The Death of Annie Dryden

Originally posted by inimalist
given it was a male who provoked the fight in the first place, isnt this more of a reason to ban males from the military?

No. 😐

Males should be banned from military service (by your logic) because they are unreasonable at times, more difficult to give orders too (it's what my classmate said who served in both Iraq and Afghanistan in a leadership position), play around too much, end-up doing off-the-wall sh*t like r*pe and murder of civvies, and so forth.

I think a case could be made for only allowing females to serve, personally. 😐

Originally posted by dadudemon
misdirecting your feminist rage at me.

...

That's a fairly ignorant position to hold, don't you think?

...

As a feminist, you of all people

nope, you're right

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
All of the information we do have suggests otherwise.

All of the information we have suggests you're at least wrong and at most partially right (still making me right either way).

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
She became a packaging specialist, for one, not a grind-up-Arabs-with-a-chainsaw specialist (they offer that). That's a logistics job with no special physical requirements and about as far as a soldier can get from the GI Jane mold.

Don't forget she had to do PT just like the others...but she was a female meaning she did not get as much out of the PT as her male counterparts.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
There are two versions of events suggested in the article both of which suggest she was not thinking "I can do anything a man can do".

I disagree. Joining the [marines]* is prime suspect #1.

*corrected

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Story 1: she randomly started a fight with another marine
Story 2: a guy was badmouthing the marines and she punched him for it (and knocked him off his feet apparently)

Knocked him to the ground. I always thought, based off of the wording, the she used a take-down move taught to you during basic.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Both of these just suggest she was impulsive and/or not very bright.

Both of those suggest she was a typical military female because she had to be that way. It's not easy being a female marine (if you approach it from a gender prespective).

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I notice in reviewing the article a rather serious problem with the writing. Early on they narrate a set of events as if they were fact. Then they explain that it's the one thing we know for sure didn't happen.

Probably because of the incident report and the lies from various sides.

I'd like to see the stories from all around. And was that guy charged with manslaughter?

Originally posted by dadudemon
We're talking about an imaginary average male or female that are required to pass the same physical requirements, regardless of their size, to serve in the armed forces. Agreed?

The average male/female determined from a set of people made to pass a certain set of physical requirements?

Yeah, you'll see a more severe right-tailed skewness to the set of women's data and have a lower sample size. In practice this probably normalizes a bit in both sexes since the 90-pound-weaklings of the world don't usually try to sign up for the military.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I disagree. Because he's male, it may have ended up being a typical scuffle where they just wrestle. If it was a dude, same size as Annie, he would have been stronger so he may have been able to defend the counter-attack a bit better. No matter how you approach the topic, a dude would have fared better in that same scenario even if you "control" for size.

I'm going through the only relevant stats I have for this (champion powerlifters give me height/weight information and let me just assume they're going all out training) and I'm going to say you're probably right. Even controlling for height and weight an average man would be meaningfully stronger.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
The average male/female determined from a set of people made to pass a certain set of physical requirements?

Yup...and I pointed out that implications of your question in the same post. Did you see that?

edit - I'm agreeing with this point of yours, by the way: don't know if that's obvious. Making the testing equal only ensures your women are equally physically fit. For pilots, I think they already do that...which makes the Air Force and Navy awesome-r in my eyes.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Yeah, you'll see a more severe right-tailed skewness to the set of women's data and have a lower sample size.

You will?

Why?

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
In practice this probably normalizes a bit in both sexes since the 90-pound-weaklings of the world don't usually try to sign up for the military.

A male, 5'5", 120 lbs, is going to generally be a more physically fit specimen than a 5'5" 120 lbs female counterpart. It's not true for every single case but it is true for a very large majority.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I'm going through the only relevant stats I have for this (champion powerlifters give me height/weight information and let me just assume they're going all out training) and I'm going to say you're probably right. Even controlling for height and weight an average man would be meaningfully stronger.

Let it be known that you are not a thick-headed obstinate poster. But, yes, I originally thought that women were stronger than men in highly trained athletes if you control for weight: not true. It has something to do with bone-density, cross-sectional area of the muscle fiber and a third factor that I am not remember (was is the tensile strength of the tendons?)

Originally posted by dadudemon
Don't forget she had to do PT just like the others...but she was a female meaning she did not get as much out of the PT as her male counterparts.

I disagree. Joining the military is prime suspect #1.

