DEATH IN ATLANTA AND GENDER SAMENESS IN THE HAPPY LAND OF MAKEBELIEVE (Don Feder Alert)

DonFeder.com ^ | 03/17/05 | Don Feder

[goldstategop]

America today is The Happy Land of Make-Believe. We’ve become exquisitely adept at ignoring reality when it offends the prevailing cultural ethos. But reality always reasserts itself in the end – often with deadly consequences.

Take gender differences.

In the Happy Land of Make-Believe, we like to pretend that men and women are interchangeable – physically as well as psychologically. According to feminist dogma, women can be tough and aggressive – men sensitive and nurturing. Hence women firefighters, female soldiers and 5’ 2” cops.

In Atlanta, on Friday, reality had the last word.

Brian Nichols, a former college football player on trial for raping his ex-girlfriend, wrested a gun away from a female deputy who was taking him to trial, and shot and killed Judge Roland W. Barnes, court stenographer Julie Ann Brandau and Deputy Hoyt Teasley. (He’s also suspected of the murder of an off-duty federal agent.)

It wasn’t until the sixth paragraph of The New York Times’ Saturday story that we learned the name of the deputy who was disarmed, sparking the tragedy – Cynthia Hall.

I’m guessing it wasn’t that hard for Nichols (all 6’-1”, 210 pounds of him) to physically overpower Hall – all 5-feet-2-inches of her.

But to The New York Times, Deputy Hall’s gender is no more relevant than her eye-color or ethnicity. That the average woman is considerably smaller, weaker and a lot less aggressive than the average man is inconsequential in the Happy Land of Make-Believe.

Officers don’t have to be bruisers, we’re told. After all, cops have guns, don’t they? – that is, until a prisoner who’s larger, stronger and more aggressive takes their gun away from them.

Despite the manifest absurdity of assigning Thumbelina to guard King Kong, thanks to feminist lobbying and a judiciary bent on gender equality at any cost, physical standards increasingly are obsolete in determining who wears a badge and carries a gun.

The FBI Law Enforcement Bulletin for May 2001 noted that police forces which attempt to establish physical standards had better be damned sure that they don’t result in what the courts call “disparate impact.”

Even standards that are entirely rational could leave a department open to a federal civil rights suit. The Bulletin cites the case of the Philadelphia transit system which, in 1991, established endurance standards for its 234-man force.

Based on the latest scientific studies, and after exhaustive research, the Southern Pennsylvania Transportation Authority determined that there were occasions when its officers would have to run (fast) to: pursue a fleeing suspect, make an arrest, assist a fellow officer or stop the commission of a crime. Yea, verily, it determined that the inability of officers to move rapidly endangered the public.

In light of the foregoing, the Authority decided that potential recruits should be able to run 1.5 miles in 12 minutes – not exactly an Olympic record, but fast enough to do the job.

But that’s where disparate impact came in. Even though the Authority didn’t intend to discriminate against women, its standard did (due to a little thing called reality).

As the FBI Bulletin informs us, during the years 1991, 1993 and 1996, almost 60 percent of male applicants for the Transit Authority police force met the 1.5-miles-in-12-minutes standard, but only 12 percent of female applicants did so.

In 1997, five women who had been rejected for the force filed a Title VII (gender discrimination) civil rights action. The U.S. Justice Department – under that great friend of female-kind, William Jefferson Clinton – intervened in their behalf.

The Authority eventually prevailed, after the case wended its way through the federal court system, at a cost of millions to taxpayers. Despite the positive outcome, rest assured that the expense will discourage other departments from establishing physical standards that the average little lady can’t meet – exactly what feminists intended.

One public-safety job that’s largely escaped the reality-defying, feminization drive is firefighting.

As of May, 2002, out of more than 11,500 active-duty firefighters in New York City, exactly 25 were women. This might possibly be related to the fact that running into a burning building carrying 60 pounds of equipment, and dashing up stairs with same to rescue trapped tenants, requires physical endurance that all but a very few women lack.

Still, feminists excel at long-distance whining. Take Brenda Berkman, who, in 1982, successfully sued the City of New York to have physical standards for firefighters lowered because they – you guessed it -- discriminated against women (as does nature, when it comes to stamina).

In a TV interview a few years back, a feminist (I believe it was Gloria Steinem) wondered why firefighter recruits should be required to carry victims over their shoulders. They can drag them out (and down several flights of stairs?), can’t they?

Anyway, Berkman, now a captain by virtue of quotas, says she was traumatized by tributes to firefighters who fell at the World Trade Center.

Said she: “What was most hurtful was to be invisible at the funerals and memorial services. The officials giving the eulogies would talk about ‘firemen,’ the ‘brothers,’ the ‘men.’” Oh, the agony! How did Berkman endure it?

