Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
The Pentagon could be poised for a rapid about-face under the Trump administration, with the Obama administration's push for social reform surrendering to what could be an old-school emphasis on combat readiness and the spirit of the United States military, experts told FoxNews.com.
Under President Obama, the military sought to integrate transgender persons into the ranks, allow women into special operations forces and purge the nomenclature of gender-specific words, adopting what some critics say was a "politically correct" liberal agenda. That's a contrast to the traditional U.S. military approach.
In addition, some Navy ships have been named for civil rights activists. And while the Obama administration has taken an inclusive approach on some issues, it has also worked to minimize expressions of Christianity in the ranks. For example, several officers have been disciplined for displaying Bibles or gospel verses in their quarters.
Veterans and military experts told FoxNews.com that, while some of Obama's civil rights advancements may be locked in, neither Trump nor his choice for secretary of defense, Gen. James "Mad Dog" Mattis, are likely to make social experimentation a priority.
Source: Fox News
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:08PM
This story submission is just A LITTLE BIT right wing.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:14PM
What does "right wing" mean now? "Realistic"?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:16PM
It's a label that means exactly nothing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:24PM
realistic? Someone has an inflated ego...
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:52AM
I live in a city full of current and former military and work with many of those types as well, and the military's social experiments are the reason why the overwhelming majority of them got out.
Saying that men and women are physically equal and then putting both of them together on grueling marches and watching all the females fall out and end up getting free jeep rides, leaving the men to carry their rucks for them, really does something to the morale of your male force. They had no faith that things would improve and were wary of a military future in which it would be impossible to fart the wrong way without being hauled into Social Actions*.
Of course both men and women should serve in the military, but considering them physically equal is batshit-insane. Even my butch rugby-playing lesbo aunt acknowledges that fact and how silly leftist bullshit is becoming.
* Social Actions is always staffed by angry fat Black Shaneequas with tacky nail jobs, chips on their shoulders, and ferocious attitudes. It's as if they'd waited their entire lives to put Whitey in his place.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:31AM
"Even my butch rugby-playing lesbo aunt"
Wow, you have interesting relatives. My aunts were mostly boring old women, except for great-aunt Madeline who was retired from the CIA. But, every time senile old Aunt Madeline started talking interesting stuff, her keeper chased everyone out of the room. "Top secret, out out out!" My only real takeaway from all of that, is that she saw a lot of China.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:15PM
Can you really say you were surprised by this? After all, the story was submitted by our intrepid Runaway. 'Nuff said.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:28PM
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:29AM
It balances out the stuff submitted by aristarchus...
Um, no it doesn't. aristarchus hardly ever submits anything, and when he/she does, it is always about Peter Thiel, anyway. Runaway is always posting right-wing shit from the Moonie Times, or Faux News, or Brautwurstbite. Not really a balance, at all, really.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:29PM
I had conflicting thoughts on adding a counterpoint to this summary, but decided against it as it's pretty easy to see the agenda and perspective the summary is coming from...
TFA mostly uses quotes from someone who was/is a 'senior fellow for national security' at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Family_Research_Council [wikipedia.org]
But here's some other stuff...
https://thinkprogress.org/defense-secretary-mattis-women-lgbt-military-dodge-7f5ef4d85fed [thinkprogress.org]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by BK on Friday January 13 2017, @10:15PM
We see submissions approved from sources like CNN, NPR, NYT, WaPo, etc. all the time. These sources have a clear agenda although most agree that they lean but do not topple (CNN is pressing their luck there lately though...). Hell we've even had numerous approved stories from sites like Mother Jones and Common Dreams which are beloved by certain groups but far off into looney land from the perspectives of others. We seem to do this generally without a need for commentary or opposing viewpoints.
This story came from FoxNews. Like some of those mentioned above, this source has a well established viewpoint and agenda and leans... but does not topple.
If we wanted a truly balanced discussion we would followup any Mother Jones link with something from Breitbart... Or maybe infowars. Something to consider when deciding whether to accept a story....
Anyway, once you decide to accept the story, the place for commentary and counterpoints is in the comments. Kudos for getting it right.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:27AM
If we wanted a truly balanced discussion we would followup any Mother Jones link with something from Breitbart... Or maybe infowars
That is not even remotely balanced.
You thinking Mother Jones, which has a long reputable history, is equivalent to infowars or breitbart just reveals your position on the political spectrum.
There are left-wing sites that are just as nutty and lacking in journalistic ethics as breitbart and infowars, but you don't know their names because they are just not very popular. That kind of tabloid-level delusion is simply not particularly compatible with typical left values.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @04:24AM
We see submissions approved from sources like CNN, NPR, NYT, WaPo, etc. all the time. These sources have a clear agenda
No they do not have an agenda. They have biases, both editorial and due to the circumstances of the individual reporters. But they do not have an agenda. Fox has an agenda - to promote the republican party. We've seen that revealed via internal memos [wikipedia.org] that required reporting to be specifically slanted to favor republican party orthodoxy. All of those sites you've listed regularly criticize the left, especially when it comes to economic policies.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:37PM
We've seen that revealed via internal memos [wikipedia.org] that required reporting to be specifically slanted to favor republican party orthodoxy.
Note, that your linked source doesn't currently [wikipedia.org] say that. Maybe you were looking for a particular date [wikipedia.org]?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:46PM
Khallow, will you ever grow beyond simple literalism?
No there are no memos that say "support the republican party line."' There are memos that say "spin stories about X, Y and Z in this way" where "this way" is always the republican party line. Its particularly revealing when the direction of spin changes right as the republican party line changes direction.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday January 15 2017, @04:29AM
Khallow, will you ever grow beyond simple literalism?
When will you stop saying things that are "simple literal" false? It would not have been hard to avoid that particular pitfall.
There are memos that say "spin stories about X, Y and Z in this way" where "this way" is always the republican party line.
Sure, if I cherry pick the memos that follow the Republican party line, then they always follow the Republican party line. Funny how that works. I believe that's the Sex Panther fallacy.
Fox News is so biased, I wouldn't be surprised that they're running an overt pro-Republican party agenda. But I'm not clear how you're so certain other major media outlets aren't running political agendas of their own.
(Score: 2) by Bot on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:22PM
Right or left wing, it is incredible that the military were forbidden to show religious signs.
Not for ethic or religious reasons. It could well be some commie symbol.
The reasoning is, if someone goes to his superior and says "I am offended by corporal Bot's discrete 5x2 foot Christian cross decorated with real blood that he keeps in our room", the superior should kick the pussy out of the unit with the reason: whiner, unsuitable for team work, probably terrorist, and pussy.
Account abandoned.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:28PM
"Several officers have been disciplined for displaying Bibles or gospel verses in their quarters"
Disciplined for religious material in their own quarters? Hardly likely.
This is more claptrap trying to support the "persecuted Christians" meme that the religious right loves to spread.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:34PM
I assume TFA is referring to this:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/nov/28/monifa-sterling-marine-punished-for-displaying-bib/ [washingtontimes.com]
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:51PM
As usual, there is more than one side to a story, personally I've never been very impressed with The Washington Times. From http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-rodda/the-case-of-monifa-sterli_b_9028368.html [huffingtonpost.com] I think the headline says it all, but I've also pasted in the large central section of the long article:
The Case of Monifa Sterling: How to Turn a Bad Marine into a Persecuted Christian
...
The charges against Sterling resulted from several separate, unrelated incidents over the course of five months. These incidents included failing to go to her appointed place of duty, disrespecting a commissioned officer, and disobeying direct orders from her superiors to wear the proper uniform. These incidents had nothing to do with religion or religious freedom.
The most serious of the charges that Sterling was found guilty of were her failing to go to her appointed place of duty, and her disrespecting of a commissioned officer in relation to that incident. Sterling was assigned the duty of giving out passes to family members visiting Marines who had just returned from a deployment. This duty was to be for a few hours on a Sunday afternoon. Sterling claimed that she couldn’t perform this duty because she was on medication for migraines that made her drowsy, but, as the court-martial found, there was no reason that this medication would have interfered with Sterling performing this duty if she took it at night as prescribed. But, as Sterling admitted, she was not planning to take her medication as prescribed on that Sunday. She was planning to take it earlier. Her reason? She was going to church and the loud choir at the church service might bring on a migraine. Seriously, that was her excuse — that she planned to take her medication not as prescribed. Needless to say, this excuse didn’t work. The disrespecting of a commissioned officer occurred a few days before the Sunday on which Sterling was assigned to be on duty giving out the passes. Sterling refused to take the passes from the major who was trying to give them to her, an incident witnessed by a first sergeant who, when asked at the court-martial to describe Sterling’s behavior towards the major, said it was “the most disrespectful thing [he] had witnessed from a Marine of junior rank” to a commissioned officer in his over eighteen years of service.
Sterling’s defense for the charges against her regarding her disobeying direct orders to wear the proper uniform was also a medical excuse. Sterling claimed that she had a medical order, referred to as a “chit,” saying that she did not have to wear a particular uniform because of a medical device she needed to wear for a back problem. But when her superiors checked this out, they found it not to be true, and that there was no reason that Sterling couldn’t be in the “uniform of the day” like everybody else. Much of the court-martial was focused on this issue of Sterling’s medical “chit,” and the finding was that it did not excuse her from refusing to obey the orders of her superiors to change into the proper uniform.
There was also a third incident, in which Sterling refused to obey an order to remove signs on which were printed her interpretation of a Bible verse that she had put up in her work space. At her court-martial, Sterling was also found guilty of refusing to obey this order.
Of all the charges that Sterling was found guilty of at her court-martial, the charge of disobeying the order to remove the signs was not the most serious of the charges brought against her. In fact, as the transcript of the court-martial shows, the Bible verse incident received the least amount of attention at the court-martial. But now, thanks to the propaganda from fundamentalist Christian organizations and the right wing media, Sterling’s case has been turned into a case of outrageous Christian persecution. Anyone reading articles about this case on the internet would think that Sterling is a poor, persecuted Christian who was court-martialed for nothing more than posting a Bible verse on her desk.
