Female Soldiers More Likely To Be Raped Than Killed

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I myself could easily work with women in military duties. The fact is that some statistics show that a lot of military men cannot. If it were a case of the military saying:

"Here's the facts, the military does not condone rape, but we cannot guarantee it won't happen. We will take legal action against someone who rapes you, but be aware there is a risk that we cannot completely control."

and then a woman going into that situation knowing full well the dangers, then I can see your point. However, I think the military whitewashes the data. Even if they don't, once a rape occurs the women scream that it is a systemic problem and blame ALL men for the rape. Fact is, I don't trust the military to adequately punish the few rotten apples who do commit rape, and I don't trust the feminists to take a rational approach that focusses on catching and stopping the real offender.

I most certainly do not think women are too stupid or weak to protect themselves. However, in general men are bigger and stronger, physically, and I think it would be irresponsible in the extreme to place ANYONE in harms way when you know protective data.

You're twisting my words -- it would be as logical for me to say that based on your comments you believe that all female rape victims are all weak and stupid. I know you don't believe that, and neither do I.

I don't know about Finland, but here many businesses have a policy that says if a woman works a late shift at a store or restaurant, her supervisor or another worker must walk her to her car. I say that's common sense. A radical feminist says it's repressive. I say safety first and feminists who don't care if a woman gets raped as long as they can insult men second.

 

I do trust our military to do so, and the past has shown that they do take sexual offences in military very seriously. If they don't there is something systematically wrong with the system that needs to be fixed. As for the radical feminists I don't give a penny what they think. Let them scream and howl for all I care.

Nope, never heard of such policy. I don't think such policies are necessary but neither do I think they are overly repressive. I figure it might have something to do with the employer being partially responsible for any damages that occurs to their workers on their way home and therefore might be responsible in making reparations in cases of rape (I think in here that would be the case but I'm no lawyer so don't bet on my word on that one) and those reparations might be quite steep.

 

Assessment is a matter of perception and does not directly affect fats.

Which takes weight away from, "in the army."

Everyone's chance is equal when captured.

With a man it's rare, with a woman it's practically a given.

Sufficiently justified by practical reasons. If it's discriminatory, tough life. Isn't it unjust and discriminatory that the average woman is shorter and lighter than the average man? And that's not something a lawsuit or legislation could fix.

Another reason to keep idealistic girls away from it.

 

What facts? The fact that women are more likely to get raped than men? The fact that those rapes happen? Blocking women from the military is like sweeping the problem under the carpet, the women are not the ones doing anything criminal, it's the men. What happens to women if they are captured is irrelevant since when you are captured you are at the mercy of your captor no matter what gender you have. Women more likely to get raped? So what? The chances of getting killed are also quite high and in my book while raped is certainly a very bad and notorious thing, getting killed is a step worse.

Army is not all about field duty.

Some are just a lot less likely to be captured. When getting captured is more hypothetical than an actual likelyhood it gets increasingly irrelevant.

Nope. The soviets often used female soldiers, we did not rape everyone we captured during the winter war. The likelyhood of being raped might be higher than with men but it's not given.

The only practical reason given is the possibilty of getting rape which in itself is a very weak reason, you might as well argue that we should not use men in the military because they might get killed. Then there's of course the mild inconvenience of providing two set of showers for both genders which hardly constitutes a great impracticality. Nothing that constitutes enough of justify discriminatory actions.

There are "idealistic girls" who are able to handle the military and the army. Before you start lashing out judgements I suggest you try and meet some, you might actually learn something from how they view things.

If women could not handle miltiary enviorment there would not be women in the military. Why are there women there then? Are they idealistic or stupid or don't they just see the greater wisdom that you wish to impose upon them by keeping them away from the institution? I don't get it. What gives you such a greater prespective on things than them? What gives you any right to choose what career path they choose?

 

Every soldier knows the risks going into battle. I'm not saying that women soldiers are too dumb to understand the risks of combat operations. What was pointed out at the beginning of this thread was that there is an added risk -- a high likelihood of being assaulted by their OWN comrades. Now whether or not they are aware of that risk and willing to take it, the military commanders have a responsibility to their soldiers to keep them safe, regardless of how willing those soldiers are to take risks. If the Military command feels a particular situation is too risky for a particular soldier, then I think they are within their rights to take steps.

An analogous scenario would be placing a black soldier in with a troop from the Southern USA in the 1950s. No one is denigrating the black soldier or his skills or his right to pursue his career. Sadly, a number of his fellow soldiers are not enlightened as to the benefits of a multicultural armed service, and will almost certainly lynch him. It is not fair, it is not right, and if the brass knew exactly which soldiers would do the lynching they could take steps, but if they put the black soldier in all they will do is be able to punish the offenders -- it'll be too late for the black soldier. THEN the brass has to deal with the horrendous publicity such an event would engender. Rather than feel responsible for a man's death and deal with its fallout, they choose the lesser of two evils and keep the soldier on different duty.

It is unjust, unfair, and a result of a racist (or in the present thread) sexist society. Hopefully one day it will be fixed, just as the idea of a racially integrated military eventually caught on, but in the meantime I think vilifying people who just want to keep fellow humans safe is a bit over the top and unfair in and of itself.

 

The correct way to deal with the problem is naturally to weed out the rapists and not the women. Also T2Bruno kindly told us about the tight definitions the military has on rape and made the comparison to college parties. Are we to ban women from entering these parties too since inappropriate behaviour by overly eager men might follow?

I'm not against putting them on different kind of military duty and trying to minimize the potential rapes. What I am strongy against is effectively banning half the population from national defence and combat training because of their gender. Also I'd be interested to know how many of these assaults actually happen on active duty and how many are during nights at the mass etc. where such behaviour at that age is unfortunately very common outside the military too.

 

Interesting debate. By the way, do the surveys also have any data on male-on-male sexual harassment, so we can have a better ground for comparison? I've heard anecdotal stories from people who had served a while ago that could be defined as harassment if the rules are tight enough.

 

This is the best point made in the entire thread.

And before you go and "it's impossible to do it" then I can say no, it isn't. Neither Sweden or Israel have had a single documented case of rape within their armed forces and both have aplenty of women serving, both on the field and in support. Denying women the right to become a soldier is dumb, deal with the rapists instead.