Posted on 11/25/2013 8:27:58 AM PST by NCjim
Soldier beauty queen Theresa Vail, Miss Kansas, has entered the fray created this week when a female Army colonel at Fort Leavenworth branded another female soldier too pretty to use in Army publicity photos.
In the leaked email exchange first reported by Politico, Col. Lynette Arnhart warned her colleagues that photos of average-looking and ugly women should be used in public relations campaigns to attract more women into combat roles.
Unfortunately that is the sick reality and one of the many stereotypes I'm trying to break, Vail, a sergeant in the Army National Guard, wrote on Twitter Wednesday.
She added: However, it is going to take an army of women to break that perception, not just myself.
Politico reports that Arnhart is deputy director of the Armys Training and Doctrine Commands Analysis Center at Fort Leavenworth. Shes heading a study looking into ways to integrate more women into Army combat jobs.
She reportedly took issue with a Pentagon photo that ran with an article in the November issue of Army Magazine about the Armys efforts to attract more female soldiers.
The photo showed Cpl. Kristine Tejada of the 1st Cavalry division on security detail in Iraq.
In her email, Arnhart reportedly wrote that the photo shows a pretty woman, wearing makeup while on deployed duty. Such photos undermine the rest of the message (and may even make people ask if breaking a nail is considered hazardous duty).
In general, Arnhart wrote, ugly women are perceived as competent while pretty women are perceived as having used their looks to get ahead.
According to Politico, she wrote that a photo of a female soldier with mud on her face used by news agencies last spring sent a much different message one of women willing to do the dirty work necessary in order to get the job done.
Like Miss Kansas, Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.), weighed in on Twitter, calling Arnharts comments another example that @USArmy just doesnt get it as it debates if pretty girls should be used in pamphlets.
After the email leaked, Army spokesman George Wright issued a statement saying that Arnharts comments were an internal email conversation and not an Army position.
the one on the left is wearing the rarely-seen Combat Flip-Flops (not that I’d point that out in person)
No wonder King David couldn’t keep ‘em zipped...
Reporting for duty, Sarge!
She wants more burly, hairy legged she-men but didn’t want to just come out and say so.
Any society that sends its women to fight before it sends its non-shaving boys and cane-borne old men deserves to be destroyed.
Actually, yours truly ended up in a USMC Officer recruiting brochure, and I am far from chisel jawed. I look more like McGee than Gibbs. Of course, we'd just returned from 3 or 4 days in the field, muddy, old camo face paint, tired and ready to hit the showers. Seriously MEAN scowls on every face.
Truth in advertising... :-)
In the bottom photo, I’ll take the one in the middle, stat. Please hurry, I’m still ronery.
And sadwy a-wrone.
In other words, Connie the Park Ranger from "Brickleberry."
:-(
I started to pass out from lack of blood to the head...
I quiver
“Nice.....form.”
Poor form. I was always taught that the elbow of the drawing arm should be in a straight line with the arrow.
Oh.... You meant the other form? Well, ah, yes, I do agree :)
I’m not really sure what your message means, and I’ll avoid guessing lest I spawn negative feelings.
“has been suspended pending the results of an investigation “to protect the integrity of the ongoing work on gender integration in the Army.” “
That the Army is doing “gender integration” at all is the problem.
Any society that sends its women to fight before it sends its non-shaving boys and cane-borne old men deserves to be destroyed.
___________________________
That’s really what it comes down to.
Solution for the US Army female spokeswomen: Use feminist icons like Hillary(!) Clinton and Gloria Steinem to attract women into combat arms. These two icons should scare the bad guys out of their socks.
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