...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:55AM
A woman named "Monifa"; her insistence on going to church on Sunday, a church with a "loud choir" (apparently loud enough to trigger a migraine); extremely disrespectful attitude and refusal to obey orders...
This sounds like a stereotypical "loud black woman" to me.
It's also quite shameful that the Washington Times actually lied in the story, claiming that she posted this Christian stuff in her "quarters" when in fact it was at her work space. There's a huge difference there.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:01AM
Marines have little tolerance for dirtbaggery, especially when it comes to their uniforms. Malingering is also a pretty serious offense. So is disrespecting your seniors, especially a commissioned officer.
Shitbags are hounded relentlessly in the military. What her case looks like to me was that they were already hounding her ass and opportunistically went after and tacked on the bible-verse thing.
Being a Black Woman does not grant one free license to shirk rules and regulations and sass their superiors -- although taking a look at her, she'd be a good fit for the Social Actions department.
(Score: 5, Touché) by frojack on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:06AM
The AC says:
personally I've never been very impressed with The Washington Times. From www.huffingtonpost....
Really?
/snort
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 1) by Chrontius on Saturday January 14 2017, @11:13AM
When the facts are on your side, pound on the facts.
ah, here it is:
"If you have the facts on your side, pound the facts. If you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have neither on your side, pound the table."
(Score: 1) by Type44Q on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:58PM
personally I've never been very impressed with The Washington Times
No?? LOLOLOLOL, they're run by the fucking Moonies, for Chrissake.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Pax on Friday January 13 2017, @10:09PM
um.........since is when is a lance corporal an officer?
Officer infers the commissioned types s a rule and not non commissioned ranks
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:12PM
And a work station isn't "quarters" either.
The referenced anecdote doesn't fit the original article's quote at all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:19PM
And it wasn't a Bible, it was a copy of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows". I mean, if it's fake news, why can't we all play?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Friday January 13 2017, @09:42PM
You even remotely scratch the surface of any one these "oppressed Christian" stories and there is a 150% chance that it's someone abusing their authority to oppress others and then whining when they're lightly reprimanded for it.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:36PM
The military is trained to kill people, to break and destroy stuff, and to enforce government's will on people around the world.
We aren't generally "socially acceptable" people. Military men and women aren't always included in social functions, in Hollyweird, or the state or city governments around the country. I invite all to read some Rudyard Kipling, maybe starting with 'Tommy'.
You - the great plural "you" including all of society - don't like the military very much. You use us, you abuse us, you blame us for your own failures.
The military IS NOT the place to play experimental social games.
Good military officers have been cashiered by the Obama administration, because they wouldn't sign on to this whole gay marriage bullshit. Any wise leader would have accepted that his military commanders just STFU and don't sound off on issues they disagree with. But, instead, good officers have been thrown out of the military because they couldn't give vocal, enthusiastic support to an inane policy. Worse, a policy that has no real military application.
There has been pressure on the Marine Corps, to commission some female combat officers. To date, no females have met the physical requirements to become combat officers. It will happen, sooner or later. But, there shouldn't be pressure on military officers to sign off on a female officer - or a black officer - or a white officer - or whatever. Officers need to meet requirements, if they can't meet the requirements, then they can't be officers. Simple as that.
Gender confused people like Bradley Manning seem to believe that the military owes them gender reassignment surgeries and treatments. Well - Mannin, a dishonored, convicted traitor, foregoes anything the military DID owe him. But, the military does NOT owe people whatever elective surgeries they might choose to have. The military has it's MEDICAL CORPS, it has no elective procedure corps.
Whatever else you may believe that O'Bummer has done right, or done wrong, he has done this nation a disservice by trying to force the military to change so drastically, so quickly.
Any military that loses it's customs and traditions, has lost it's bearings. A military with no bearings is no military at all. Eight more years of Obama policies may well have destroyed our military.
I don't really expect the average civilian to understand all of that. It may well be gibberish to most of you here. But, that doesn't change the facts.
The military is not, can not be, a social experimentation playground.
civilians need to make their experiments work out here in the civilian world, and only after their policies are PROVEN to work, should they ASK the military if those same policies might work in a military environment.
https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/2819 [gutenberg.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday January 13 2017, @09:43PM
Fuck you and your “gender confused” bullshit.
And have a nice Friday! :)
(Score: 4, Insightful) by acp_sn on Friday January 13 2017, @09:51PM
Do you prefer "metal illness"? Because thats probably a better description of the reality
(Score: 2) by acp_sn on Friday January 13 2017, @09:54PM
\m/
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @09:55PM
Do you even know any trans* folks? I do. Easily a third of my friends are, mostly FtM (talk about an invisible minority...). This isn't a mental illness, but seems to be some sort of birth defect. I'd be interested to see what the brain scans from Kevin, Riley, and Aaron (nee Katherine, Kristina, and Paige) look like, and would bet money if i had any that they look like stereotypical male brains.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:08PM
Dick Swaab [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:22PM
If a third of your friends are transgender, you probably live in California. Either you will vote to separate from the USA, or an earthquake will separate you, but either way the whole mentally ill lot of you will be out of or hair soon after the inauguration.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @11:37PM
Wisconsin, but thanks for playing :D Try again, dipfuck.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:45PM
The secession of California from the US is the on way I would stay in the former. I already am packing my bags of the latter.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:54PM
If you don't like this country, get the fuck out and leave, maybe Mexico will take you.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by NewNic on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:35AM
If California separated from the USA, the USA would be bankrupt very quickly:
1. The dollars that CA contributes to the federal budget.
2. Access to West Coast ports (LA and Oakland).
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:12AM
And Cali would be in a self-run race to see if it wanted to starve or die of thirst first. This is a fun game. Let's do Washington DC next.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:04AM
Wow, you're stupid. California is a huge agricultural producer and exporter. Water is indeed a problem but they get that from the Colorado River which constitutes the border between it and Arizona, so even in secession they'd be entitled to half of that, and could easily purchase the rest they needed since they're the 6th largest economy on the planet all by themselves and would have plenty of cash after not having to send any to Washington to subsidize the lazy ignorant fucks in the red states.
Honestly, I wish the rest of the nation would vote to kick California out (and give other states the option to leave to, so that Oregon and Washington would leave with them). It'd be funny as hell to see the rest of the nation crying the blues after their economy implodes, while "WestCoastia" (or whatever they end up calling themselves) becomes the richest nation on the planet. Then maybe they can offer to rejoin the union, but only with terms extremely preferential to the west coast states (i.e. they get to run the federal government by themselves). Of course, what's more likely to happen is that the northeast states will see what happened and rightfully realize it's the South that's bringing everyone down (along with a bunch of midwest states), and secede themselves, leaving the unproductive Southern states to turn into a 3rd-world nation that makes Mexico look like a world-leading economy.
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:24AM
I've been saying since eighth grade that the South won the Civil War by the backdoor; they got to stay in the Union. Fuck me, cut the fucking South loose already and, as you said, let them turn into a 3rd world basket case that makes Mexico look sane.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:28AM
Not in a free market where neighboring states treat them like the foreign country they are they couldn't. Water would quickly become so expensive that poor people wouldn't be able to afford it at all. As for food? Good luck growing it without water. That economy you're so proud of? Wouldn't last a year once basic staple prices went through the roof. I mean the riots caused by the poor being unable to afford what they absolutely need to live would be entertaining to us still in the US but that'd be the only entertainment being created in California by exit plus one year.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by aristarchus on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:38AM
Not in a free market where neighboring states treat them like the foreign country they are they couldn't.
Well, as Bugs Bunny would say, "This means War!" Funny how a seceded California would re-assert the territorial claims of the original California, and take the Colorado drainage as its sovereign right. And Oklahoma would fight over that? The Territories? The Nation? And you need to look into things like the Columbia. There are international water rights. Yes, I know, not enough water in Oklahoma for this idea to ever occur to anyone there. More likely to be drifting on thermals, looking out for that free lunch, as buzzards are wont to do.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday January 14 2017, @11:48AM
See, if you still hung out in IRC you'd know I've been in TN for just under two years now. Tons of water here. And it's far more fun to float over lake currents in my boat with a line or two in the water.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:05AM
California would be paradise on Earth if we could nuke Los Angles and San Francisco.
#NotAllCalifornians
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @05:22AM
Assholes!
Self-important shitheads
As far as the eye can see.
Pollution!
A sky turned orange
by traffic that you
wouldn't believe.
Worthless!
Egos and denial
Nobody is really
your friend.
Burn it!
Set it on fire
It's time to put it
to an end.
Burn LA!
Straight to the ground
We've had enough
of that worthless town.
Burn LA!
It's a total disgrace.
Engulf it in flames
and lay it to waste.
Violence!
You might get shot
Either by a Crip
or an aggressive cop.
Endless!
A concrete sprawl
Made up of liquor stores
and porno shops.
Crowded!
People crammed together
There's barely any room to die.
End it!
Put it to the torch
Light it up and wave goodbye.
Burn LA!
Straight to the ground
We've had enough
of that worthless town.
Burn LA!
It's a total disgrace.
Engulf it in flames
and lay it to waste.
Compton and Watts showed
the power of the mob but they
weren't prepared to finish the job
Incinerate Hollywood
and Beverly Hills
Cure California of all of its ills.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday January 13 2017, @10:00PM
What we have to establish is whether or not gender is a social construct. Are men and women different? Maybe it's just me, but I don't think gender is a social construct. I'm pretty sure men and women are different.
If gender is, in fact, just a social construct, then sure, go for “mental illness.”
