I won’t out them here, not full names at least, but I can name four women who I knew personally while I was in the military who were on par with the men at RMC: Tanya, Clare, Evelyn, and Barb. I can remember their names, 30 years out, because these were, and are, really exceptional women. Many of them are still in the ring, holding their own.
Given the events of this past weekend, there’s questions about women in a secret service capacity. Only a few days prior to the current discussion, which was brought on by Trump's assassination attempt, the House of Representatives passed an updated version of the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), which allows the U.S. government to automatically register men ages 18 to 25 into the Selective Service, or draft system. This new version of the bill opened up the possibility of women being drafted for mandatory military service.
As a Christian… golly, how awkwardly ironic that must seem to the guys I served with, God have mercy… I’ll restart: by God’s grace, I now have convictions about putting our daughters, sisters, and mothers in combat roles, but as a recovering feminist, who despite my best efforts, and the work of the Holy Spirit, still glories in Thug Rose’s MMA victories…. again - Lord have mercy - I can confess, with experiential proof: women are not made for this. Even among the best of the women I listed, if I was to be taken hostage, or in a trench, or needing cover from an assassin, I’d want the 50th percentile man over the top 1 percent woman any day. And be honest, we all would. You know you would.
I’m so proud of the women I knew who held their own beside the men at BOTC, during RMC recruit term, and in the military. It wasn't me, that’s for sure. I was a slow, weak, burdensome, 1990s quota-requirement-appendage and I was given grace, kindness, and mercy from the young men I served with. But even the best women soldiers only just met the bar. That was what made them so amazing - they weren’t a burden. They carried the radio. They didn’t need an already exhausted hand to pull them over the last obstacle.
We (former) feminists know it’s true; we just can’t seem to say it. Many of us are finding company with the TERFs but even there, it feels a bit hollow. We all saw the same footage and we know it's a judgement, but we just can’t bring ourselves to say why…. Judges 4:8-9 and Ezekiel 23:32-49