She had to do basic PT, yes, but she didn't then seek out a very masculine job. She went into profession packing and sang songs for the other troops at night.

Originally posted by dadudemon
Both of those suggest she was a typical military female because she had to be that way. It's not easy being a female marine (if you approach it from a gender prespective).

I don't think randomly attacking people (talk about lack of context) is typical for any marines.
The second is such a cliche for soldiers in general that I don't think you can really put much of a gender perspective. She was trained to have that mentality.

Originally posted by dadudemon
And was that guy charged with manslaughter?

I don't think so, it sounds like NCIS finished with the case and made no charges. They'd be applying whatever legal standard they use to the case. Under non-military law, at least, manslaughter would be a difficult case to make. The other soldier probably didn't intend to kill her which would make it involuntary and that's only a crime if you commit another crime in the process which I don't think he did.

Originally posted by inimalist
nope, you're right

I don't think we disagree on the overall topic but I do think you are misdirecting your feminist rage towards the wrong person (I do not think “feminist rage” is necessarily bad...so do not interpret that incorrectly. Without feminist rage or even black rage, we would not have the equality that we do have, today…sure, it is not perfect, but we have way better gender and race equality than at any point in history: we need that type of rage). Just because I'm arguing that the average marine male would be larger and would have probably had a more positive outcome to their stupid fight, does not mean that I think women should be banned from the military. I think the opposite. They should be welcomed with open arms and in spades. We should make the testing gender blind.

You know Zeal, I agree with you on a number of things but I find this thread to be disrespectful to the person who died.

If you think that females shouldn't be in the military there are plenty of reasons to bring up but this thread seems like it's using a tragedy to push an agenda.

Let this thread perish and if you think that women should not be in the military, let that idea stand on it's own.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
She had to do basic PT, yes, but she didn't then seek out a very masculine job. She went into profession packing and sang songs for the other troops at night.

lol And it's true.

But if she were a male...she'd get more out of her PT.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I don't think randomly attacking people (talk about lack of context) is typical for any marines.
The second is such a cliche for soldiers in general that I don't think you can really put much of a gender perspective. She was trained to have that mentality.

Actually, no, she was trained to have the opposite mentality. Keeping a cool head and logically planning out a course of action is taught quite well in the marines (all my god-brothers are marines). We cannot rule out that "i'm as good as any man, damnit!" mentality that women MUST have to succeed in the marines.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I don't think so, it sounds like NCIS finished with the case and made no charges. They'd be applying whatever legal standard they use to the case. Under non-military law, at least, manslaughter would be a difficult case to make. The other soldier probably didn't intend to kill her which would make it involuntary and that's only a crime if you commit another crime in the process which I don't think he did.

Yes, that what's I meant: "invuluntary manslaughter". But I thought it would be aggravated manslaughter because he definitely intended her harm. She did not hurt him nearly as much as a body-slam would harm her...but he did not pre-plan to kill her so it would never get murder 1.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I don't think we disagree on the overall topic but I do think you are misdirecting your feminist rage towards the wrong person (I do not think “feminist rage” is necessarily bad...so do not interpret that incorrectly. Without feminist rage or even black rage, we would not have the equality that we do have, today…sure, it is not perfect, but we have way better gender and race equality than at any point in history: we need that type of rage). Just because I'm arguing that the average marine male would be larger and would have probably had a more positive outcome to their stupid fight, does not mean that I think women should be banned from the military. I think the opposite. They should be welcomed with open arms and in spades. We should make the testing gender blind.

actually, my initial point was essentially how its not really valuable to use counter-factual examples when trying to determine things.

For instance, both you and sym have presented "equivalent" possible situations where you would expect different outcomes, depending on whether you use an "average" male or relatively sized one. Neither scenario is any more valid because they are equally artificial and tautologically designed to prove the point either of you is trying to make, and largely, there are much simpler explanations in this case that have nothing to do with gender. The woman acted impulsively and the man overreacted (or whatever, used force enough to kill her).