(Score: 3, Insightful) by BK on Friday January 13 2017, @11:03PM
Do you ever wonder whether a male or female dog or cat you see might be transgendered? How about a chicken? I certainly don't. But it occurs to me that if the standard of making this determination is not by looking at the animal, but by comparing brain scans of representative animals to our test animal, that something has gone horribly wrong. Do you know what a chicken sexer [wikipedia.org] is? Have they been doing it wrong all along?
Gender is really important to both domestic and to wild animals. It defines their place in the natural order. It affects how they will grow and what they can do. It defines how they are treated by humans if domesticated.
In recent years there has been an attempt to redefine gender... for humans... into a thing not of physical morphology but of 'identity'. There has been an effort to place identity above morphology. That's interesting but it has confused the issues. Identity is really important and needs its own words and identifications separate and distinct from the words we use to describe the physical features of animals. Anything else invites confusion and even a degree of hostility.
Circling back to your point, the issue is not about whether gender or sex is a social construct... it's not. It's morphological and it is not strictly binary. (though there are social constructs that are built up around the morphology) But identity is something else. If identity is a thing of the mind then there could well be illnesses associated with it.
The problem for those with the identity condition we currently mislabel (confusingly) as 'trans-gendered' is that their 'identity' - the way they see themselves - is different from the morphological facts.
Let me give an example of a morphology / identity mismatch:
(no Red Bull jokes kids)
So... Am I a deformed but otherwise normal winged human? Am I confused. If I demand that you make space in the elevator for my wings am I rude? Deranged? If I demand that human society attach wings to me am I being reasonable? Should society pay for this or should I? Should society treat me the way (I envision) normal winged humans are treated? Should this change if I manage to have my wings attached?
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 2, Touché) by kurenai.tsubasa on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:05AM
I didn't realize we were talking about gelflings [wikia.com] or animals.
But it occurs to me that if the standard of making this determination is not by looking at the animal, but by comparing brain scans of representative animals to our test animal, that something has gone horribly wrong.
How does that follow? I'm going to conjecture that it's almost certain that we can find similar differences in the brains of other mammals that have the same correlations to mental sex. Why would something have gone horribly wrong for us to be giving brain scans to animals? I'll conjecture that we don't do it for the same reason we don't give human infants brain scans to determine brain sex at birth. There's very little utility to doing so.
For an animal, it's uncertain what would be gain by determining that the subject as a brain sex that opposite of their reproductive sex. However, let's suppose we did make such a determination. What would the animal's keepers change? I'm going to place farm animals aside. If a pet's owner is the crazy kind of pet owner that dresses their pet up, does the animal really care whether it's wearing clothing indicative of the common manner of dressing for a human of one gender or the other? Plus, if a pet is really that adamant about not wearing certain clothes but likes wearing other clothes, I'm not certain that most pet owners would make it a big moral issue about how the pet “should” be dressed, mostly because it's just not normal for animals to be in clothing!
Forgive me for being small minded, but I think we can assume that human and gelfling social habits are vastly more complicated than just about any animal out there, including gorillas.
(I'm going to recombine some parts of your post here.)
In recent years there has been an attempt to redefine gender... for humans... into a thing not of physical morphology but of 'identity'…. The problem for those with the identity condition we currently mislabel (confusingly) as 'trans-gendered' is that their 'identity' - the way they see themselves - is different from the morphological facts.
Do you regularly go around performing the Crocodile Dundee maneuver? How are you sure what another person's reproductive gender is? Are the morphological facts you're talking about reproductive sex, genetic sex, assigned sex at birth, or something else?
The Apache attack copter go-to example (remembering to be sensitive of our very own Mighty Apache Attack Copter) leads us here:
So... Am I a deformed but otherwise normal winged human?
You're probably a female gelfling.
Am I confused[?]
No, you sound pretty adamant about being a female gelfling. That doesn't strike me as being confused at all.
If I demand that you make space in the elevator for my wings am I rude? Deranged?
You're being unreasonable. You seem to be a pre-flight-op female gelfling. I'll offer my sympathies and encouragement as you save up for surgery to buy your wings, but until you have wings, nobody's going to afford you all of the space required by woman displaying her full wingspan. I'm pretty sure that's considered immodest at any rate, so even though most gelfling women have fully functional wings, it may in fact be extremely rude to open one's full wingspan in public, especially a confined space like an elevator. (I don't know, maybe those damned kids go around with their wings on full display in their crop tops these days. Disgraceful! They also need to get off my lawn!)
If I demand that human society attach wings to me am I being reasonable? Should society pay for this or should I?
Ok, so we've established that you're a female gelfling. You tell me. Is it normal in Thra for medicaid to pay for female gelflings who weren't born with functional wings to obtain a similar surgery in order to become flight-capable? If that's the case, then sure, you're being reasonable. However, if gelfling medicaid is like human medicaid, it probably won't cover an operation like that. You'll have to live with an unfortunate birth defect that leaves you flightless just like any other female gelfling not born capable of flight.
Should society treat me the way (I envision) normal winged humans are treated?
I don't see why not. In the words of Mr. Trump, “There have been so few problems.” How are flightless female gelflings treated?
If we're coming back around to the flight aspect, perhaps you've found some allies with female gelflings who, because of a variety of birth defects, were born without the ability to fly. Personally I think that acrobatic ballet is overrated. Plus, I would think that many gelfling women who don't have that perfect, stereotypical, petite frame but are otherwise capable of flight aren't very represented in acrobatic ballet. Perhaps it would help to popularize competitive hang gliding?
Should this change if I manage to have my wings attached?
Not being an expert on gelflings (as a xenosociologist, I'm more familiar with the lizard people), I'm sorry I'm not sure how to answer that.
Gelflings are an interesting study in gender, I'll admit. I think I have problems not having a female reproductive system! I would absolutely be beside myself if I were a gelfling! If I could conjecture, being born flightless must be crushing for any gelfling with a female brain sex. I can't imagine the pain that must cause.
Did you want to talk about humans or should we continue talking about gelflings?
Or did I completely miss a point that was obvious to you because you believe you can instantly and completely accurately determine somebody's “real gender” by sight alone?
(Score: 2) by BK on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:36PM
Forgot about that... lol.
Safe to say, no. Should that be an acceptable social custom?
In the context of your question, "reproductive sex" is the most correct answer. I would never use those descriptors in reference to a living thing in any other way.
I can usually tell once I can see the distinguishing visually apparent features. Again this can be non-binary so a tiny fraction of cases will be indeterminate (in fact, indications could be "both", "neither", or "something else"...) even after close inspection. Some humans have themselves surgically altered to confuse any observers.
How insensitive -- and clearly you weren't listening. I'm a regular winged human. At least get the species right.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Sunday January 15 2017, @02:37AM
Safe to say, no.
Why? Afraid your ability to spot somebody's “real” gender isn't as good as you hope it is?
Some humans have themselves surgically altered to confuse any observers.
Are you prepared for the possibility that no surgery is required for a really good woman suit?
I'm a regular winged human.
Good luck then. I assume you also believe that human women are imaginary creatures as well!
(Score: 2) by BK on Sunday January 15 2017, @04:50AM
It just never seemed like the right thing to do.
If you read what I wrote rather than what you think I wrote, you'll find that I am prepared and am not especially bothered by this.
One of the hardest parts about talking about serious things when there is also serious disagreement is maintaining a degree of respect, or at least the appearance. If you want to know what I believe ask me. You may not like the answer but I will share. Comments like your last, and even the ones before, where you call names and attempt to pin me with ideas that are not mine (but might be yours?) do nothing to further the conversation or enlighten a reader.
If you don't want to take part in discussion of serious things... then don't.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 2) by cubancigar11 on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:49PM
Here is some science: Sexuality and Gender [thenewatlantis.com]
Page 8, Executive Summary:
Page 114, Conclusion:
Page 115:
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Monday January 16 2017, @07:55PM
I really appreciate that you know what a gelfling is.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by SanityCheck on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:43PM
"What we have to establish is whether or not gender is a social construct. Are men and women different?"
To me just entertaining that question gives these buffoons undeserved legitimacy. Their belief that feelings trump facts is beyond comical, it is in fact ludicrous and very scary.
Though yes, if we treat everyone as if there were no differences between genders, in few million years there probably would not be because of pressures such nonsense would put on our evolutionary path. We would have gained nothing from it, and it would create shit ton of problems in the mean time.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:41PM
Can't believe someone wasted a mod point on you - it's probably a personal thing. There is much more deserving flambait elsewhere in this thread. ;^) One fascist wants to put a bullet in my head - you just want to fuck me!
Which reminds me. Most Democrats seem to want to kill Russians these days. Trump likes to fuck Russians. Make love, not war, right? ROFLMAO
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:48PM
You - the great plural "you" including all of society - don't like the military very much. You use us, you abuse us, you blame us for your own failures.
And YOU, the military - which is an all-volunteer force - willingly signed up to be used and abused by the government of the day for whatever pet peeve they have today. YOU do not have the common intelligence to understand that you're not fighting for worthy ideals, values or 'freedom', instead you entered an organization that has a single purpose: execute the orders of the government of the day, whatever they are. And above all, execute them blindly, don't think for yourself.
YOU have no right to complain whatsoever; you signed up to be a tool for those in power. So do your 'duty': shut up, get on your knees, swallow and say "thank you sir, can I have some more".
There is no honor whatsoever in enlisting in the military! None whatsoever! You should be ashamed of yourself!
(Score: 4, Informative) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @09:53PM
Be fair, most of the people who "volunteered" for the military did it because there isn't shit for them in their hometowns, and I have to wonder if it was engineered to be this way. In other words, make communities that just HAPPEN to be primarily black or Hispanic into shitholes on purpose so they'll "volunteer" for the military in the same way a homeless woman might "volunteer" for what is euphemistically called "sex work."
That said, Runaway himself is from a different situation and most of what you said applies. I will add that the disgust in his post is palpable; he reeeeeally hates "civilians," let alone trans* people, and is using his "vet cred" to shit on them. Classy as a long, wet, muddy beer fart in a concert hall as always, Runaway.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:54PM
"government of the day"
That is where you err. We are sworn to uphold the constitution, first and foremost. Then we are sworn to obey congress. The Commander in Chief doesn't pay our wages, congress does. Obama is not the military's master, congress is.
