While I don't believe that wimmin belong in combat, I also take issue with the Woman As Mommy characterization; we have been battling for a long time now against the idea that the only thing a woman has to offer to the world is her uterus. Anyone who has worked in any kind of shelter or outreach or settlement house or visiting nurse program knows all too well that Mommyhood is not only not a hard-wired, always-included part of being born female, it is something that a lot of wimmin can't be trained to do. And the continued insistence of Hallmark Men that ALL women are created with an intrinsic talent for motherhood is as foolish as the assertion that all Blacks have rhythm and all men are born to play football. This falsehood is causing a great deal of misery among women who are not so gifted and who assume that there is either something fatally wrong with them or with their children because they would rather do almost anything than spend another five minutes with a child.
While I agree that many women are unfit to be in combat, I think a far larger percentage are unfit to be mothers. When we can admit that, we'll be on our way to eliminating a lot of problems from society at large.
ping