Last week, the Pentagon opened 14,000 military jobs to women in uniform. The new roles include positions that are closer to the front lines, but one-fifth of military jobs, such as combat tank units and commando units, remain male-only. There is no international consensus on female roles in the military. Certain countries remain very strict in policy, but even countries with liberal policies may fail to enact them. Here in the U.S., the issue has drawn attention when the resurgent Rick Santorum issued statements regarding the matter.
Santorum thinks women's new role will create "a very compromising situation, where people naturally may do things that may not be in the interest of the mission because of other types of emotions that are involved." He later elaborated on this statement, suggesting that men's natural protective instincts around women would disrupt combat missions.
Santorum's comment is offensive to the highly trained members of the United States military. Portraying men as Neanderthals who can't act judiciously around females is not only offensive to men everywhere, but also wholly ignores the 865 women injured and more than 140 women killed in active duty since 2001.
The suggestion that society should work to prevent men's "protective instinct" is horribly ignorant of the real situation. The Department of Defense estimates that in 2010, 19,000 service members were the victims of rape in the military. More than 20 percent of female veterans report being raped, with estimates of sexual assault as high as 41 percent. Women in the military are the victims of institutionalized sexual violence on a massive scale. For Santorum to suggest that men's protective instincts are of concern is grossly out of touch. Santorum has also stated that, if elected, he would re-enact Don't Ask Don't Tell. He believes that social values (he referenced the repeal of DADT as a "social experiment") should not interfere with military organization. Santorum must not realize the hypocrisy in this statement as he tries to force his own crooked social vision of women and gays onto the military.
The senator's comments are actually more tolerable than Fox News contributor Liz Trotta's, who opts for tasteless victim blaming. Responding to the 64 percent increase in violent sexual assaults in the military since 2006, Trotta asks, "What did they expect?" She also blames "the feminists" who are trying to be "warriors and victims at the same time." Trotta must not be familiar with the 19,000 service members who already are both warriors and victims. She should ask them directly what they expected.
How can the conservative half of American politics be expressing both uneducated victim-dismissal along with ugly and antiquated victim-blaming? I think that the discourse around sexual violence has come to a standstill. In this stasis, conservatives are regressing into indefensible views of gender relations. Since victim blaming has been thoroughly filleted, although it refuses to die, academics and social workers have struggled in their efforts to advance the fight against sexual violence. Materials such as "stop date rape" flyers that are addressed to potential rapists never really functioned beyond being a rhetorical device addressing the idiocy behind victim blaming. A new public campaign is hoping to inject some new ideas into this issue.
Last month, the Men Can Stop Rape organization launched an exciting campaign aimed at college-aged men. The "Where Do You Stand?" campaign targets male bystanders to sexual violence. Text-heavy posters encourage men to fight sexual harassment by confronting the would-be assailants and harrassers that they know. One of the posters reads, "When Jason wouldn't leave Mary alone, I said she's not into you any more, let it go." MCSR also offers bystander intervention training. A nation-wide and well-funded campaign of this type could change how Americans confront sexual violence. This community approach is laudable, sustainable, and shows a new way to combat a crime as old as civilization. Without bringing community attention to the milieu of hypocrisies and double standards involved in gender relations, sexual violence will continue to be a problem in the American military, and in American society.
David is a senior majoring in English. Please send all feedback to opinion@dailycardinal.com.