Obama took a lot of liberties with the military that were simply wrong.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @09:58PM
If you're a good little soldier, you know that you have to obey your commander. The head of the government of the day is also the "Commander in Chief". Either you're not military, or you're advocating insubordination or mutiny and deserve some time in the brig!
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:09PM
"good little soldiers" know that they must obey LAWFUL ORDERS. Have you forgotten the lessons of My Lai? Have you ever heard of My Lai?
Oh, I missed Colburn's death. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/16/world/asia/larry-colburn-my-lai-massacre-dies.html [nytimes.com]
Rest in peace, Soldier.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:35PM
Was it "lawful orders" when that young blonde Specialist at Guantanamo (in the famous photo) had those terrorist suspects naked on a leash and collar like dogs? I'd say that at the time the entire complex was acting under orders. It was to break the enemy to get information. However, when the photos came out, it provoked a backlash. That lowly Specialist was deemed to have acted on her own, and anyway, if they had been orders, presumably the govt was not on the hook for what she did because it was her duty to decide the orders were unlawful
and to not follow them. So I can see where the lawful order business is to prevent outright massacres and other war crimes, but I can also see that it is a useful way for the govt to deflect responsibility onto lower ranking personnel for actions they took under command. Hey, not the Army's fault, it's *that girl's* fault!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:46PM
Those were not lawful orders. Pretty much everything that happened at Abu Ghraib is contrary to everything the military has taught it's troops since - damned near forever. Blame that shit on George Bush and his legal corps trying to find excuses to justify torture. And, I don't let anyone in the chain of command off the hook on that. The blonde in the photos needed to serve prison time, in the cell across from Bush.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by NewNic on Friday January 13 2017, @11:39PM
But you do let them off the hook, because the whole chain of command should have served prison time. Do you think that the officers all the way up the hierarchy did not know what was going on? So why are Bush and the blonde the only people you say should serve time?
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:47PM
Uhhhh - please re-read the post you responded to. I said the blonde needs to be in prison, right alongside the former president. I don't see any suggestion in my post that the lieutenants, colonels, and generals in between the top and the bottom of the chain of command should be exonerated.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NewNic on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:03AM
Uh, I did read it, carefully. Perhaps you should re-read my post.
I was commenting on your omission, which I felt was informative (perhaps showing implicit biases) rather than what you included.
It would have taken less words to write that the whole chain of command should go to prison than the way you overtly expressed that Bush and the blonde should have been punished. For example, instead of:
"And, I don't let anyone in the chain of command off the hook on that. The blonde in the photos needed to serve prison time, in the cell across from Bush."
you could have written:
The whole chain of command, from the blonde in the photos to Bush needed to serve prison time
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:47AM
No, it's a direct result of what was decided at Nuremberg. Go educate yourself.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @04:21AM
That may be where it *originated*, but that doesn't explain why the USA chooses to apply that language *to its own military* to this day.
Think about the reasons I gave when I wrote my post. One of the benefits is that the US military can absolve itself as an organization of responsibility for atrocities by claiming the people underneath their commanding officer are personally responsible for those atrocities. It's a way of limiting the military's liability. Try using your brain to THINK.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:05PM
Be serious man, when unlawful orders are given, they are made lawful retroactively if your side wins. This whole "uphold and protect the constitution" has had long enough of a run, let's let that dumb retort retire now, please.
Oh, and the CinC DOES pay your wages, when there is a government shutdown, like your nutty right-wing friends pulled a couple of years ago, you stopped getting paid. You aren't paid by congress, you're paid by the USG. Congress just controls whether or not the USG gets the money to pay you.
Come on man, you surely must be able to do better... At least pretend you've got more brain processing power than a goldfish! At least *try* to not live up to the stereotype of a mindless drone/hammer in the hands of the Government of the Day.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:31PM
This whole "uphold and protect the constitution" has had long enough of a run, let's let that dumb retort retire now, please.
So - the military is just a mercenary mob? Wow, I learn something new every day.
(Score: 2) by linuxrocks123 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:10PM
It's clear from the anecdotes and testimonies that have managed to escape the military's internal workings that the military is hell on Earth:
- You are sworn to blindly obey petty tyrants.
- Said petty tyrants play sick psychological torture games on you whenever they feel like it.
- You have very few rights.
- What few rights you do have are protected by biased, petty-tyrant-packed military courts, with no civilian supervision other than the Supreme Court.
- The "culture" of the military consists essentially of various forms of institutionalized Stockholm syndrome.
- Oh yeah: if you're ever given real work to do, you're likely to die violently.
If I were drafted for Vietnam, and I couldn't get out of it, I very well might have taken the five year prison sentence instead of acquiescing to being cast into that hell.
Now, in our culture, we're supposed to revere military veterans. I agree we should, but I have my own reasons for why:
Military veterans aren't necessarily brave, they aren't necessarily intelligent, they aren't necessarily noble. They aren't even necessarily functional individuals, at least not after their service has given them PTSD and other mental problems.
We should revere military veterans because they did a job that no one in his right mind would want to do and that, if the world were a better place, no one would have to do. Veterans are the living embodiment of the Utilitarian tortured child thought experiment.
Interestingly, the sick "culture" of the military, where superiors can get away with treating their subordinates like total shit, has made many veterans' hellish jobs even more hellish. To respect veterans, we need to smash the military's "culture" from the top down, just like the federal government smashed the South's Jim Crow "culture" in the 60s.
Social experiments in the military? Ha. The military is one giant, unsupervised, unintentional Milgram experiment in action. Fix that, and everything else will fall into place.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:37PM
I disagree with your perspective, but some of your points are decent.
I'll state here again, that the military is a tool of congress. Sometimes, congress uses it's tools wisely, but more often, congress uses it's tools foolishly.
Vietnam had little real justification. More, Vietnam was lost by politicians meddling in affairs that they didn't understand. Iraq was another misuse of the military. Afghanistan was a proper case for the use of the military, but the tool was used incorrectly.
Blame your elected officials when the military is used improperly, don't blame the military.
You've earned a nod of respect, by reason that you recognize that the military might be necessary, and that soldiers don't deserve to be shit on for being soldiers. But, I believe military men to be some better than you paint them. You're right, we aren't all real smart, we aren't all heroes, etc. But, each and every person who has worn a uniform has demonstrated at least the willingness to step up when the shit hits the fan.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:31PM
No, the AC's right. That "uphold and defend the constitution" and "obey lawful orders only" schtick is only a dodge, an attempt to have your cake and eat it, too. No wet-behind-the-ears private is going to look the commander in the eye and refuse to massacre the villagers because "that's an unlawful order, sir!" Puh-lease.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:05AM
At My Lai, there wasn't just a commander and a couple wet-behind-the-ears privates. I would have to look for specifics, but I can say that there were almost certainly some sergeants, some of them with years, maybe even decades of service. Among the people who acted to end the massacre were a spec 4, and a warrant officer. A spec 4 shorhorned in between corporal (discontinued in the Army, I believe) and sergeant. It might be reasonable to say that a tech 4 has replaced corporals - that is, the next step up from private first class.
But, all of that command structure aside, let me ask you Phoenix. Some lieutenant orders you to put your weapon to an old man's head and pull the trigger, do you obey? Are you going to commit murder, at the order of some mere lieutenant? How about a colonel? A general? Do you even question the order to murder? Or, are you afraid of the uniform?
(Score: 1) by charon on Saturday January 14 2017, @05:53AM
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @04:18PM
My Lai wasn't combat. My Lai was a massacre of unarmed civilians. Much the same as the massacre at Wounded Knee.
(Score: 1) by charon on Saturday January 14 2017, @05:28PM
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Saturday January 14 2017, @10:48AM
Do you obey orders? Illegal orders? Immoral orders? Suicidal orders? This is a surprisingly difficult question, for a whole pile of reasons.
- Depending on the situation, there may be no time to thing - if you're under fire, for example.
- An individual or even a unit in the field sees only a very small part of the larger context. In my training, we were given a scenario where we (a small unit) were ordered leave cover, for no good reason that we could see. Suicide, stupid REMF with no clue, right? Wrong, it turned out that we were serving as bait in a larger plan, and by endangering our lives would save a whole pile of other people. See the first point above: command didn't have time to hold a philosophical discussion with us; they just needed us to follow orders.
- It's the military, which is not a democracy. People under massive stress must be trained to follow orders, otherwise your military will be utterly ineffective.
That said, officers are held to a higher standard. As an officer, you are expected to do all of the above, plus also filter for illegal orders. It is your duty to disobey illegal orders, while immediately obeying all legal orders. With little time to think, knowing only a small part of the context, that is not an easy standard to meet.
Next to last, war is not nice, it is not civilized. Really, there are no rules other than "win". Geneva conventions, domestic laws - all of that can and does go by the wayside from time to time. If you find yourself in a situation where blowing away a grandma will save the lives of you and your unit, odds are you're going to blow away grandma. If your green-behind-the-ears 2nd Lt objects, it's called "fragging".
Which brings us to last: In order to kill people, you first have to dehumanize them. If the enemy is subhuman, dinks, cockroaches, whatever you've mentally turned them into so that you (as an otherwise normal human being) can kill them, then it's easy to slip over into atrocities. Kill all the cockroaches for the betterment of planet. That doesn't excuse My Lai and other sordid events, but it does explain them.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1) by Chrontius on Saturday January 14 2017, @11:46AM
You don't always know who's got ice water in their veins ahead of time. Which is a shame - if you did, you'd get a lot less "shoot 'em all and let God sort it out" orders.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday January 13 2017, @10:24PM
> Obama is not the military's master, congress is
Factually incorrect, courtesy of the constitution you're sworn to defend.
