"But an officer on duty knows no one..."
It has been brought to my attention that women now make up 14-16% of a West Point class, as opposed to 10%. That might seem like a minor difference at first, but it is a fifty percent increase.
Consider this: There were about 100 (out of 1,000) women in my West Point class. Imagine if there had been 150, or 50 more women. Just in my class alone. That would have made a huge difference to those of us going through the Academy. Fifty more women you could turn to, pass by on your way to and from class, see out there in that giant sea of gray. Fifty more women to add strength to our numbers and help validate our presence.
I am not sure how many women there are in the “real” Army these days, or what percentage of the total they are. I do know that the military has shrunk considerably since the 80s and the end of the Cold War. It doesn’t seem like the number of missions or deployments has decreased any; in fact, I daresay they have dramatically increased. So, we have fewer soldiers deploying more frequently and repeatedly. And the wisdom of these continued deployments is debatable.
When I was in CBT, Cadet Basic Training, “Beast,” I did not think about things like that. I did not think about much besides what uniform I needed to wear to the next formation or activity; where and when it would be; all of the Plebe knowledge I was supposed to be memorizing; what was for dinner (not because I thought I was going to get to eat any of it, but rather because an upperclassman could ask at any time, “What’s for dinner, New Cadet?” – among a whole plethora of other mind-numbing questions. And ask they did! And you’d better know the answers); and where the fuck my room was.
The barracks, to me, were a giant maze of identical stairwells and hallways. On R-Day, I had been led to our company area by a very circuitous route, one that I had difficulty replicating. It took me a while to figure out when I was on the outside of the building, on which wing and side my room was and thus which door I should enter. It was all a giant blur. I kept getting… lost. NOT something one wants to do in Beast. Once of the worst things you could do was wander into the wrong company area.
I tried to follow my Beast squadmates, particularly my roommate, back into the barracks whenever I could. Fortunately, I was blessed with an amazing Beast roommate. Not only was she funny, down-to-earth, and supportive, she was also a “prepster.” That meant she had just spent the past year at USMAPS, the U.S. Military Academy Preparatory School. And this meant she was a font of experience and information, and she was more than willing to share it. I mean, for starters, she knew what most of the stuff laid out on our beds that first day was. And she knew how to wear a uniform, how to roll up fatigues sleeves, how to polish combat boots so they really shined, and what all of the unfathomable acronyms meant. While I felt blessed, she probably wondered what sort of bonehead she’d ended up with, someone who couldn’t even find her own room in the barracks!
My Beast roommate was a dynamo from Queens, a cosmopolitan New Yorker. She was charismatic, smart, funny, and very talkative. I, on the other hand, was a shy introvert from a small town in Pennsylvania. Perhaps a little to both our surprises, we got along great.
Which roommate(s) you end up with at West Point is pretty much luck of the draw. There were fewer women and fewer women per company, so the number of permutations for roommates was fewer. As upperclassmen, women cadets might end up rooming with the same roommate(s) their entire time there. Your Beast roommate, however, was completely arbitrary. I am so thankful for the incredible woman I met for the first time on R-Day. We are still close friends today – having been there for each other through marriage, motherhood, career changes, umpteen moves, deployments, divorce, aging parents, teenagers, middle age, the whole gamut of life’s events and crises. And we still make each other laugh.
We both firmly believed a sense of humor would help us make it through Beast. And we made a good team. We also seemed to have a predilection for show tunes….
There were tons of things we had to memorize as new cadets – sayings, orders, songs, facts, military ranks and insignia, historical trivia. The list was endless and overwhelming. Soon after R-Day we were issued a little book called Bugle Notes, affectionately referred to as the “Plebe Bible.” It had nothing to do with religion; rather, it was chock full of all the crap we had to memorize.
One lengthy passage we had to be able to spew verbatim was Worth’s Battalion Orders. It was long and stilted and somewhat difficult to memorize, so we put our creativity to work to get this thing down pat. Imagine our squad leader’s surprise when he entered our room one evening to find us doing a whole song and dance routine (with rifles) to help us memorize Worth’s Battalion Orders.
“But an officer on duty knows no one…”
(Did I mention that neither of us could sing?)
Our fearless Firstie squad leader took one wide-eyed glance at us before bidding a hasty retreat. “I’m going to try this again!”
Two solid knocks sounded at our door, the signal that an upperclassman was standing outside.
“Enter, sir!” we shouted, both standing at attention. As if Broadway was the furthest thing from our minds.