Beyond that, I'd say there is little to no evidence that gender played a decisive role here. In terms of physicality, we can't recreate the same forces or whatever in the situation, so we can't say with any certainty that a man would survive it any better than a woman. For instance, as military combat is highly lethal, it is possible that the injury sustained by the woman would have been fatal if sustained by either a similarly sized or average sized military man. Talking about probabilities actually does the opposite of what you want ultimately as well. You don't want men and women to be judged by their gender based probability distributions, you claim they want them to be judged on a case by case basis. Thus, it is irrelevant if an average woman might be weaker than an average man, but rather, we would have to make specific "head trauma resistance" profiles for this woman and her fellow male soldiers. In terms of her motivation or psychology, there is no specific evidence, and you have theories about how female soldiers act in general, which is the same issue as above. It doesn't matter if you can make an argument where it is true that some percentage of women might act in a certain way, what matters is what evidence we have about why she acted the way she did.

I haven't mentioned gender equality once, except in jest in a post you essentially reposted

Originally posted by inimalist
beyond that, I'd say there is little to no evidence that gender played a decisive role here.

I think gender played a direct role, myself. In fact, and you'll sh*t yourself, I think the fact that a girl put him on his *ss was what caused him to react so harshly. 😄

But...if she were a male and had reacted the same way, the outcome would have been positively different even if you controlled for size. This is something that Sym and I agreed to, eventually. The male would be better equipped, physically, to handle that positive outcome. (I did not read the three articles you made on TBIs mostly because I already found what I was looking for (meow)). But none of this is what I want to focus on: it is equality in testing. It should be the same regardless of gender.

Originally posted by inimalist
I haven't mentioned gender equality once, except in jest in a post you essentially reposted

😬 Please. I'm not that dumb.

You don't have to directly mention it when each of your posts are about "it's not about teh genderz mang!"

Originally posted by inimalist
Talking about probabilities actually does the opposite of what you want ultimately as well.

Actually, this point of yours is still wrong. The probability is in a male's favor from surviving a body slam even if he hit his head, too.

CONCLUSIONS: Female sex (particularly those age > or =55 y) is associated independently with higher mortality in isolated severe TBI. This increased mortality of postmenopausal women after isolated TBI may suggest a hormonal influence and warrants further investigation

Sure, that may be post-menopausal women, but that still favors my point, not yours. IDGAF about brain function recovery after 1 year: that's not the point. It's surviving the body slam. A larger, more muscled, and denser boned male, even if the same weight, would fair better simply due to the ellastic collision of their bodies being different. Note: the male body would absorb the impact better before the momentum kicked in for the head.

Originally posted by dadudemon
I think gender played a direct role, myself. In fact, and you'll sh*t yourself, I think the fact that a girl put him on his *ss was what caused him to react so harshly. 😄

But...if she were a male and had reacted the same way, the outcome would have been positively different even if you controlled for size. This is something that Sym and I agreed to, eventually. The male would be better equipped, physically, to handle that positive outcome. (I did not read the three articles you made on TBIs mostly because I already found what I was looking for (meow)). But none of this is what I want to focus on: it is equality in testing. It should be the same regardless of gender.

sure, given a bunch of unknowable caveats about the situation we can make lots of different claims

Originally posted by dadudemon
😬 Please. I'm not that dumb.

You don't have to directly mention it when each of your posts are about "it's not about teh genderz mang!"

which is precisely why I responded to your point about counter-factual evidence rather than anything on the previous 4 pages about gender issues

Originally posted by dadudemon
Actually, this point of yours is still wrong. The probability is in a male's favor from surviving a body slam even if he hit his head, too.

which point is still wrong? I'm explaining that even if the probabilities are that way, your desire to judge people independently on a case by case basis argues against judging this woman based on statistical averages.

Originally posted by dadudemon
You will?

Why?

Bah, never mind I was trying to mentally slice up a normal distribution and figure out what would happen. Bad idea.

The skewness should be the same whether you take all the scores above 0 sigma or all the scores above 1 sigma.

Originally posted by dadudemon
A male, 5'5", 120 lbs, is going to generally be a more physically fit specimen than a 5'5" 120 lbs female counterpart. It's not true for every single case but it is true for a very large majority.

I'm saying that the behavior of the applicants will probably change the distribution. Less fit people are also less likely to apply in the first place.

The same principle inflates a lot of things. All of the car insurance companies in the world can show that on average people who switch to them save a lot of money because people only switch when they stand to save a lot of money by doing so. Fertility clinics reject people with especially low odds of having kids in order to show a high success rate.

Originally posted by dadudemon
Let it be known that you are not a thick-headed obstinate poster. But, yes, I originally thought that women were stronger than men in highly trained athletes if you control for weight: not true. It has something to do with bone-density, cross-sectional area of the muscle fiber and a third factor that I am not remember (was is the tensile strength of the tendons?)