The Commander In Chief is the boss of the US military, regardless of whether you're volunteer, conscript, drafted, paid, unpaid...
If you question the chain of command, you are a worse soldier than the weakest or dumbest gay, female or transgender soldier, and a shame to the people who preceded you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:33PM
Smackitty smack smack! Makes me wonder if Runaway isn't just some shill account pretending to be a strongman... stupid anonymous internet making me question the legitimacy of every single goddamn thing!!
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @10:39PM
Nope, pretty sure this is 100% genuine. A lot of ex-military his age talk like this.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:00PM
The root comment reads like it was written by a jilted veteran who didn't get exactly what he expected he'd get when he signed on the dotted line and is now bitter.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:51PM
Who, exactly, commissions officers, warrant officers, senior NCO's, ships, and units? Commissions come from congress. Ultimately, all pay comes from congress. Congress authorizes wars, congress signs peace treaties. President Washington didn't create the Marine Corps, congress did. No president disbanded the Navy, congress did. And, no president re-created the Navy later, congress did that. Congress is the military's master - the Commander in Chief is but the highest officer within that military.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:08PM
The highest officer that can command the military to take actions that start a war or are a war in all but name. Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, and Cambodia all come to mind.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Grenada [wikipedia.org]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Menu [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:55AM
Absolutely not true. Not true at all. You are allowed to question orders from a superior officer. But you must follow the chain of command when stating your dissent. In my experience, military types really hate it when you don't follow and respect the chain of command.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:40AM
Let me rephrase my point to clarify for you:
- You are required to question orders which you believe to be unlawful (going to the hierarchy for this).
- You are allowed to question the fitness of your commanders to be above you in the hierarchy , if you can present facts supporting their incompetence or improper behavior.
BUT
- Outside of those two cases, you are not to question the chain of command itself. The president is the boss, period. The admiral or general is the sub-boss, period. And so on until it gets down to you. You don't get argue why or how those people are where they are, you either follow lawful orders, or leave the service.
(Score: 2) by n1 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:53PM
The CIA has much more experience in social experiments anyway... The military should stick to being test subjects for the chemical/drug based psychological experiments. Because there's a long history of that, so it's practically tradition at this point.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:58PM
Ted Kazynski (the Unabomber) was an MkUltra test subject before he became a professor then had his break down and hid in the woods for years before deciding to blow random people up because his favorite meadow got turning into a mining town or something.
Lot of fucked up shit gone down cuzza gubment.
(Score: 1, Troll) by ikanreed on Friday January 13 2017, @09:53PM
Oh look, here's the shitfuck who submitted this trainwreck.
Yes, we know. You're very committed to your cult of action for action's sake.
We also know that you view traditionalism(not just for gender roles) as a source of power, because you're not very bright.
Here's the thing: you will never be satisfied. You are the kind of authoritarian shitbag who would sacrifice every single value you posses in the name of a pragmatism that you haven't even meaningfully demonstrated exists.
Your politics have no redeeming value, Runaway. You're shit. Fuck you. And please downmod me for calling our petty local fascist out on what he is. Worthless. Nazi. Scum.
(Score: 1, Redundant) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @09:56PM
Sorry, my finger slipped and hit +1 Insightful instead.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @09:57PM
So proud - you can't refute anything I say, so you sink to personal attacks. You're doing great, man!
(Score: 1, Troll) by ikanreed on Friday January 13 2017, @10:03PM
I don't need to refute what you've said. Giving nazi shitfucks time of day got us here in the first place. You are due no fucking respect anymore.
If you're going to pay attention to a nazi, it ought to either have a well-honed blade or a recently discarded shell casing.
Evil doesn't warrant debate.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:11PM
You've been reading to much MSM. Every day, I look in my news feeds, and some fuckwad is declaring that nazism has won in America, because Trump won the election. Step away from the propaganda, son.
(Score: 0, Troll) by ikanreed on Friday January 13 2017, @10:19PM
No, no. Trump is a shitty pseudofascist, and that reeked from 2015 and only someone who's never studied anything about fascism would fail to recognize that. He's not really a nazi.
But I am saying based on the things you personally have said, you're a nazi who doesn't deserve polite debate, but probably a bullet in the head. There are no good nazis, and you really aren't a good person and fuck you for who you are, you nazi shitstain.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:24PM
"but probably a bullet in the head"
I hear the pot calling the bone china black . . . . .
Stated another way, you are projecting.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Friday January 13 2017, @10:37PM
No, it's pretty much just Nazis.
The rest of us aren't vile monsters for the sake of preserving an imagined past.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:38PM
Nope, not projection. What you are witnessing is anger resulting in overblown statements. Runaway, you often have decent points but you really are deep into the conservative propaganda. Its up to every fish to realize they're in a bowl, so until you can realize that (and all the anger you get directed your way should paint you some clues...) you'll just keep getting yelled at while you cruise along thinking everyone else is a punk kid that doesn't know any better. Old people stuck in their ways are the WORST, at least have the decency to attempt self-reflection because at your age its about time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:37PM
ikan, Observe the "Do Not Feed the Trolls" sign. Your making it worse not better :-/
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:16PM
No, you don't need to refute anything. What you should do instead of end your life, it clearly has less value.
I'd rather have actual SS posting on this site than see another one of your retarded remarks.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Saturday January 14 2017, @05:10AM
Oh no. A Nazi apologist is sad that I'm mean to nazis :(.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @05:32AM
Nazi nazi nazi nazi nazi nazi nazi!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Genius. Add in "9/11 9/11 9/11 9/11 9/11" and "This is about child porn!" to further strengthen your argument.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Spook brat on Friday January 13 2017, @09:59PM
A counterpoint to your argument: the military is [terminallance.com]gay. [terminallance.com]
Honestly, when I was in no one in my unit cared one way or another about other soldiers' sexual preferences. We were all pointing our firearms the same direction and all wearing the same colors. We were not there to have sex with each other, there was a job to do. We've already crossed the threshold of mixing men and women in the armed forces; letting people admit that they are homosexual would be better for national security (less likelihood of being blackmailed). If they can meet the physical requirements (several females in my training unit met the male standards), let them do the job.
Travel the galaxy! Meet fascinating life forms... And kill them [schlockmercenary.com]
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:22PM
Your counter point doesn't seem to be very counter to my own point. You will note that I've not claimed that homosexuals are unfit for duty - my complaint is that the administration is willing to sacrifice proven, good warriors, in the interest of promoting gays.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:44PM
"Proven, good warriors" can become a liability if their subordinates don't respect them, or if those leaders cause undue friction where there shouldn't be any. Also legally, the military doesn't want lawsuits just because some general is a tool.
Oh, and there are plenty of other good proven warriors. Jesus, your "warrior" culture is the problem. There is no need for that bullshit, that group of Russian women in WWII who were badass snipers probably had zero of that machismo bullshit.... It can actually hurt morale and cause more extreme PTSD as soldiers try to "tough it out".
You have a general viewpoint of the world that is very skewed, and you put zero effort into educating yourself about how things and people really work.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:16PM
"that group of Russian women in WWII who were badass snipers probably had zero of that machismo bullshit"
That part of your post is perfectly true. Those women were warriors. Machismo and warrior are not synonyms. Now, maybe you want to go look up the definitions of those words?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:37AM
Lol, you really want to take on the position that there isn't a bunch of machismo bullshit in the military? Really? I wasn't equating "warrior" with "machismo" at all, but your post history suggests you took some of that on, and current stories say its totally still there. Your comments about "must keep traditions" belies the underlying sentiment, there is zero reason to prevent changes in the military simply to keep things "traditional". I would prefer less meat heads and more considerate and thoughtful soldiers who have the leeway to say "no" when an order violates what they believe is right. If we can't have conscience in the military then we're all screwed until those military kids come to their senses.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:52AM
Meatheads. People who aren't nerds are meatheads. But, SURPRISE! There are a hell of a lot of nerds in the military - always have been. So - a big fuck you, right back at you.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Friday January 13 2017, @10:01PM
> Any military that loses it's customs and traditions, has lost it's bearings
I could easily make a list of ancient traditions that the military abandoned, whether they got displaced by modern solutions, proven counter-productive, or were just plain god-awful practices.
The military obey a code of conduct, the primary goal of which is efficient and unquestioned execution of lawful orders. Everything else is cute window dressing to feel like a man, not live like a pig, or be ready to blow someone else's brains.
The military is a volunteer force which needs to attract human beings who sign contracts. It reflects the changes of society and must incorporate enough of them to keep representing the people it protects.
Does the transgender and women thing go too far? In a sense, it has to, for a little while, because the macho attitude, and deeply conservative background, of the old guard are a barrier to an evolution that the rest of society is going through. But I agree with you that standards should be set for the job, based on what is required, and there should be no discrimination between the people who meet the standards...
Which would be easier if we weren't talking about mostly late-teens to early twenties men guided by highly traditional-minded people. Not a great recipe for tolerance to any deviation from the group.
(Score: 2, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:18PM
"In a sense, it has to, for a little while,"
Thank you for that. While you and I may disagree on precisely what the problem is - you do acknowledge that there is a problem. I don't believe that your reasoning justifies Obama's meddling with the military, while you seem to believe it is justified. But, you obviously have more insight into the issue than most of the clowns submitting articles to the MSM.
"Not a great recipe for tolerance"
Tolerance would have accepted that Germany and Japan carved the world up between them. "It's just their way of life, it's none of our business!"