Why do women go to West Point?
People ask me that all the time.
For the same reasons men do, I suppose. Because they are young and naïve. Because they are idealistic and want to serve their country. Because their father or grandfather went to West Point. Because they want to do something that matters, that makes a difference. Because they want to do something challenging, different. Because they are interested in a university that is about way more than just academics. Because they are attracted to the tradition, the prestige, the history. Because they want to be leaders. Because they are inspired by principles like duty, loyalty, and honor. Because it’s a “free education.” Because they have no fucking clue what they’re getting themselves into. Because it seemed like a good idea at the time.
The reasons are numerous and complex and multi-layered. To try to break it down by gender would be meaningless.
A better question might be: why would smart, motivated, talented women want to go somewhere they were not necessarily welcome? Why would they want to enter a bastion of maleness, a fortress of male testosterone and machismo? Perhaps because in their youth and idealism they did not see the military as having to be all male. They saw the Army as a place they could contribute and make a difference. Why couldn’t a woman server her country? Why couldn’t a woman lead soldiers in battle? Fire a gun, dig a trench, cross a minefield, drive a tank, just as well as the next guy? Why not? As young women in the feminist era, we were raised to believe we could be anything we wanted to be – doctors, lawyers, physicists, engineers, astronauts. Why couldn’t we be soldiers, too? I don’t think it had occurred to us that we couldn’t.
No one had prepared us, though, for the antagonism, the resistance, the outright misogyny we faced within those gray granite walls. No one had prepared us for the fact that there were some people, mostly men (and not just cadets, officers, too), who did not want us there. They did not want us to be soldiers, they did not want us to be officers, and, most of all, they did not want us to be West Pointers. Surely, the admission of women would lower standards, lessen the challenge, diminish the experience, and produce a weaker brand of West Pointer.
Such fears proved woefully unfounded. And I would argue that the admission of women changed the institution for the better – raised the bar, improved the training environment, and increased the overall degree of performance and achievement. I am sure there are still some (mostly men) who would beg to differ. Who feel women have no business being at West Point.
To them, I would say: Fucking get over it!
Consider this: There were about 100 (out of 1,000) women in my West Point class. Imagine if there had been 150, or 50 more women. Just in my class alone. That would have made a huge difference to those of us going through the Academy. Fifty more women you could turn to, pass by on your way to and from class, see out there in that giant sea of gray. Fifty more women to add strength to our numbers and help validate our presence.
I am not sure how many women there are in the “real” Army these days, or what percentage of the total they are. I do know that the military has shrunk considerably since the 80s and the end of the Cold War. It doesn’t seem like the number of missions or deployments has decreased any; in fact, I daresay they have dramatically increased. So, we have fewer soldiers deploying more frequently and repeatedly. And the wisdom of these continued deployments is debatable.
When I was in CBT, Cadet Basic Training, “Beast,” I did not think about things like that. I did not think about much besides what uniform I needed to wear to the next formation or activity; where and when it would be; all of the Plebe knowledge I was supposed to be memorizing; what was for dinner (not because I thought I was going to get to eat any of it, but rather because an upperclassman could ask at any time, “What’s for dinner, New Cadet?” – among a whole plethora of other mind-numbing questions. And ask they did! And you’d better know the answers); and where the fuck my room was.
The barracks, to me, were a giant maze of identical stairwells and hallways. On R-Day, I had been led to our company area by a very circuitous route, one that I had difficulty replicating. It took me a while to figure out when I was on the outside of the building, on which wing and side my room was and thus which door I should enter. It was all a giant blur. I kept getting… lost. NOT something one wants to do in Beast. Once of the worst things you could do was wander into the wrong company area.
I tried to follow my Beast squadmates, particularly my roommate, back into the barracks whenever I could. Fortunately, I was blessed with an amazing Beast roommate. Not only was she funny, down-to-earth, and supportive, she was also a “prepster.” That meant she had just spent the past year at USMAPS, the U.S. Military Academy Preparatory School. And this meant she was a font of experience and information, and she was more than willing to share it. I mean, for starters, she knew what most of the stuff laid out on our beds that first day was. And she knew how to wear a uniform, how to roll up fatigues sleeves, how to polish combat boots so they really shined, and what all of the unfathomable acronyms meant. While I felt blessed, she probably wondered what sort of bonehead she’d ended up with, someone who couldn’t even find her own room in the barracks!
