Originally posted by Bardock42
Surely you agree that the rules for passing should be assessed from time to time to ensure no mistakes in the thinking of the creators of the test?This is basically what is being suggested, with people advocating that the creators of the tests have made a mistake with some of their standards.
More meaningless rhetoric.
Test's in Math are not the same as combat.
End of story
I know people in the military on both sides of the border. Imo no, they should not lower the standards for women. Most men are unable to meet the requirements to work on the front lines. Even as a medic, women would have a hard time dragging men to safety. Being an elite..... that's even harder. Elite needs the best of the best, period.
Imp knows what he is talking about, anyone who says other wise, don't.
Originally posted by The Nuul
I know people in the military on both sides of the border. Imo no, they should not lower the standards for women. Most men are unable to meet the requirements to work on the front lines. Even as a medic, women would have a hard time dragging men to safety. Being an elite..... that's even harder. Elite needs the best of the best, period.Imp knows what he is talking about, anyone who says other wise, don't.
I agree, the standards are there for a reason, because when shit hits the fan, you fall back on your training. If your training has been altered and lessened over gender equality issue, everyone has been put in danger, men and women.
Originally posted by Bardock42
I agree with the second part. The first part is the question.I agree with Ush, we need to look at standards and test and see if they actually get us what we need. It's perfectly possible, that the test as it is designed excludes people based on inflated fitness requirements who bring skills that would be much more useful in the actual job.
I've no problem with reevaluation. If a flaw is found and there's a better path, sure
But lowering fitness and mental duress standards so more people can pass Special Forces training (which is a physically and mentally demanding job) makes for a "weaker" soldier overall, imo. This isn't just for women either as it's something like a 50%+ fail-rate for men as is. The tests are hard, for a reason.
Conversely, reevaluation might lead to standards actually needing to be raised. Spartan style, only the top of the top pass, regardless of gender.
I've also no problem with women in combat roles, iirc, test have shown that women are generally better at multitasking. Get them in the jet-fighters and controlling drones.
Originally posted by Bardock42
The issue is that these tests may be myopic because they were designed by men for men. The ramifications of that are hard to assess. I agree with you that the test should be equal, that is, if the fitness standard is lowered, it should be lowered for men as well.
Well yeah, but the problem is if they lower the standards and thus have to do it for both genders, doesn't that just lower the quality of soldiers we get?
I'd be curious to know though which parts of the course people feel should be removed or rethought of in order for the tests to better reflect what will be expected of you.
Originally posted by Surtur
Well yeah, but the problem is if they lower the standards and thus have to do it for both genders, doesn't that just lower the quality of soldiers we get?I'd be curious to know though which parts of the course people feel should be removed or rethought of in order for the tests to better reflect what will be expected of you.
Well, like I said, it's about lowering one aspect, in hopes to get better overall quality. It could be that this one aspect (in this case fitness) had been given too much weight, and therefore excluded candidates who would have performed better than some that exceeded at the one aspect.
Originally posted by Surtur
Though now if they DO change it..it really will come off like they changed it because women were too weak to pass the test, as opposed to just changing it because the overall standards are out of whack.
Yes, it would likely be interpreted that way. However that's not a good reason not to do something, obviously.
I know a female officer here in Canada in rl. Just had just started off as a rookie, night shift, some small country town. She pulled over a truck, she stepped out, as soon as she got near the truck, four men came out to rush her. She ran, hid, then called for back up. She just didn't have the time do defend herself. She was not mentally prepared and they would have beaten her before she could have drawn out her firearm.
This is just being a woman rookie cop, being in the military, okay some can do the job, but being in the elite.... no way. Sorry, women do not belong.
I also have to ask..I'm reading some comments from people in articles about this, from some of them..it seems to imply that in the past..the bar for something WAS lowered for women? Is there any truth to that? I've just seen a lot of comments to the tune of "don't lower the bar again". Makes me wonder when the bar was first lowered and why?
