even the selective service registration we have now should be abolished. On the other hand, if women actually do want full equality, they have to be willing to deal with the responsibilities and obligations too. Since the registration does exist, yes, women should have to register. I remember when my PoliSci teacher brought this up in class. A few of the women were surprised that all of the men had to register or face some kind of consequences. Almost all of them vehemently opposed the idea of women having to register, with the exception of a few fair-minded women in the class. Funny how they always argued for women’s rights in other areas, but weren’t willing to support equal responsibility. That experience made me very skeptical of feminism when I later encountered it in force. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-women-have-to-register-for-the-draft/388776.md?page=2)