Yeah, I was thinking men would be a few percent stronger for the same height and barely stronger for the same weight and height.

Originally posted by inimalist
sure, given a bunch of unknowable caveats about the situation we can make lots of different claims

Sure, ignoring a bunch of knowable variables can be used to incorrectly claim "it can't be known!"

Originally posted by inimalist
which is precisely why I responded to your point about counter-factual evidence rather than anything on the previous 4 pages about gender issues

I was talking about, specifically, the things you had been saying, not anything else, in that section of my post you quoted.

Originally posted by inimalist
which point is still wrong? I'm explaining that even if the probabilities are that way, your desire to judge people independently on a case by case basis argues against judging this woman based on statistical averages.

Don't type so fast: read the edit.

Originally posted by inimalist
Talking about probabilities actually does the opposite of what you want ultimately as well. You don't want men and women to be judged by their gender based probability distributions, you claim they want them to be judged on a case by case basis. Thus, it is irrelevant if an average woman might be weaker than an average man, but rather, we would have to make specific "head trauma resistance" profiles for this woman and her fellow male soldiers.

This is basically the case I was making in a nutshell. I think dadude has essentially agreed to it.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
I'm saying that the behavior of the applicants will probably change the distribution. Less fit people are also less likely to apply in the first place.

On this, I agree. I think it takes a more aggressive female, compared to their male milityar parts, to succeed in the military. So you get a stronger attitude from your females...but that's mostly positive.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
The same principle inflates a lot of things. All of the car insurance companies in the world can show that on average people who switch to them save a lot of money because people only switch when they stand to save a lot of money by doing so. Fertility clinics reject people with especially low odds of having kids in order to show a high success rate.

I don't think that's comparable. What I'm talking about is literal averages with no data skew. You're comparing it with a data-skew. They aren't the same.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
Yeah, I was thinking men would be a few percent stronger for the same height and barely stronger for the same weight and height.

I was thinking it is closer to about 20-30% when bodyweight was controlled. Is 20% barely in your book?

The average male and female have a 40-50% difference.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8477683

Even when controlling for lean-body mass, it does go back to what I said: cross-sectional muscle area. Men just have "stronger" systems.

For me, those are huge differences. Throw in that the lady was probably much smaller (she appears small next to her male counterparts...those dudes could have been big, of course...but it is more likely that she was just a small lass) than the jerk and you have a situation where she was almost hopelessly involved in a fight.

Yeah...you're right...she was just stupid.

Originally posted by Symmetric Chaos
This is basically the case I was making in a nutshell. I think dadude has essentially agreed to it.

Not to that first sentence but to the rest of what he said, I agree.

Originally posted by dadudemon
Sure, ignoring a bunch of knowable variables can be used to incorrectly claim "it can't be known!"

with what force did her head impact the pavement?

Originally posted by dadudemon
I was talking about, specifically, the things you had been saying, not anything else, in that section of my post you quoted.

I'm pretty sure most, if not all, of what I've said has been related to types of evidence and logic. Feel free to point out the things I've said that make you think I'm worried at all about gender equality or other such things

Originally posted by dadudemon
Don't type so fast: read the edit.

I posted 6 recent studies that were about gender differences in TBI survival and recovery. The only finding of those 6 that shows a disadvantage for women is the exact thing you quoted, that deals with post-menapausal women. I posted this last page in fact.

You have now posted something to me which I think anyone who knows how to read evidence would take to suggest women have at least equal ability to recover and survive TBI, except maybe in one age demographic which is not relevant to the discussion. Only, you posted a deliberately selective quote from a single study among many.

please explain how this supports your point at all?

in fact, one of the studies has a conclusion in its abstract that says literally the opposite of what this study claims. Science isnt about single studies, and it is pretty silly for you to repost links I've already provided because you can snip out something that makes it look like your point has legs.

BTW:

Originally posted by inimalist
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21808209

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20838931

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19901653

Originally posted by inimalist
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17891564

EDIT:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17891564

one from 2009 that says postmenapausal women are more likely:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19185108

If you really want to have this argument you should probably read what I'm posting about it... It will save such redundancy

EDIT: whoops, only 5, one is a duplicate

Originally posted by inimalist
with what force did her head impact the pavement?

