Have you mapped SEALs requirements to world athletes and is the cutoff point above or below the top ranked female athletes and if you don’t care if they take the test or not, what is the point of repeating ad nauseum that women are not the physiological equal of men? BECAUSE SPORTS is, again, not persuasive.
Welcome to the Straight Dope: Idiots Arguing Past Each Other Since 1973.
Then you are either retarded and should locked away from society or you’re blind and you’re just making shit up.
I don’t think anyone for the last several pages of this discussion has “insisted they be banned”. The issue is more a commonsense caution that looking at the parameters of this situation initiating a head to head competition is extremely unlikely to wind up with any women graduating.
If this is just a check off for equal access, fine, go for it. Gather your data and we can have this conversation at a later date.
Watch the video linked in the thread. BUD/S involves physical challenges beyond pretty much anything anyone would subject themselves to. It clearly requires elite-tier physical performance. This thread has people in posting shit like “you don’t need to be physically fit to pull a trigger”, I doubt anyone here has any fucking idea what BUD/S includes. But there’s a pretty good documentary that’s been linked twice now, so watch it.
The point of continuing to make my argument is because people are still arguing against it. The only one actually making a case against women applying to BUD/S is the idea that it’s a waste of time because they won’t pass, so if they want more women involved in the special forces, there should be some other method of entry. But even then it’s not because he thinks they should be artificially barred, he just assumes they wouldn’t be able to qualify the normal way. And it’s actually a pretty productive suggestion, if getting women into special forces is deemed some worthy goal in itself. I’m unconvinced, but it’s unrelated to the argument I’ve been making in this thread.
So again, why isn’t that enough in itself?
As if those traditions and cultures are already perfect and could only be harmed by change? Really? I refer you to the various military rape threads for context, btw.
Well, like I said, call the Pentagon, I’m sure they’re dying for your update.
Do Kristin Beck’saccomplishments and accolades sway you dissenters at all? It’s pretty clear that feminine traits didn’t hamper her ability to SEAL the motherfuck out of Team 6, earning a Bronze Star and a Purple Heart in the process.
Thanks. That is a reasonable response.
[QUOTE=MOIDALIZE]
So again, what reason do we have for allowing women to be SEALs other than some generic notion of equality? What are they bringing to the table that’s worth upsetting long established tradition, and introducing unique tensions to that particular military subculture?
[/quote]
This, on the other hand, is why people are yelling at each other in this thread. The bottom line for some people (and so far in this thread MOIDALIZE is the only one who has openly expressed it), is that there is no reason to gather the data, because it might “upset tradition” or “introduce tensions.” It is the absolute essence of bigotry to deny people equal opportunity on the basis of gender. What a fair chance for women brings to the table is an absolutely fundamental right to be judged not by our gender, but by our abilities. It is the opportunity for the military to represent not only the best qualified people for the job, but also the highest ideals of our country.
Wait, are you serious? We’re talking about a genetic male who identified as a man and was in every way a man when he was a SEAL.
Is this like that retarded headline about MAN PREGNANT talking about a genetic female who identified as a man? I remember when people said “How is this news? ‘He’ still has an ovary and full female reproductive organs” and the liberal douchebags screamed BIGOT!
It’s like you’re trying to build a huge jenga tower of liberal douchebaggery, but it already collapsed.
No, I’m not impressed that someone who’s genetically male was able to be a SEAL. He didn’t even live as a female until after he left the service. How in the world would that be persuasive? What’s your line of logic that suggests that it would be?
Edit: I’ve just decided that Der Trihs has a much more palatable, much more grounded representation of crazy leftism than you display. Congratulations.
She was a male seal. What’s your point?
Oh no, it’s just ice cream.
I got it.
Are you serious too? You’re going to jump on that retarded point? You’re going to use this as evidence that biological/genetic/physiological women are qualified to be SEALs, because a guy who is 100% genetically male served as a SEAL?
Is this like, a gotcha semantics game, or an earnest attempt to pretend that this proves that women can be SEALs?
I intended to quote this with that link:
But since you keep selling the SEALs demi-gods rather than mere human beings, it tickles me that Beck’s presence might force to accept the fact that your idea of the perfect male military specimen is far too limiting.
Wow… you’re not even paying attention anymore are you? Yes, all we have been chattering about is female behavioral traits being the limiting factor not baseline physiology.
Couple of us have hit on behavioral traits, it’s not all about you, astro. But don’t worry, someone will come along and pay attention to you again soon if you keep chattering.
Funny.
To my mind, this raises a couple of questions:
Should the Navy and the other military be allowed/required to provide female recruits with steroids to help make up the difference in strength and speed? I tend to agree with the OP that almost no women can pass the SEAL standards as they exist, but steroids could give a significant boost to women’s chances.
Are physical standards that almost no woman can pass, inherently discriminatory? Fire departments in the States have lowered their physical standards in order to recruit more women, and the aspects of the physical abilities test that women couldn’t pass were deemed inherently discriminatory.
Firemen who can’t do a firemen’s carry, and the team going after Bin Laden made up of affirmative action recruits. That’s definitely the liberal douchebag ideal. When lives are on the line, and our national security is at stake, accept only the… well, not the best, but, hey, everyone gets to play. We’re all winners.
Only as part of achieving better alignment between the tests and the actual job requirements, though, AIUI.
Do you deny that any woman who actually participated in BUD/S would have to deal with an incredible amount of shit from the instructors and her fellow trainees, including sexual assault and extrajudicial punishment? I’m not asking whether they should get it, or it’s right for them to get it, but whether they will get it. It will happen because the presence of a woman will be contrary to established tradition, tradition formed in a life or death enterprise. People tend not to deal well with changes to the traditional way of doing things even under the best of circumstances, never mind when there’s no compelling reason to change the way things have been done. The notion that the ideal of equality requires us to fight for the right of a tiny number of women to become trained killers if they want to is bizarre to me.