Spokane7
39°
Had
to happen someday. My major concern is not how it will work on the boat, but how the media attention will cause more work for already overtasked Submariners. There will probably be the same proportion of whiny female Submariners as there are male; the big difference will be that the whiny females will get a lot of press, resulting in more and more useless training and potentially causing a mission-degrading CYA mentality among the leadership. I would hope the Submarine Force bigwigs will be able to keep it in perspective when the first inevitable problems happen, but I doubt they will/Bubblehead, The Stupid Shall Be Punished. More here.
D.F. Oliveria is a columnist and blogger for The Spokesman-Review. Huckleberries Online was judged the best 2008 Idaho newspaper blog by the Idaho Press Club. And the best 2007 news blog in the Pacific Northwest by the Society for Professional Journalist. Print Huckleberries is a past winner of the Herb Caen Memorial Column contest by the National Association of Newspaper Columnists. The Readership Institute of Northwestern University cited this blog as a good example of online community journalism.
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HonestGeorge on February 25 at 5:04 p.m.
Women are certainly capable of handling the rigors of sub duty but I think that they should keep the ban. There is only so many square feet available in a sub. With women aboard there must be a portion dedicated for women’s use. Gender-restricted use times would work for some of the common areas - such as entrances to showers, the showers themselves, etc. but bunk areas must be segregated. Subs are crowded - I’ve toured them and even the newest hurt for space. Sub crews sleep in shifts, in assigned but often shared bunk areas about 2 feet wide and 6.5 feet long stacked usually 3 high with about 3 feet between bunks - at least that is the way that it was about 15 years ago. Where do they expect to find the space?
hmoffsuite on February 25 at 5:13 p.m.
They are close quarters, no doubt. Another consideration might be, I am thinking, that they go out in nuke subs for 3 or 6 months at a time. Thats lots of cabin fever. With no where to go.
idawa on February 25 at 5:32 p.m.
I think the better question is why the heck do we need these boats anyway … the cold war is over, last I checked. I would concede that we still need fleet maintenance and to replace older vessels, and that having a nuclear presence somewhere in the murky waters is a good thing, but I think the size of the current fleet is enough. I know it is a huge jobs program in some parts … but for all those that are all about trimming the excesses of the federal government, here’s a could place to start …
Megan_B on February 26 at 8:35 a.m.
Why not banning all of the men who ever sexually assault their fellow sub officers? THIS IS THE BIGGER, MORE REAL PROBLEM. If they “can’t help it” because “men will be men” then they need to be kicked out ASAP. It’s not fair to ban women when you could just as easily ban men and have an all-female crew. You can’t favor one sex over the other, that is discrimination. If these men can’t be trained to manage their pee-pee’s urges, they need not be allowed. Simple as that.
Norther on February 26 at 8:43 a.m.
As one who was there when the warships were integrated, I hope they have plenty of legalmen and JAG reps available for all of the harassment claims being filed. And I am sure it is discriminatory, but it is a fact that a sub can be on patrol for upwards of ninety days (rough estimate). If a female becomes pregnant within a week or two of the patrol beginning, it could be three months before she could recieve any prenatal care. And it is not the same as a female in a combat zone. She can be transferred out if she gets pregnant. On a sub, there really isn’t any way to do that without jeopardizing the mission at hand. There are disastrous things that happen when a ship gets integrated. I can only imagine how this will affect subs.
Cabbage Boy on February 26 at 8:53 a.m.
Megan, without denying many men have trouble keeping it zipped, are you being sexist in proclaiming woman don’t have the same issues?
Never been a woman that used what she has to her advantage?
And as Northerner pointed out so well, it isn’t just the harassment, there are many issues that make this a bad idea.
Megan_B on March 01 at 7:58 a.m.
They are called condoms. And you could always stock plan B pills, if necessary. And I am not being discriminatory against men, just looking at the numbers. How often are men in uniform sexually harassed/raped by their female counterparts? I’m not saying it’s never happened… but seriously, let’s compare apples to apples. And disallowing a woman a position because she has the possibility of being pregnant is 50’s era job discrimination. You could have them write 1000 times, “I swear I will not use my vagina, I swear I will not use my vagina…” if you think it would help. If men were capable of becoming pregnant, the issue wouldn’t even be brought up.