My Beast roommate was a dynamo from Queens, a cosmopolitan New Yorker. She was charismatic, smart, funny, and very talkative. I, on the other hand, was a shy introvert from a small town in Pennsylvania. Perhaps a little to both our surprises, we got along great.
Which roommate(s) you end up with at West Point is pretty much luck of the draw. There were fewer women and fewer women per company, so the number of permutations for roommates was fewer. As upperclassmen, women cadets might end up rooming with the same roommate(s) their entire time there. Your Beast roommate, however, was completely arbitrary. I am so thankful for the incredible woman I met for the first time on R-Day. We are still close friends today – having been there for each other through marriage, motherhood, career changes, umpteen moves, deployments, divorce, aging parents, teenagers, middle age, the whole gamut of life’s events and crises. And we still make each other laugh.
We both firmly believed a sense of humor would help us make it through Beast. And we made a good team. We also seemed to have a predilection for show tunes….
There were tons of things we had to memorize as new cadets – sayings, orders, songs, facts, military ranks and insignia, historical trivia. The list was endless and overwhelming. Soon after R-Day we were issued a little book called Bugle Notes, affectionately referred to as the “Plebe Bible.” It had nothing to do with religion; rather, it was chock full of all the crap we had to memorize.
One lengthy passage we had to be able to spew verbatim was Worth’s Battalion Orders. It was long and stilted and somewhat difficult to memorize, so we put our creativity to work to get this thing down pat. Imagine our squad leader’s surprise when he entered our room one evening to find us doing a whole song and dance routine (with rifles) to help us memorize Worth’s Battalion Orders.
“But an officer on duty knows no one…”
(Did I mention that neither of us could sing?)
Our fearless Firstie squad leader took one wide-eyed glance at us before bidding a hasty retreat. “I’m going to try this again!”
Two solid knocks sounded at our door, the signal that an upperclassman was standing outside.
“Enter, sir!” we shouted, both standing at attention. As if Broadway was the furthest thing from our minds.
Why do women go to West Point?
People ask me that all the time.
For the same reasons men do, I suppose. Because they are young and naïve. Because they are idealistic and want to serve their country. Because their father or grandfather went to West Point. Because they want to do something that matters, that makes a difference. Because they want to do something challenging, different. Because they are interested in a university that is about way more than just academics. Because they are attracted to the tradition, the prestige, the history. Because they want to be leaders. Because they are inspired by principles like duty, loyalty, and honor. Because it’s a “free education.” Because they have no fucking clue what they’re getting themselves into. Because it seemed like a good idea at the time.
The reasons are numerous and complex and multi-layered. To try to break it down by gender would be meaningless.
A better question might be: why would smart, motivated, talented women want to go somewhere they were not necessarily welcome? Why would they want to enter a bastion of maleness, a fortress of male testosterone and machismo? Perhaps because in their youth and idealism they did not see the military as having to be all male. They saw the Army as a place they could contribute and make a difference. Why couldn’t a woman server her country? Why couldn’t a woman lead soldiers in battle? Fire a gun, dig a trench, cross a minefield, drive a tank, just as well as the next guy? Why not? As young women in the feminist era, we were raised to believe we could be anything we wanted to be – doctors, lawyers, physicists, engineers, astronauts. Why couldn’t we be soldiers, too? I don’t think it had occurred to us that we couldn’t.
No one had prepared us, though, for the antagonism, the resistance, the outright misogyny we faced within those gray granite walls. No one had prepared us for the fact that there were some people, mostly men (and not just cadets, officers, too), who did not want us there. They did not want us to be soldiers, they did not want us to be officers, and, most of all, they did not want us to be West Pointers. Surely, the admission of women would lower standards, lessen the challenge, diminish the experience, and produce a weaker brand of West Pointer.
Such fears proved woefully unfounded. And I would argue that the admission of women changed the institution for the better – raised the bar, improved the training environment, and increased the overall degree of performance and achievement. I am sure there are still some (mostly men) who would beg to differ. Who feel women have no business being at West Point.
To them, I would say: Fucking get over it!
posted by delta at 10:55 AM
1 Comments:
Hoo'ah.
This reminds me for the reason I believe DADT and any laws limiting the service of homosexuals should be repealed. To me, the military represents the civic ideals of Service and Duty for nation and people, and more than Service, Selfless Service that ought to include all healthy minded and bodied Americans. To bar any group of healthy citizens of a diverse nation from military service weakens the ties that should bind all of us together as Americans.
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