The military's code of conduct? Yes, it changes, but at it's core, it really hasn't changed since the days of chivalry. Fight the oppressors, protect the defenseless - that stays constant.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @10:37PM
You stupid motherfucker, you'd equate letting gays serve openly with the fucking World War II Axis powers? Wow, you're even more of an asshole than I thought you were. Piss off and whine somewhere else.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:52PM
He's not equating them, merely pointing out that "tolerance" in itself is not inherently positive.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:13PM
Did ya read what AC said in response to your silly post? If not - read it. FFS, I thought you were literate.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:39AM
And equating the concept of "tolerance" with allowing the nazis and japanese to take over the world is a huge strawman. You're equating civil liberties and rights with war criminals and empire builders. At least I recall you not being fond of the US empire building...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:46AM
Words have meaning. Tolerance means you tolerate shit that you don't like. Need some help?
tol·er·ance
ˈtäl(ə)rəns/Submit
noun
1.
the ability or willingness to tolerate something, in particular the existence of opinions or behavior that one does not necessarily agree with.
"the tolerance of corruption"
synonyms: acceptance, toleration; More
2.
an allowable amount of variation of a specified quantity, especially in the dimensions of a machine or part.
"250 parts in his cars were made to tolerances of one thousandth of an inch"
Once again, I'll remind you that conservatives are more tolerant than liberals. Conservatives tolerate bullshit like you posted. Liberals, on the other hand, want to pass laws outlawing all manner of thought, speech, and conduct.
If tolerance and diverstity were a thing when Germany and Japan were carving out their empires, the US never would have become involved.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:29AM
Motherfucker, tolerance does not mean you sit back and accept any shit anyone else wants to do. In particular, you are not to be tolerant of intolerance, and I can't think of much more intolerant regimes than the Nazis. Why is this difficult for you to understand?
"Butbutbut hurr hurr you "tolerant" liberals don't tolerate my intolerance so you're intolerant hypocrites durpa derrrr~ *hic*" is what is known as the Stolen Concept Fallacy, i.e., using a concept to argue against its genetic roots. It is the exact equivalent to Wile E. Coyote sitting on a tree branch and sawing it off at the trunk. Congratulations, too, on proving that there is no good and just God who intervenes in human affairs in real time. If there were, you would have caught a big fat juicy goddamn thunderbolt for that "conservatives are more tolerant than liberals" line.
Joseph Heller was right: turning everything backwards and inside out and perverting it into a mockery of itself requires no brains at all, just no character.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0, Offtopic) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:53AM
That is some funny shit, Azuma. "We gotta tolerate Muslims, as well as any kind of minority, but we can't tolerate any kind of conservative views." Please, just stop the hypocrisy.
"Joseph Heller was right: turning everything backwards and inside out and perverting it into a mockery of itself requires no brains at all, just no character."
You have just described the democrat party approach to almost everything.
Speaking of funny - did you catch that bit about George Soros losing a billion dollars because he bet against America, and Trump? I hope the queer rotten bastard loses the rest of his money the same way. And, I hope that losing all his money causes him to have a stroke. http://www.cnbc.com/2017/01/12/billionaire-george-soros-reportedly-lost-nearly-1-billion-during-trump-rally.html [cnbc.com]
Imagine that - the stock markets rallied after Trump was elected. (Gomer Pyle voice) "Surprise, surprise, surprise!"
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 14 2017, @05:25AM
What the ever-loving fuck makes you think I tolerate Islam? Have you NOT been seeing the posts where apparently I step on peoples' toes and get bitched out for "sucking at math" and "being an Islamofoe?"
You're fucking deranged, Runaway. Sit down, shut up, medicate yourself with a fifth of Jack, and calm down before what I will charitably call your heart explodes.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @09:38AM
Motherfucker, tolerance does not mean you sit back and accept any shit anyone else wants to do.
That's exactly what it is, by definition.
In particular, you are not to be tolerant of intolerance
A common mistake, which immediately reveals the total hypocrisy of most who preach tolerance as innately good.
What you are suggesting is not unlike that pacifists should go to war with those who are not pacifist.
In the end, what you're really talking about isn't true tolerance, but instead a limited tolerance of only the things which you like. To then claim that this is the one and only "tolerance" is an attempt to claim that the things which you like are objectively good.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 14 2017, @06:54PM
You fell right into it, you moron. Read the below post about what the stolen concept fallacy is. You're doing the equivalent of arguing for complete epistemological scepticism; when someone asks you how you know this, you'll have no possible answer. God, why are so many of the ACs on this site so completely fucking illiterate?!
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 15 2017, @05:35AM
He's just being a disingenuous retard and misconstruing what people actually mean when they call for more tolerance by taking everything they say 100% literally. He likely knows what they mean, so this is just a dishonest argumentation tactic.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Monday January 16 2017, @12:46AM
What we need to do is figure out a way to encode a slap across the face into TCP/IP specifically for people who do shit like this :/
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:49PM
Tolerance of people deviating from the majority did happen during WWII. Not discriminating against people serving in your own military is not the same as tolerating "the enemy".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_history_of_African_Americans#World_War_II [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:16PM
> The military IS NOT the place to play experimental social games.
You may not think so, but there is a good long history of exactly this. An older friend (gone now) commanded a tank company in the Korean War, early 1950s. One of his treasured stories was of Pres. Harry Truman who integrated the US Armed Forces -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Executive_Order_9981 [wikipedia.org] He told stories about all the excuses from the "old Army" and many others, and condemned them as so much crap. Yes he was white, but his position was constant--if someone qualifies for the job they should be allowed to do it.
His tankers were mixed and he never had any racial problems with his team. He was very proud to have headed his unit and, in some respects, to have been out in front of the civil rights movement that started later in the 50s and 60s.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @10:29PM
Uh-huh. First, I recommend the CNN article, "Gay is not the new Black", written by a gay black man who should know what he is talking about.
Then, I've already recommended Rudyard Kipling. Try Fuzzy Wuzzy. Military men have always respected people who have proven themselves.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:44PM
> "Gay is not the new Black", written by a gay black man who should know what he is talking about.
I'll see your token black man and raise you the entire country of South Africa that, after freeing itself from apartheid which had made miscegenation illegal, recognized that bigotry against minorities in all forms is unacceptable and so gave full marriage rights to gay people in 2006.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:17PM
"token black"
LOL, I'm not one of those who try to keep blacks on the plantation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:20PM
Nope you just want to use them as pawns for hating on gay people.
Good deflection though, unable to argue with an entire country, a country that openly accepted gays in their military in 1996, you try to make it all about you.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:43PM
Hating on gay people - - - - -
Please find the hate, and quote it back to me. Please find where I've stated that all gays are going to hell, because God didn't make them that way. Go ahead, find all the hate.
Sorry, poor deluded fool, this entire discussion seems to have "whooshed" over your head.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:54PM
Yet again its all about you isn't it.
But now you are claiming to support gay marriage.
That's new.
Did you finally come out of the closet?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:13AM
YOU made it about me with your personal attack.
No, idiot, I don't support gay marriage. I might have supported civil unions, but never marriage.
It isn't hate to recognize that marriage is about children. Homosexuality is not about children.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:23AM
No. You made it about you when you went off about you not wanting to keep black people on the plantation.
Oh, excuse me, "blacks" not black people.
As for your hostility to gay marriage, every hater ever has some rationalization that their hate is actually totally reasonable.
That doesn't make them any less of a hater.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:26AM
"every hater ever has some rationalization"
Alright, you have your opening. Start rationalizing your own hatred.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:30AM
Awww, are your feelings hurt?
How terrible for you that you be judged for your own words.
Its not fair!
Does your narcissism know no bounds?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:38AM
Feelings hurt? Please - you over estimate your importance and influence. I simply don't give two shits what you think of me. I heard you crying for an opportunity to rationalize your own hatred. It seems that you're going to waste the opportunity. Speak now or forever suffer in silence.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:51AM
> I simply don't give two shits what you think of me.
And yet you made this thread all about you first chance you got and then you did nothing but respond to the parts where I fucked with you for like 6 posts now.
You are easily the most insecure person on this site.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:28AM
"where I fucked with you for like 6 posts now"
And, there you have it folks - AC admits to being a troll. Except, AC actually has an identity, but we're not supposed to know that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:30AM
Indeed. Once you made that plantation crack and revealed yourself as having no interest in honest debate you invited trolling.
Don't like it? Don't start it.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Saturday January 14 2017, @02:48AM
Heterosexuality isn't about children, either. Pretty much everybody I see on a daily basis has been divorced 2 or 3 times and has children from each relationship. The other thing is marriages that don't even intend to produce a child.
What I am hopeful of is that homosexual couples are as capable of raising a child as heterosexual couples. It would need to be proven out in the data. I admit I'm biased because in deep infiltration mode I'm basically a heterosexual woman.
Should marriage be held to a higher standard? Perhaps. I've been thinking that perhaps if marriage has any legal recognition at all, it has to be something that's much less flimsy than even pre-gay-marriage marriage. People shouldn't be able to just divorce at the drop of a hat. (I believe the Bible gives precedence for divorce in cases of domestic violence for example, so I'm not saying it needs to be final-final.)
I guess the problem then is what we do with all those heterosexuals who keep making babies outside of wedlock where baby has 3 dads because that's how many men mommie's made babies with.
Does my chain of thought make any sense here?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:09AM
"all those heterosexuals who keep making babies outside of wedlock"
Stop paying those women for having babies. If the parents can't support their babies, then take the babies, and feed them, clothe them, shelter them - and let the mother sleep on the streets. Our welfare system has come to be designed to encourage the kind of crap you describe. Each of those baby's daddies should be supporting the child, instead of hanging out with their fellow gang members.
A lot of different things have gone to undermine the institution of marriage, and the welfare scheme is just one of them.
But, marriage was and is all about children. It's not about the couple. No society has really stood to benefit from couples having sex and sharing a home - there was never a need to recognize or reward a married couple if you take children out of the equation. Society invented marriage because of the children. We need to get back to the basics - if you don't intend to commit to supporting children, then don't get married, don't have sex, don't pretend to be married - just don't. If marriage is little more than a piece of ass and a tax break, then you're not nearly ready to be married.
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Saturday January 14 2017, @03:34AM
Ah, I see where you're coming from, and I think we might have a lot of points of agreement. Some people who find they can't have kids for whatever reason adopt, and there's going to be a lot of kids to adopt. I'm assuming the case of an infertile heterosexual couple adopting isn't in question here, since that would seem to qualify as marriage, right?