About 90n based upon the autopsy report describing the hematoma and subcontaneous but epi-cranial swelling and macrophage activity. 😬

Additionally, stronger necks reduce the head acceleration via active and passive tension (passive because muscle has a "relaxed" tension to it).

Originally posted by inimalist
I'm pretty sure most, if not all, of what I've said has been related to types of evidence and logic. Feel free to point out the things I've said that make you think I'm worried at all about gender equality or other such things

Cool story, bro.

Originally posted by inimalist
I posted 6 recent studies that were about gender differences in TBI survival and recovery. The only finding of those 6 that shows a disadvantage for women is the exact thing you quoted, that deals with post-menapausal women. [b]I posted this last page in fact. [/B]

facepalm

Read again what I quoted:

"CONCLUSIONS: Female sex (particularly those age > or =55 y) is associated independently with higher mortality in isolated severe TBI. This increased mortality of postmenopausal women after isolated TBI may suggest a hormonal influence and warrants further investigation"

If you read the study, you'd know that it wasn't just the "old ladies" but almost all age-groups that showed a statistically significant mortality rate for sever TBIs.

In other words the following:

If it was a man, all things equal, he had a better chance of surviving from multiple variables such as body mass being more lean, neck strength absorbing more of the momentum, and denser bones.

Originally posted by inimalist
You have now posted something to me which I think anyone who knows how to read evidence would take to suggest women have at least equal ability to recover and survive TBI, except maybe in one age demographic which is not relevant to the discussion. Only, you posted a deliberately selective quote from a single study among many.

please explain how this supports your point at all?

I already addressed this point of yours:

IDGAF about brain function recovery after 1 year: that's not the point. It's surviving the body slam. A larger, more muscled, and denser boned male, even if the same weight, would fair better simply due to the ellastic collision of their bodies being different. Note: the male body would absorb the impact better before the momentum kicked in for the head.

Originally posted by inimalist
in fact, one of the studies has a conclusion in its abstract that says literally the opposite of what this study claims. Science isnt about single studies, and it is pretty silly for you to repost links I've already provided because you can snip out something that makes it look like your point has legs.

[QUOTE=13670095]Originally posted by inimalist
[B]BTW:

If you really want to have this argument you should probably read what I'm posting about it... It will save such redundancy

That's my line. Stop hiding behind studies that are almost completely irrelevant to my point.

You've done this:

Me: Nah, women are more susceptible to injury abou 85% of the time on 20 markers used.

You: Nuh uh. It takes men longer to recover.

Me: The die more often than men.

You: Nuh uh. It takes men longer to recover.

Me: That's not my point. The men die less often than the women.

You: Nuh uh. It takes men longer to recover.

Me: 😬

Cool story, bro.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/17891564

"the relationship between gender and cognitive recovery 1 year following traumatic brain injury (TBI)."

Cool story, but almost completely irrelevant.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20838931

"The objective of this study was to assess the role of gender as an independent factor in cerebral oxygenation variations following red blood cell transfusion (RBCT)."

Cool story, but almost completely irrelevant.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19901653

"As peri- and postmenopausal women demonstrated improved survival, and premenopausal women did not..."

That proves you directly wrong in this particular case becaue Annie was not postmenopausal.

"There was no difference in mortality in premenopausal women compared with their male age-matched counterparts (AOR, 1.09; 95% CI, 0.99-1.21; p = 0.0917)."

I should not have to continue after that.

Originally posted by dadudemon
About 90n based upon the autopsy report describing the hematoma and subcontaneous but epi-cranial swelling and macrophage activity. 😬

would an average sized army man's head survive such an injury?

also, 1/5 ain't bad

EDIT:

2 of the 4 I posted deal specifically with surviving TBI:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21808209

CONCLUSIONS: Female gender is not an independent risk factor for in-hospital mortality after TBI.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19901653

CONCLUSIONS: Female gender is independently associated with reduced mortality and decreased complications after TBI.

and in another, the oxygenation of damaged areas is found to be higher in women, which would increase the chance of survival were the brain injured

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20838931

Originally posted by dadudemon
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19901653

"As peri- and postmenopausal women demonstrated improved survival, and premenopausal women did not..."

That proves you directly wrong in this particular case becaue Annie was not postmenopausal.

"There was no difference in mortality in premenopausal women compared with their male age-matched counterparts (AOR, 1.09; 95% CI, 0.99-1.21; p = 0.0917)."

so, women are at least as likely to survive...

what do you think i've been saying?