Navy intends to let women serve on subs.........

[Pete]

Originally Posted by afchic

..... What would one of you all do if son came up to you and said, dad I don't want to play on the guys team, I want to play with the girls, ........

I don't know, I live in a house full of females. I got a male dog and sometimes we go out in the back yard just to get away from it all. Do guy stuff like throw the ball, run around and............

[ZonieDiver]

Originally Posted by Pete

I don't know, I live in a house full of females. I got a male dog and sometimes we go out in the back yard just to get away from it all. Do guy stuff like throw the ball, run around and............

I lived that way for years, Pete. Hell, even the two cats and one dog were female! (I'm not sure about the fish... how could you tell.) I frequently took a low profile on all this male-female stuff. That said, my younger daughter was one of two girls who competed on a Khoury League baseball team in Littleton, CO back around '92.

They were the only two girls in the entire league, and their team WON the championship. (However, that had less to do with having two girls on the team and more to do with having an 11 year old (whose birth certificate was the subject of more controversy than BHO's) who could throw an 85 mph fastball.

[Pete]

Originally Posted by afchic

With all this talk of gender issues, I wonder what you all think about women being at the service academies.

Women at VMI? Whats next? Men at the Citadel.

Spoken as someone who knows young lads at both schools.

That issue is settled but as long as afchic brought it up.

Don't have the link but there appears there seems to be a problem at the Naval school. The Navy is fixing the young cadet's eyes with surgery to give them all 20/20. In the past those with less vision volunteered for Sub duty. Now with 20/20 everyone appears to be going for pilot duty and volunteers for sub duty are dropping off.

Could sub duty become an assignment and not a "volunteer" duty? Could the dropoff in male volunteers be filled with female volunteers? Why go "assignment" when you have volunteers?

Will this become the path?

[echoes]

Originally Posted by Pete

I don't know, I live in a house full of females. I got a male dog and sometimes we go out in the back yard just to get away from it all. Do guy stuff like throw the ball, run around and............

Pete Sir...

Sorry for off the topic, but that visual is just, well, cute! I know, I know, SF Men are not "cute," but that takes the cake, IMVHO!!!

Okay, back to the topic...

Holly

[Richard]

I had a female pitcher on my otherwise male baseball team a few years back. Jess was a twin and her brother was her catcher. She was fiercely competetive and the team had no problems accepting her as a player.

The other teams chuckled when the season started - until she started pitching - she had a consistently accurate 87 mph fast ball and was a strong batter. She was a two-time all-conference player and female Athlete of the Year her senior year.

After graduation, she was recruited by Texas A&M where she threw the javelin in NCAA DIV1 track and field, and was a 3xAll-American for sports as well as an academic All-American for her grades.

She's now in medical school and wants to focus on sports medicine.

And so it goes...

Richard's $.02

[afchic]

Originally Posted by Pete

I don't know, I live in a house full of females. I got a male dog and sometimes we go out in the back yard just to get away from it all. Do guy stuff like throw the ball, run around and............

okay, say one of your daughters comes up to you and says "dad, i want to try out for such and such boys team." You know she has the skill to do so, she may just be one of the special ones that can actually compete with the boys. What do you tell her?

You have a daughter who is in the Navy, who has done her time in the nuke field on a ship and is one of the very best at what she does, as shown by her performance evaluations, and she comes to you for advice about wanting to get on a sub. What do you tell her?

[The Reaper]

Originally Posted by afchic

okay, say one of your daughters comes up to you and says "dad, i want to try out for such and such boys team." You know she has the skill to do so, she may just be one of the special ones that can actually compete with the boys. What do you tell her?

You have a daughter who is in the Navy, who has done her time in the nuke field on a ship and is one of the very best at what she does, as shown by her performance evaluations, and she comes to you for advice about wanting to get on a sub. What do you tell her?

Not trying to answer for Pete, but here is my .02.

Two different scenarios.