So, even though .002% of New York firefighters are people of the feminine persuasion, including none of those who perished on 9/11, officials eulogizing those heroes were expected to speak of the brave “guys and gals,” “brother and sisters,” and persons-who-fight-fires. Amazing.

Where reality-avoidance really gets risky is in the military. For over a decade, Elaine Donnelly, president of the Center for Military Readiness (www.cmrlink.org), has been fighting a lonely battle against political correctness in uniform.

Despite clear Congressional mandates against women in land combat, the Pentagon’s feminist-whipped brass keeps moving female soldiers closer and closer to the front lines.

Donnelly notes: “Modern body armor alone weighs 25 pounds. This weight is proportionally more difficult to carry by female soldiers who are, on average, shorter and smaller than men, with 45-50% less upper body strength and 25-30% less aerobic capacity, which is essential for endurance. Even in current non-combat training, women suffer debilitating bone stress factures and other injuries at double the rate of men.

To summarize an enormous body of well-documented evidence by physiologists in the U.S. and Britain, in close combat women do not have an ‘equal opportunity’ to survive, or to help fellow soldiers survive.”

There are other considerations weighing against women in combat. As prisoners, they tend to get sexually molested by an often-less-than chivalrous enemy -- witness Pfc. Jessica Lynch, an Army truck driver taken prisoner at the outset of the Iraq war, who was gang-raped and sodomized by her captors.

Also, men in combat tend to get themselves killed trying to protect women in combat. (This was the Israeli experience in 1948.) And, mixing the sexes at a time when hormones are running high tends to result in fraternization. (Thus the high rate of pregnancy among female troops stationed in the desert during the first Gulf War.)

The fact that men and women are different offends our modernist sensibilities. (Feminists really should sue God for giving women breasts and vaginas and a maternal instinct, and men penises and testosterone, as well as a warrior ethic and a natural inclination to serve and protect what used to be called the gentler sex.) So we pretend that men and women are fungible commodities – that anything he can do, she can do better – or just as well, at any rate. It comes down to this: You’re a young soldier with a leg wound. Who do you want to count on to carry you to safety, a 180-pound man, or a 110-pound woman?

Or, you’re trapped in a burning building. Who do your want Ladder Company 49 to send in to save you, a strapping, 6’2’’ fireman, or a gal with a ballerina-build in a fireman’s uniform?

Or, you’re a spectator at a trial. Who do you want to escort the 210-pound, 6’1” rape suspect to the courtroom – Dirty Harry or Little Mary Sunshine?

[Route101]

...don't want no short people here.....

[trebb]

Yes people get hung up on the gender but we need to focus on the size.A short man is just as much a problem as small women....More women use their guns more causing more fatalities which adds to the problem.

Yep - and that went out the window in order to include women; many jobs, where physical strength/endurance was an issue, used to have standards of height too - but, alas, there are more men that top 5'6" than women, so that had to go out the window...

[ken5050]

If this was Freepmail..or your e-daay, contact the admin moderator..someone needs to be suspended..

[sgtbono2002]

I have a hundred stories about Female Firefighters. Some of them not fit to tell. I will let you in on this one. A ssceretary at Fire headquarters applied to be a Firefighter. The difference in pay was thousands of dollars more than she was making as a secretary. She was appointed as a Firefighter.She went through the Training academy and was assigned to a Company. As time went on she soon discovered that Firefighting is a pretty tough job and she couldnt cut it,shw ent off sick with an injury and was assigned to light duties. Guess where? Thats right she is now right back with her old secretarial job, only now she is earning a Firefighters pay, and the Company Captain is glad to see her there.

[mother22wife21]

Bump

[finnigan2]

The irony of all these shenanigans is that the juvenile behavior of the participants and the faux, "in your face" immaturity of their events, only reinforces the stereotype that grown women are child like and need only a strong man to help them cope.
Now, if the organizers of these theaters of the absurd were to have the courage to schedule events that protested the treatment of women under Sharia Law and risk the resulting death threats from the Islamofascists, then I might have some respect for their activities. As it is, they preach only to the converted while making sure that they themselves run no real risk of, God forbid, physical harm.
Society today is overflowing with "poseurs" who hold views which are designed merely to offend onlookers and attract attention to themselves while trying to present a phony image as some sort of radical.

[Condor51]

A short man is just as much a problem as small women.

While I agree in general, there are some exceptions.

Here's a few 'short men' that were pretty bad people in 'their day'.

and last but certainly not least

A very 'short' War Hero

And back in the 'old hood' the baddest guy was Dave ****, who stood a whole whooping 5'-7" - IN cowboy boots. Then there was this guy who rode in our MC club for a while - "Animal". He was about 5'-5" or 5'-6" tops (I think he eventually died in Joliet?). He'd kill you as soon as look at you, hence his nickname.

