Military Review English Edition March-April 2015 | Page 42

(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Marionne T. Mangrum) Marine Corps 1st Lt. Marissa Loya, a female engagement team commanding officer, crawls through a doorway 30 December 2012 during a patrol in Marjah, Helmand Province, Afghanistan. The team worked with infantry Marines by engaging women and children in support of the International Security Assistance Force. This always seems to happen. As traditionally male military occupational specialties (MOSs) are opened to women, the standards are questioned and maligned as unfairly discriminatory as women’s inability to achieve them is exposed. Development of Double Standards Double standards were developed because every time women are tested, they prove that they cannot consistently achieve men’s standards and that they suffer many more injuries than men do in the attempt. Proponents pushing more military opportunities for women have never insisted women achieve the men’s standards because their lack of qualification would mean fewer women in the ranks. They could not achieve the standards when the military academies first were integrated. In his 1998 book Women in the Military: Flirting with Disaster, Army veteran Brian Mitchell cites results for physical testing at West Point and Annapolis: When 61 percent [of female West Point plebes] failed a complete physical test, compared to 4.8 percent of male plebes, separate standards where devised for the women. 40 Similar adjustments were made to other standards. At Annapolis, a two-foot stepping stool was added to an indoor obstacle course to enable women to surmount an eight-foot wall.2 Mitchell also reports that when women were integrated into the Air Force’s Cadet Wing, The [Air Force] academy’s physical fitness test included push-ups, pull-ups, a standing broad jump, and six-hundred-yard run, but since very few of the women could perform one pull-up or complete any of the other events, different standards were devised for them. They were allowed more time for the run, less distance on the jump, and fewer push-ups. Instead of pull-ups, female cadets were given points for the length of time they could hang on the bar … . They fell out of group runs, lagged behind on road marches, failed to negotiate obstacles on the assault courses (later modified to make them easier), could not climb a rope … . The women averaged eight visits to the medical clinic; the men averaged only 2.5 visits … . On the March-April 2015  MILITARY REVIEW