In the first, find out why she isn't trying out or playing for the girls' team. Virtually all sports have teams for each gender, at least at the Div I level. Why force the boys and their coach have to make accomodations and hard decisions? I also not not want to see her get hurt. Once boys hit puberty and catch up, she is going to get pounded. Up till then, say age 13 or so, she could probably compete.

In the second, I would ask her why she wants to be on a sub. If she has been successful as a surface sailor up to this point, why change? It isn't like the job is any more rewarding in a sub. Be the best she can as a surface nuke sailor. Why get locked up with 127 men for months at the time? Why would we ask 127 males to make accomodations for one female?

My children both realize that everyone is different (especially boys and girls), people have to live with rules, and life isn't fair.

As far as your earlier question about service academies, I have no issue with it at the public service schools, as long as they do not distract. If you can have private women's school, then I do not see an issue with a private men's service school.

Back to the OT, I do not think that the few females who are qualified and able to serve aboard subs are worth the turmoil, drama, and morale issues of putting them aboard submarines. Too much to lose, little to gain.

YMMV.

TR

[Pete]

Originally Posted by afchic

....... What do you tell her?

I'd tell them what I tell them now. "If you want it go for it, you don't get anything by sitting on your ass."

They learned well by the second grade about the "Terrific Kid" program. They started declining the "award" each year to let kids who "needed" it more to get it a second time. Something only has worth if you earn it.

[afchic]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

Not trying to answer for Pete, but here is my .02.

Two different scenarios.

In the first, find out why she isn't trying out or playing for the girls' team. Virtually all sports have teams for each gender, at least at the Div I level. Why force the boys and their coach have to make accomodations and hard decisions? I also not not want to see her get hurt. Once boys hit puberty and catch up, she is going to get pounded. Up till then, say age 13 or so, she could probably compete.

In the second, I would ask her why she wants to be on a sub. If she has been successful as a surface sailor up to this point, why change? It isn't like the job is any more rewarding in a sub. Be the best she can as a surface nuke sailor. Why get locked up with 127 men for months at the time? Why would we ask 127 males to make accomodations for one female?

My children both realize that everyone is different (especially boys and girls), people have to live with rules, and life isn't fair.

As far as your earlier question about service academies, I have no issue with it at the public service schools, as long as they do not distract. If you can have private women's school, then I do not see an issue with a private men's service school.

Back to the OT, I do not think that the few females who are qualified and able to serve aboard subs are worth the turmoil, drama, and morale issues of putting them aboard submarines. Too much to lose, little to gain.

YMMV.

TR

Are there any female only service academies? Not being sarcastic, just wondering. As for places like VMI etc.. I concede the point. As a private school they can do what they want. But for West Point, USAFA, Annapolis, that take Federal Money, that is another story all together.

FWIW I never agreed with the VMI decison. That poor girl got taken by the PC left and she got hung out to dry for it. Why put yourself in that position if you know you can't pass the standards? The fact that she had to sue to get in, then couldn't pass muster sent us back ages as far as I am concerned.

[jw74]

Originally Posted by Sacamuelas

What the hell is a "defensive guard" in football??? haha

Not to nitpick, but depending on the type of defense, a nose tackle is often called a nose guard

[Razor]

Originally Posted by afchic

With all this talk of gender issues, I wonder what you all think about women being at the service academies.

Ooh-ooh, pick me, pick me! Glad you brought up the point. I absolutely believe that women deserve to be at the federal service academies, as those schools provide as much as 25% of the officers in a year group that fill vacancies across all billets. Thus, if you want to sustain the officer corps in, using Army examples, the Transportation Corps, Corps of Engineers, Aviation, Ordnance or Quartermaster Corps, then you need to produce able young officers to take those positions.