Determine how necessary each requirement is for performing the duties of special forces soldiers. If they're all necessary, then by no means should we lower them for the sake of "giving a fair chance." But if they're not absolutely necessary, then it might turn out that we're placing arbitrary rules that are keeping out lots of good potential recruits, male and female. That's my principle on this issue.
Why would the instructors or army want a less in shape person just because some people can't pass a test?
It's clearly doable. And it seems to be weeding out the mentally weak from the mentally strong. Are they lazy or just physically incapable of doing it? And if they're physically incapable of doing it at any stage then why should a reliance be put on them if/when shit hits the fan?
The army is not a place to go if you want an easy road. You tried and failed. End of discussion. If women can't do it then they shouldn't be in that specific branch. Not everything should be a feel good olympics. They need "the best" not people they have to cater to. And correct me if I'm wrong but women have completed this course before. Which should only make you take a look at the people who failed. They were not cut out for it when others passed. They either did not take it seriously or they were too weak. Why does the army need them?
An extreme example but you wouldn't change the course based on a couple overweight people failing. They were clearly not ready for it. The army wants people who can pass the passable test, not just anyone who can pass a gimped test. The army wants in shape people. What need would it have for lowering standards?
The simple fact is that some standards designed for men might be a totally inappropriate way to define if a woman is fit for the job.
To take an isolated example- the US army often has a bit of an obsession with straight bench-press style lifting. You don't actually need to bench-press to fight in combat but there is a vague correlation between that and a person's broader fitness (in a lot of people's opinions, not a very good one, but let's run with it). But that's going to give you the totally wrong result if you use the same benchmark for men and women, because the amount a woman would need to bench press to show she is broadly fit by that correlation is a lot less than a man would need to be able to do. So by applying the same standard, you are actually discriminating against women that could do the job well.
Now, if this was a weightlifting job (if you can imagine such a thing), then the standards would have to be the same as that is literally what the job is. Likewise, if the women here are failing on, say, marksmanship (and let's remember, their reasons for failing are not being made clear here), then that's a standard that should be identical and that's a good reason to fail them.
But broadly speaking, you cannot simplify the world into treating men and women in the exact same way and calling that equality. Equality is more nuanced than that- sometimes it involves adjustments to get a fair result.
Originally posted by Ushgarak
The simple fact is that some standards designed for men might be a totally inappropriate way to define if a woman is fit for the job.To take an isolated example- the US army often has a bit of an obsession with straight bench-press style lifting. You don't actually need to bench-press to fight in combat but there is a vague correlation between that and a person's broader fitness (in a lot of people's opinions, not a very good one, but let's run with it). But that's going to give you the totally wrong result if you use the same benchmark for men and women, because the amount a woman would need to bench press to show she is broadly fit by that correlation is a lot less than a man would need to be able to do. So by applying the same standard, you are actually discriminating against women that could do the job well.
Now, if this was a weightlifting job (if you can imagine such a thing), then the standards would have to be the same as that is literally what the job is. Likewise, if the women here are failing on, say, marksmanship (and let's remember, their reasons for failing are not being made clear here), then that's a standard that should be identical and that's a good reason to fail them.
But broadly speaking, you cannot simplify the world into treating men and women in the exact same way and calling that equality. Equality is more nuanced than that- sometimes it involves adjustments to get a fair result.
However, there are some actual operative requirements in special forces service for weight lifting (or weight bearing) ability. With all their gear, they're usually lugging around 50-100 lbs or more. A lot of women simply can't run with that kind of weight, and they shouldn't be admitted, but there are some who can and I say let them fight if they can.
That's not bench press, that's stamina (the SAS have a particular way of looking down on US special forces for this reason, as the SAS has a stamina focussed regime and doesn't care how much you can lift- they seem far more sensible).
Stamina does not really have a gender difference of the sort I describe so if a woman cannot run X distance bearing Y weight, like a man, that's a good reason to fail, because that is indeed something you directly need to be able to do.
But I used bench pressing itself as an example because that is a test where you literally need a different scale for men and women to get a useful result. We're not interested in how much they can lift but in how fit they are, and a fit woman would lift less than a fit man.