Could two people of the same gender, by way of being infertile, also adopt and marry? That's what I'm wondering about. I think two parents is non-negotiable. Sounds like both of us believe that owning a uterus does not necessarily qualify one to rise children.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @04:55AM
> Stop paying those women for having babies.
You are delusional.
Half the people on welfare are the working poor.
In even the most expensive areas welfare maxes out at $600/month no matter how many children you've got.
The reason mothers are having kids out of wedlock is not about the financial incentives to have children, its about the costs of getting married. People can't afford shotgun weddings anymore.
If you want people to stop having kids out of wedlock, then support planned parenthood. Their contraceptive programs prevent half a million unplanned pregnancies a year. No other group is anywhere near as effective. And do not give me any of your hypocritical god shit. Your church supported full abortion rights until at least 1976.
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Saturday January 14 2017, @04:50PM
Following that logic, infertile couples should not be allowed to marry. Perhaps society could start with an age limit: no women over the age of 60 may marry? Should the couple be required to provide a certificate attesting to their fertility?
Next, we should require couples to provide evidence that that they don't have serious genetic defects before being allowed to marry. Perhaps you can see where this is going? Or do I need to spell it out for you?
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Friday January 13 2017, @11:43PM
I recommend the CNN article, "Gay is not the new Black", written by a gay black man who should know what he is talking about.
I'll admit I didn't do a thorough search. Was it this piece [cnn.com] you had in mind?
No point I'm after here, just curious.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:57PM
Yeah, that's the one.
And, as usual, derpaway has only read the headline and the intro paragraph.
Because it pretty much says the opposite of what he wants it to say.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:23AM
Right author, wrong article - I wasn't aware that there was another article incorporating that old title. The original article is dated 8 June 2012.
Errr - wait a second. I'm not certain that IS the "original". As I recall, the original was longer than that.
I don't guess it matters a whole lot. The message is, if you're gay and black, that doesn't necessarily make you part of the greater gay movement. White gays aren't all that accepting of black gays. And, at the end of the day, race counts for more than sexuality.
That much is preserved in your find, as well as this link. http://www.cnn.com/2012/05/22/opinion/granderson-black-and-gay/ [cnn.com]
(Score: 1) by kurenai.tsubasa on Saturday January 14 2017, @01:40AM
Thanks! That was a good read.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:16PM
You do not speak for the entire military, so quit acting like you do. Your opinion is yours, not everyone else's.
Also enough of this crybaby bullshit about not getting enough love from the public. Veterans as well as serving men and women are routinely honored in news stories and public events. I have never been alive during a time when the military was more admired.
Just tell me where you want your bronze statue erected, and we can have everyone on Soylent chip in for it if it will soothe your butthurt.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:37PM
> Also enough of this crybaby bullshit about not getting enough love from the public.
Indeed. The ONE place that does not give service members enough love is the government. We all know about the problems at the VA, in large part due to republican willingness to fund war but not pay for the costs afterwards. But my personal experience working at a defense contractor raking in the sweet military billion dollar contracts was even more damning. They ran employee donation campaigns of food and other basics like socks for the families of service members. Ignore the part about it being a blatant attempt to curry favor with the DoD - the very fact that lack of food and necessities was considered normal enough to require civilian donations is utter fucking nuts.
Government support for the people in the service makes great rhetoric, but too often its just lip service. They are pawns off the battlefield.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:45PM
We aren't generally "socially acceptable" people. Military men and women aren't always included in social functions,
Who is this "we" you are talking about, Runaway? We all know now that your never served. I contacted the DOD, and they have no record of a Runaway1956 ever having served in the United States Navy, so I call BS. Yours is stolen valor, you are not fit to speak for actual veterans.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:19PM
Poor idiot, Aristarchus.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:49PM
Oh please mighty military, please please change with the times. We would really like it if you could just improve a tiny bit. No? Ok, sorry for asking, didn't mean to trouble you. Detained? Huh? Oh, terrorist threat huh... Guantanamo you say? Never mind, I never said anything! Please let me goooo!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NewNic on Friday January 13 2017, @11:02PM
It's not as simple as that. Life isn't black and white.
You also have to show that those requirements are actually necessary for proper performance of the job.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:26PM
Actually, I believe the reverse to be true. If you (plural you, not you personally) believe that those requirements are unnecessary and/or unfair and/or unreasonable - it's up to you to prove your case.
Mankind has thousands of years of fighting experience. Pretty much all of our basic requirements for soldiers and sailors have a long, proven historical necessity. All other things being equal, bigger people have the advantage in most physical contests. Stronger people have the advantage in most physical contests. Faster people have the advantage is some physical contests. The soldier or sailor who can't keep up can prove to be a liability.
If you can prove that an 80 pound, 4 ft 6 inch woman can routinely kick big men's asses, then the military will thank you for your contribution, and start changing a lot of requirements.
(Score: 1) by NewNic on Friday January 13 2017, @11:33PM
What percentage of the today's military actually sees front line combat?
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:51PM
You hit on one reason I respect the USMC so much. Every Marine is a rifleman. No one is so high, or so low, or so specialized that he is exempt from front line duty.
IMHO, if you aren't willing to go in harm's way, you shouldn't be in the military. Any branch, at any level.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:02AM
Take note, derpaway just admitted that NewNic was right and he was wrong. He's just too fragile to actually say it.
Every time he is faced with facts he can't dispute, he tries to make all it about his glorious opinions.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:54PM
If you (plural you, not you personally) believe that those requirements are unnecessary and/or unfair and/or unreasonable - it's up to you to prove your case.
So it's not up to the people who put the restrictions in place or continue to keep them in place to justify their existence? Really? This sort of backwards anti-individual mentality has no place in the 21st century. Government should have to rigorously justify every single thing it does, without exception.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:11AM
How informative. So, based on your word, we can just shitcan then entire legal system, our legislative branch, our executive, basically all of government. Just throw it all away, unless they can prove that they are necessary.
What a putz. Maybe we can just throw YOU away? Prove that you have any value, then maybe we'll keep you.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:41AM
Oh, Dear God!!! I'm going to vomit!
Puhleeze!!! Put away your persecution complex. It's most unbecoming of one who had once worn the uniform. While I have never served in the military, I have worked as a civilian employee of the USAF for about ten years now. I know for a fact that our nation's soldiers do "socially acceptable" just fine, thank you very much. In fact, I must admit with a bit of chagrin that more often than not the military men and women I interact with daily frequently display better manners than I do. (Working on that) And I've also noticed that civvies do like our military members just fine. If you are finding that people don't like you or disrespect you, it may be YOU, specifically, they don't like, not your military service. Just sayin'.
This is just plain stupid. No one is being asked to "sign on" to anything. The Obama administration has now allowed same sex couples to collect the exact same benefits that heterosexual couples get. While I am not a supporter of SSM, I can see why the Obama adminstration would do that. Beyond that, it really isn't any of my business who my co-workers, military or civilian, spend the night with after the work day is over. Why should you care?
I checked wikipedia here [wikipedia.org] and I didn't see anything about the military's medical corp giving him any sort of "gender reassignment" surgery, although I did see discussion of being given hormone treatments and allowing him to wear "feminine" undergarments. Perhaps you have overstated your case by just a bit?
Change? Drastic? Quickly? What specifically are you referring to? About the most drastic change I have seen in the USAF since I started working here about ten years ago is regular mandatory training sessions on Sexual Assault Prevention and Response (SAPR). Also, some training on what I would call "soft skills" management (e.g., health and wellness, work/life ballance, etc.) While I don't really care for these mandatory training sessions, myself, I would hardly characterize them as "drastic".
Oh, Nooooooezzz! Our military people are being trained on what to do when they witness or are told about sexual assault in the workplace. Our military traditions are being destroyed! Our service members will surely become unmoored from their esteemed traditions! How will our service members ever be able to function?!?
Fear not, we understand you just fine. We just think you are spewing bullshit. Again.
I will just note that people said almost exactly the same thing when Harry Truman signed Executive Order 9981 [wikipedia.org] which abolished racial discrimination in the US armed forces. Let's face it: if we followed your druthers, we would still be living in a racially segregated military. And, most likely, all of the rest of the country would still be racially segregated as well.
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:51AM
Gay is not the new black. Now please, if you're going to vomit, go to the toilets. None of us wants to see, hear, or smell you. And, if you're not going to vomit - go to the toilets with your own bullshit.
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Saturday January 14 2017, @09:05AM
Let me just chime in here. I was in the Air Force, and we got to be the leader in gender BS. Since (aside from pilots) our people aren't really on the front line, so we had a lot less leverage to enforce minimum physical standards.
Just as an example: An aircraft mechanic must be able to handle tools, load munitions, etc.. Some of that stuff is heavy - not least some of the tools and toolboxes. On one base where I was assigned, there was a case of a woman mechanic who was unable to carry her toolbox. Her supervisor was informed that he could not include this negative information in her ratings. To the contrary, he had to ensure that someone was available to carry her toolbox for her.
This kind of BS has the following effects:
- It reduces the effectiveness of the military, because you have to carry personnel who are dead weight.
- It makes the men resent the women, because they overgeneralize and perceive all women as dead weight. Don't say they shouldn't: overgeneralizing is human nature, and it isn't going to change.
- It is hugely unfair to the women who are qualified and capable, because they have to keep proving it, over and over again.
As usual, the push to integrate women at any cost - in particular, by lowering standards - is utterly counterproductive. It's counterproductive in the military, it's counterproductive in IT, it's just one of those stupid, feel-good measures dictated by politicians without a clue.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 3, Informative) by urza9814 on Tuesday January 17 2017, @05:31PM
According to our Constitution, the destruction of the military is something which should be occurring quite regularly. And your post gives many good reasons why. You cannot have a nation of, by, and for the people when the military becomes separate from the people.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday January 17 2017, @05:57PM
Urza - you may well have made the most intelligent response to my post. You are perfectly correct - the founding fathers wanted no standing army. However, the individual states had no such prohibition. The various National Guard would, and should, still be in place. The Marines would almost certainly still be around. Congress saw fit to keep the Marines, even when they decommissioned the last of the Navy.