However, speaking from (dated) experience, fraternization issues were rampant at USMA. There's a reason that members of the opposite sex aren't allowed to be in the same room with the door closed. Not that that stopped enterprising young cadets with creativity and will, as evidenced by the 2 females from my class that left for a year due to pregnancy, and one that joined my class in our senior year after a year's 'leave' for the same reason. Fortunately, most 'couples' were smarter or more careful, and used protection to avoid that hiccup. Then there's my classmate that had an affair with an LTC instructor, who left his wife and family for her after she graduated. There were other male instructor/female student affairs as well, but most were kept very quiet. Sadly, there were a number of sexual assault charges filed each year; some resulted in the male being disciplined, others in the female being countercharged and disciplined for filing false charges. All this is to say that there was plenty of gender-based problems to go around at USMA back then, and that was over a decade after the first class including women graduated. None of this should be used to say women don't belong at the academies, but to use the schools as an example of how gender doesn't play an influential role in such an enviroment isn't accurate.

Anecdotally, I can reply to the question about men playing on women's sports team and vice-versa. When I was in high school, one sport option for women in the fall was field hockey. My junior year, we had a male Spanish exchange student. Apparently, field hockey is a popular men's sport in Europe (go figure). So, being very talented in a sport he played for years growing up, the student convinced another US male from my class to go out for the team with him. There were no rules against it, so both were accepted onto the team. Our team dominated other all-girl teams that season, and won the state title. Soon after, amid a great deal of controversy, the state high school sports governing body proscribed boys from playing on girls sports teams. My sophmore year, a girl decided to play tackle football for another team in our league. She had to stop playing halfway through the season after taking some punishing hits in the first few games that caused some painful (but fortunately not serious or long-term) injuries. Seems guys on opposing teams had no issues with treating her like any other male player.

As for women playing on men's teams at the collegiate level, this example certainly doesn't stand as the only example of what will happen, but it obviously is a possibility that can adversely affect the effectiveness of the entire team, and even the entire program:

http://sports.espn.go.com/ncf/news/story?id=1737416

[plato]

Originally Posted by afchic

With all this talk of gender issues, I wonder what you all think about women being at the service academies.

I know what I think, and what I'm "supposed" to think, and I hope I have a reasonable estimate of the distance between the two.

I struggled to pass the final PT test, which seemed to last forever, and was a great test of endurance as well as strength, when the Academy was all male.

Speaking to someone from a class that graduated a few years later, I learned that the length of the ordeal was shortened so that more females could pass.

One of the hardest events of the test was picking up a person of your approximate weight from the ground, getting that person over your shoulder, and carrying that "wounded soldier" to safety. It was one of the last events, when you were near exhaustion, and was a test of the whole body.

The elimination of that particular event speaks to me.

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by afchic

With all this talk of gender issues....

I would point out that the issue just isn't about gender, it is also about gender identity.

The former is about differences between the sexes. The latter is about how those differences shape individuals' views of themselves as well as their interpersonal relationships, and how those views shape cultural views, social structures, and political practices.

IMHO, the discussion of women in combat should focus on both issues.

Just my $0.02.

[GratefulCitizen]

Concerning the whole physical comparison:
http://www.exrx.net/Testing/WeightLi...Standards.html

Compare the "novice" columns.

It's not just about possibilities.
Economics and timelines have to be considered.


18-25 year-old males can be conditioned rapidly.
Older men can get in pretty good shape, too...but it takes FOREVER.

Experienced/uninjured male athletes in their early 30s are generally more capable than their younger counterparts.
(However, it took a big time investment to get there, and a stack of chronic injuries are usually in tow.)

Given sufficient time, some women can achieve performance comparable to men.
The training time required to get a female on par with their male counterparts would be hard to justify under economic/timeline constraints.

[PSM]

Damn Wayback machine. I always return with less head hair and more nose hair!

Anyway, my visit to my high school years confirmed that we guys back then chased the cheerleaders WAAAAY more than the female discus throwers.

Then again, I do migrate down to the beach every women’s beach volleyball season. That must mean something.

Pat