Posted on 03/06/2003 10:29:19 AM PST by Maedhros
Nothing follows...
bingo
Then if he's lucky, the male cadet gets offered a seperation, if he's unlucky (or if he protest her account of the situation) he gets locked up
Get her a quick-opening folding knife and training in how to use it effectively. A woman who submits to rape without a good fight has no business being in any branch of the military. What occurs in the academy is nothing compared to what she would face if hostiles overran the airbase.
And before you say "you wouldn't say that if you had a daughter", I've got three, the oldest 14, and yes she's currently getting training in knife-fighting and hand-to-hand from a very interesting ex-military instructor I know.
It's just a hunch on my part, but I suspect they could make it that way in the future.
It's just a hunch on my part, but if a cadet can't refrain from raping their fellow cadets (that whole thing about taking an oath among other things, obeying the honor code, etc.), chances are they won't be good officers. Just because we had a Commander-in-Chief who was a rapist and sexual predator doesn't mean we should make excuses for other rapists and sexual predators by saying the women shouldn't be there.
Take the whole male/female aspect out of this and you have a bunch of cadets who broke the law, who disobeyed the rules and regulations set out for them. That's what it comes down to. You can try and draw attention away from the fact, you can try and make subtle hints that it's the women's fault for being there and if they weren't there, there wouldn't be a problem, but I and most others see right through your living-in-the-past mindset. If they cannot follow orders and rules and regulations, they have no duty being put in a position to give orders and decide on rules and regulations.
So, what you are saying is that we should keep the "unisex" military so that we can tell who is a rapist and who is not?
Come again?
LMAO. You have something against women in the military, that's your thing, and I support your right to have something against women in the military military, no matter how out of touch with reality I think it is. I don't understand it, but then again, I've been married for a couple of decades now, I've commanded women in the Air Force and served under women in the Air Force. My oldest daughter was commissioned in the Air Force just last year (and I am damn proud of that - she is now the third generation in my family to have gone to college and to have served in the Air Force).
The issue is not about whether or not women should be in the military, the issue is about a bunch of cadets who can't follow orders and who should not be in the military (and maybe they will learn what rape is when they are in Leavenworth or wherever they end up). You can use it to justify your anti-women attitude all you want, but most of us see through it (especially the female Freepers here who have served).
Yet the whole incident was hushed up. The young lady involved was the daughter of a grad, and the family apparently valued the reputation of the Air Force Academy over their daughter's safety and wellbeing. Several of our Air Force friends were instructors at the Academy at the time, and informed us that Academy instructors and students had been ordered to attend an assembly where they were ordered to keep their mouths shut, or they would find themselves kicked out of the Air Force.
I do not believe this was the only time this or something similar happened at the Academy. They were willing to go to extremes to keep it quiet once; why should it surprise anyone if that became SOP regarding such situations?
Why is it that most of the "discussions" I find myself conducting are with people who don't bother to read what I write, because their preconceived notions take a lot less time?
I said (read it again): I am against the UNISEX military. That is, a military where the sexes are COMPLETELY BLENDED, without regard to considerations that women and men are different.
This in no way absolves anyone of guilt for rape or any other inappropriate behavior. But I am for punishing people for what they DO, not for what they INTEND to do if they have the opportunity.
In the "old days" when a young couple did not "date" in the same way we mean today, when they were expected to participate in group activities, or had chaperones, etc., "date rape" was unheard of. They young man and young woman didn't have the opportunity to stray from the proper script, and so problems were avoided.
No one would think of such a thing now, yet we are so surprised when "he said-she said" situations arise quite commonly.
By the same token, the temptation to break fraternization rules would be eliminated if the men and the women were separated. That was my intent in saying the "unisex" mililary should be done away, and YOUR reply is "oh, so you think it's okay if these young men 'rape', because the presence of the women made it so they couldn't help it."
This is clap-trap. No one in a bygone era would have ever thought twice about the need for keeping the sexes separate. No one would have expected these young men and women to keep their hands and minds to themselves while in perpetual close quarters; they would have assumed that men and women are weak and made adjustments accordingly.
In the WWII era there were completely separate facilities, command structures and duties for the men and the various women's auxiliaries. That is the way it should have stayed.
Had it stayed that way, we wouldn't be having these problems now. As it is, the people who have committed infractions of the rules should be punished, and severely, make no mistake about it.
But a near-sure way of making sure it doesn't happen again is to separate the sexes, as human civilization has always done prior to our "enlightened," Feminism-dominated age.
I suspect that got turned into "they told us not to tell anyone what happened."
So it goes.
Do you really think that none of these women are victims of sexual assault? That they all are simply practicing CYA? I realize you do not approve of women in the military. Fine. That should not result of tolerance of such behavior.
And trust me. I was a (female) Air Force officer. The Air Force is not in any way going to admit to rape and assault at the Academy if there was any possibility of spinning the reports as an attempted cover-up by the women of their own code violations.
I'm going to say this again, since you dance around it : An order, a rule, a regulation to not rape somebody should be enough for a cadet. They shouldn't have to be physically seperated. If the cadet does not have the discipline needed to keep from raping somebody because they are around them, they have no place in the military.
Do you believe that men and women in your workplace should be physically seperated?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.