The Navy is problematic. You simply can not commission and decommission navies every few years. Or, even, every few decades. Maybe a larger Coast Guard could replace what we have today - or maybe not. We'd have to give them destroyers, at least. Those cutters they use are simply not big enough to deter any potential aggressor on the seas.
You have won a mod point for this post. \o/
(Score: 2) by nobu_the_bard on Friday January 13 2017, @09:58PM
Not that I totally agree with anyone involved with how the military is run for the most part, but naming battleships after civil rights activists sounds kind of terrible. Battleships are not known for their fairness or courageous nonviolent resistance or what have you.
I looked a couple of the names up -
Lucy Stone
Sojourner Truth
Earl Warren
John Lewis
I kind of get some of this (Lucy Stone would maybe have liked women in combat roles in the military, at least, not sure if she'd have liked having a battleship named after her..) but I still think those are some weirdly named battleships ... also isn't John Lewis still alive?
Granted if they let me name them they'd have some potentially stranger Iain Banks inspired names.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Username on Friday January 13 2017, @10:25PM
Well it would be kinda funny to have the USS Jesse Jackson bombing Africans back to the stone age. Could get a USS Clock Boy for bombing Arabs.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:35PM
The USS Abbie Hoffman would be a really fun ship.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:18AM
Regardless of their backstory, those are all strong sounding names.
Sojourner Truth is an especially kickass name.
I always liked it, even if it wasn't her birthname.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Friday January 13 2017, @10:19PM
As I understand it, under Obama the U.S.'s combat readiness improved markedly. The previous administration had used up the military on futile wars.
Admission of women and gays has nothing to do with combat readiness except that it increases the pool of volunteers to recruit from.
(Score: 2) by Username on Friday January 13 2017, @10:29PM
From my understanding the military always admitted gays. It was just don’t ask don’t tell.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:47PM
Don't be dense.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:55PM
The "Don't ask don't tell" was a liberal policy that was pushed on a largely unwilling military. Before that, IIRC people could actively be investigated and charged if there was enough evidence that they were gay.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:10PM
Don't ask, don't tell was a construct offered to the military by Bill Clinton. Prior to that pearl, being homosexual was grounds for discharge. In the bad old days, I believe a homosexual got an Undesirable discharge. In my day, homosexuals were mostly given General discharges, with the phrase "Convenience of the Navy" attached.
Acceptance of homosexuals was coming, no matter what the old skool, hard corps soldiers and sailors had to say. My own complaints aren't that homosexuals are serving - my complaints are targeted at Obama's general interference in the military's way of doing things. Being conservative doesn't mean we don't change - it means we change slowly, with a lot of thought and planning in the changes. Liberals in general seem to believe that the whole world owes it to them, to change overnight.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:06AM
> Liberals in general seem to believe that the whole world owes it to them, to change overnight.
Conservatives in general seem to believe that the whole world owes their personal inconvenience more weight than the actual suffering of people who are not them.
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:28AM
Yes - I can see that people who aren't permitted to serve are suffering. So, did you even TRY to enlist? Or, are you just cry-bullying without any special qualifications?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @10:32PM
The previous administration had used up the military on futile wars.
We're currently involved in several different unnecessary military interventions. Most democrats seem to love war like republicans, but just express that love with smaller wars and bombings.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:04PM
"As I understand it"
Well, Obama is most certainly going to tell you that. Some liberal minded people have motivation to tell you that. The people who profit from the military industrial complex are going to tell you the same.
Meanwhile, our government spends ungodly sums of money on unproven hardware. Many senior NCO's have complained that standards are being lowered. The numbers of soldiers and sailors has dropped - the term "dramatically" seems to apply.
I realize this is a tech site, and most of us are in love with technology. We, as a group, like to believe that all that technology somehow improves our combat readiness. But, I remind you that bombs don't win wars - boots on the ground win wars. The grunts, the people at the sharp end of the stick, enforce our will. Bombs and other technology can sometimes break the will of the enemy, but they can't be counted on to do so.
Osama bin Laden was dug in, in the mountains, and we dropped load after load after load of bombs on him. With all of our technology, we couldn't get bin Laden. He sat in his trenches, and mocked us. We were afraid to pick up that sharp stick, and go get him.
Combat readiness. It all depends on how you measure combat readiness. Why don't we ask some grizzled old master sergeants what they think of our readiness? I may make that a project in the near future.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 13 2017, @11:16PM
You could have got OBL in no time if you had sent in the 1st Transgender Battalion (their motto: "Hell in a skirt, or pants... whichever one God didn't intend us to wear when we were born")
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:40PM
You may be making a better point than you think. ISIS/ISIL/DAESH soldiers seem to truly fear being killed by the Kurd's women soldiers. Being killed by a "mere" woman threatens their chances of getting into paradise. A transgender batallion would have a bunch of Muslims quaking in their boots.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @11:47PM
If you think about it, shouldn't men wear skirts and women wear pants? I mean, ONE of us has got external genitalia and it's not me. Maybe men would be less pissy and angry if their wedding tackle weren't always smashed up into their body cavities by their clothes. Let it breathe a little, you know? They wear 'em in Scotland and everyone's fine with it (except the sheep).
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:25PM
? It's been about 30 years since I obsessed about military subjects, but I recall having a technical edge makes a very large difference in your military success. The Third Reich rolled right over Poland not because their guys were so much braver and better than the Poles, but because the latter were leading cavalry charges against panzers, Stukas, and mechanized infantry. Having a fleet of nuclear submarines and many carrier battlegroups has been quite helpful to the United States as a superpower. Yes, you can't expect to drop those advanced weapons in a field and expect them to operate themselves, but neither could you drop SEAL team 6 naked in front of jihadis wielding AK's and expect them to do anything but get mowed down pretty instantly.
There is a lot of graft, corruption, and excess in military procurement. It should and must be better policed. But when you really think about the price we'd pay for not constantly honing our military technical edge, it's a cost much higher than we'd probably be willing to bear.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Friday January 13 2017, @11:44PM
Oh come on now, that's liberal commie pinko illegal Muslim Jew atheist Mexican traitor-speak. You don't need machines; you need to make Runaway Commander In Chief Plus Infinity Plus One. Then he'll win all the wars. It's like what would happen if a bald eagle with a couple of thermobaric explosives in the shape of Mountain Dew bottles strapped to its waist would do if it could put in the Konami Code.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:02AM
It reminds me of the scene from All Quiet on the Western Front when the protagonist gets leave to go home, where the old men treat him to advice on how to win the war.
Yeah, I don't know if including trans- or gays in the military is necessarily what the Pentagon should spend its time thinking about, but neither could it hurt military readiness as much as underpaying your soldiers to the point where they need foodstamps to survive or invading countries you don't need to invade...
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:50AM
Yaaa, the military shouldn't blame the people, they should blame congress. I'm glad the soldiers are being squeezed (don't lynch me just yet!) because at least they are getting the American experience so they're less likely to blindly follow everything when the shit hits the fan.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @12:48AM
Careful now, if you pop Runaway's little bubble to fast his hands will shrink and he'll start talking at a 3rd grade reading level.
(Score: 2) by bradley13 on Saturday January 14 2017, @09:22AM
"As I understand it, under Obama the U.S.'s combat readiness improved markedly. The previous administration had used up the military on futile wars."
Futile wars? You mean, Obama hasn't had any of those? You must be living in a different reality from me... [mintpressnews.com] That articles doesn't include all the minor little conflicts, military advisors, etc. As for combat readiness? Certainly one way to improve combat readiness is to have combat-experienced troops, so you may well be right.
"...used up the military..."
That is such a silly statement I hardly know where to begin. Go learn some military history. At least have a look at military deaths [militaryfactory.com]. US casualties have been very low in every conflict since WWII, and the size of the US economy means that logistics are also not a genuine issue. The way the US loses wars is through lack of civilian or political support. Which is not a bad thing, mind you, but it has nothing at all to do with the military itself. In fact, it would be even better if lack of civilian/political would prevent the US from entering these conflicts in the first place.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 1) by Chrontius on Saturday January 14 2017, @11:44AM
I'm gonna stop you - by only looking at military deaths, you ignore the fact that we're making cyborgs at an alarming rate, because our guys are surviving what would have been mortal injuries thanks to advances in body armor, field medicine, and prompt surgical treatment.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Friday January 13 2017, @11:46PM
I don't think allowing gays or whomever into the military or combat roles or anything Obama did in that vein necessarily degrades effectiveness. If the training remains solid, if your non-coms are solid and remain ready to train up combat-ready recruits, you'll be OK. Other things like stop-lossing people who long ago thought they had fulfilled their duty hurts. Driving out your best soldiers because you keep them on constant rotation in conflict zones, and then don't pay them enough when they can make orders of magnitude more working as mercs for Blackwater, hurts. Starting wars you don't need to fight, hurts. Blowing billions on weapons systems that don't work, hurts. Bush & Cheney started that kind of nonsense and Obama continued it because his will was weak and his foreign policy was desultory.
It's really unfortunate that some are trying to cast hyper-masculine, aggressive posturing as the way to bring the military back to peak readiness. It won't. We've been down that road before and it was a huge mistake that we're still paying for. The confrontation with China is coming. We need to be firm and smart, not brash and stupid.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by garrulus on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:12PM
The same thing should happen for all other sectors of society.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 14 2017, @08:32PM
Instead of "what the experts say", should this have been "Crazy things that Fox News and Runaway1956 say"? Would save the rest of us a lot of reading and commenting, and having to listen to all this being all about Runaway.