So no offense but stature isn't exactly everything for a guy.

[Law]

Excellent article. Thanks for posting it. My only criticism is that Feder plays into the hands of the feminists and homosexual activists by using the term "gender" where he actually means sex.

Gender is a linguistic term (e.g. in French where words may be masculine or feminism) rather than a biological one. Leftists like this term because gender may be "constructed" (i.e. made to mean whatever you wish, which is where the notion of "transgendered" comes from), whereas sex is unavoidably biological.

Words matter, so conservatives who want to fight the good fight and win should avoid misusing the word gender when they really mean sex.

[Designer]

"A short man.."

Yup. Back when I wanted to be a cop, I did not meet the minimum height requirement. Nowadays I can look at the tops of many cop's heads.

[Malesherbes]

Actually, the six foot Nichols and the five foot deputy were evenly matched. Each weighed over 200 pounds.

[rave123]

Although you are correct that women and men are different and cannot do the same things and should not in many instances. This case is quite different and has several other flaws that would have hampered "anyone" from doing the job, male or female.
First, the man was known to be a problem but according to the law he could not be handcuffed and had to change into street clothing. To do this the deputy, following orders, puts her gun in a locked drawer and then uncuffs him so he can change clothes. At this point, considering the guy knew martial arts and there is no gun, he could have taken on a man the same size as him. Second, there was no one else with her, my husband is a deputy and he will tell you that in those cases, two people should be guarding this guy, (as they are doing now only after he has wrecked havoc on Atlanta). Third, no one was watching the camera that was in place to help in the event of trouble(supposedly a safety net). And finally, the judge had asked for extra protection the day before but the sheriff or the powers in charge felt it okay to put only one person(and yes I say person considering the protocol of not having the guy cuffed at some point and his history) on this guy. This case, in my opinion, is a case of total ineptitude at the top and policy makers that are concerned about cuddling the criminal.
I cannot place the blame on this lady for the evil and mistakes of the perp and her bosses and policymakers.

[Republic If You Can Keep It]

I cannot place the blame on this lady

I agree with you.

It wasn't her fault that she was sent to do a man's job and couldn't do it.

Pretty simple, really.

[rave123]

No she was sent to do a job and was hamperd by inefficiencies. And it is not simple it is very complex.

[goldstategop]

I'm 5'7". That's average. I'm not exactly a short guy. Although I concede I'm not tall either. I don't tower over people.

(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)

[goldstategop]

If a man punches a woman in the face, its not a question of "inefficiencies"; its a question of relative strength. That's why we don't allow co-ed sports competitions. Men are much stronger than women and few women can beat a man when it comes to muscle mass. In other areas, quite possibly. But not when comes to throwing one's weight around.

(Denny Crane: "Sometimes you can only look for answers from God and failing that... and Fox News".)

[Travis McGee]

Must be nice there, in the fuzzy-wuzzy ever-happy Land of Make-Believe.

"Hampered by inefficiencies" is the same nonsense espoused by socialists, who believe that wonderful pure communism could work, if only it was not "hampered by inefficiencies" the next time it is tried.

(Inefficiencies like that perpetual bugaboo, "human nature.")

[Travis McGee]

Imagaine the spectacle if NFL teams were ordered to field 2 or 3 women on every play.

They would be carried off on stretchers in a short time.

I wonder why the feminazis don't "demand" that the NFL apply affirmative action and quotas for women players?

Because even they know that physical reality would make the experiment a disaster when it came to crunch time.

[Condor51]

***I'm 5'7". That's average. I'm not exactly a short guy. Although I concede I'm not tall either. I don't tower over people.***

No - I agree. 5'-7" isn't exactly 'small'.

But the guy I was referring to was 5'-7" with boots on which had 1 1/2" heels. So he was like 5'-5 1/2". That's pretty 'small' for being the baddest guy in the neighborhood - which he definitely was. (he was the 'original Fonz')

An aside, Cowboy boots were great for starting the 'old' Harley XLCH as you never slipped off the kick starter do to the heel ("engineer boots" were passe' and too heavy anyway). And the pointy toe came in handy during a fight (why am I still alive? LOL).

[SuziQ]

Despite the manifest absurdity of assigning Thumbelina to guard King Kong, thanks to feminist lobbying and a judiciary bent on gender equality at any cost, physical standards increasingly are obsolete in determining who wears a badge and carries a gun.

I was absolutely APPALLED when I read that Nichols only had this one police officer guarding him, and that she was smaller than he! This is NUTS! There should have been two police officers with him at all times, especially in light of the fact that at one point his handcuffs were going to be removed. I'm frankly surprised he didn't kill her too!