Times article re US military

[mcduffy]

Donald Trump to kick transgender troops out of US military

www.thetimes.com/article/1d5c0dd6-fb79-4e02-b542-171541881529?shareToken=ef33896de57008046bca3589b35f12e6

Personally, I think it shows how far the ideology has become embedded in the national consciousness.

Men and women are joining the military in order to have sex change operations, because they believe they're the opposite sex, or they may have a fetish for impersonating the opposite sex.

The military is promising them that they will support them in this, and use taxpayer dollars for surgery and hormones to facilitate it.

I don't think most people are going to think this is what the military is for. Especially in the volatile environment we are currently in.

Yes.

Nothing quite like forcing people to comply with your demands for being treated as the opposite sex, aka your philosophical belief, when the punishment can be very severe for them not doing so.

Abusers paradise.

FFS. I almost want to applaud whoever got these rules in, they really nailed it for themselves. If only men got a boner for world peace, think how different things could be with that kind of drive motivating them.

If only men got a boner for world peace, think how different things could be with that kind of drive motivating them.

Totally. The sheer determination from so many men, in so many different areas, is mind blowing.

There are probably plenty of military jobs that are not front line that require people who are on daily medication. This should be no different. The rules for fitness for active service should not change irrespective of beliefs on gender identity for people who believe in that concept. I think Biden was as crazy in the other direction as Trump will be in his.

But at the end of the day GI is a left problem/ideology/belief system in the US. It is more complex in Europe as both the ideology and the push back against it both came from the left.

Ha! Boners for peace would be great.

I guess it's a variation of yogic flying and transcendental meditation.

Perhaps all the US military personnel from Málaga Airport could create a political party, centred around this peace-making approach.

And before anyone dismisses that as madness, here's the Natural Law party proposing a similar practice (albeit by harnessing the power of bouncing on their knees rather than the power of boners) in the UK:

Yes, I've read a fair bit on conscientious objectors in the past. As a pacifist (albeit an atheist) I would also have fallen in to this category if I had been a male conscripted in during WW1 or WW2. Not on religious grounds but ethically. I don't support killing in the name of peace. It's awful what happened to conscientious objectors and how they were framed as traitors as well as killed.

However, anyone who signs up voluntarily to join the forces, it's a pre-requisite that they need to follow orders, even if that goes against their own values. They need to be prepared to do that. If not, they either shouldn't join or should face the consequences of whatever process handles this (hopefully nobody gets killed these days). This should apply equally to any personally held belief: if someone's religion stops them from killing an enemy or someone's self-identified gender (where it differs from their sex) stops them from using the facilities that are provided for them (those for their sex or potentially a third space option) then the same applies. Or at least it should.

If Trump's policy is about making sure anyone with a trans identity has to meet the same standards as everyone else for medical fitness and management of personal beliefs versus the rules within the forces, fair enough. If it's a transphobic witch hunt, no thank you. On a positive note, it's going to get people talking about the actual issues instead of shutting it all down as "too complicated" and "only impacting a marginalised minority".

@Hoardasurass ok that's a valid point but a lot of people who identify as trans do not take ongoing medication.

So yes you are right that the policy about medication should be applied fairly. But trans people shouldn't be kicked out/rejected just for being trans.

The option to be unmedicated and trans in the armed forces should exist.

And combined with clarification that any time men and women are in separate spaces it goes by sex not gender.

Agreed.

As far as I can see, that's the essence of what several PPs are saying here.

Hopefully that's where this law will settle.

I think a decision based on inability to be deployed in war is fair, this should not be relevant for those with desk jobs.

But in terms of the effect on the military, note the raging hypocrisy. TRAs and men are continually referring to TW as a “tiny, tiny number” of people whose inclusion allegedly can’t affect women’s football/sport/safe spaces because there are so few of them. How come this number is not so tiny when calculating whether their absence endangers the West’s response to Putin?

Queer maths?

If you think this is going to be done on some sort of logical, reasoned basis, I think you're a bit naive.

A good thing about Trump is that if he says he's going to do something he usually does. This time he's picked his cabinet to ensure that he will get things through without establishment objections. He will do this, and much else, by executive order.

Transgender people will be kicked out, full stop. Hesgeth will then move on to getting women out of combat roles.

It's not transphobic. It's applying the same rules that apply to every other person to trans people.

Anyone dependent on long term medication (in this case, cross sex hormones) is medically discharged.

I think he'll get around to those things too. He's not even in office, yet.

I'm amazed that as many as 15,000 miltary staff are assuming trans identities.

It think the 15,000 is based on multiplying the percentage of people assumed to be trans by the total number of personal.

I doubt there will be any attempt to get women out of combat roles. Why would there be any attempt at that?

The assumed number seems pretty random...because as we've seen over the years the rate of trans identification varies or even rises - according to the prevalence of gender ideology in schools, and other similar factors.

I'd have thought combat units might well be compromised by having females in them........certainly if we assume that males might change their behaviour in order to look out for or protect female colleagues.

Excellent summary.

Exactly! I don't think most people have ever seen the very long list of medications/health conditions that will keep a person from being accepted into the military. I have always been befuddled that trans folks who require daily meds and/or surgeries have been able to enlist when others who would equally like to serve their country cannot.

This is likely to be completely impractical in so many scenarios.

It's tricky enough to get two spaces in some military settings and this has been one of the major reasons for restrictions in women's roles at times.

I just can't see the justification for a whole third set up, at great cost, in order to accommodate what is essentially a limiting medical condition.

So I suppose they can stay in the Army if they stop pretending to be the opposite sex?

Doesn't sound too onerous.

The new Chief of Defense staff isn't keen on women in combat roles, I believe. I don't know if he feels that way about all combat roles, or only some.

That being said, there aren't huge numbers, especially if you don't include the air force, where arguably the situation is different.

One of the arguments against it is that in a lot of combat scenarios, especially for the army or Marines, you are essentially saying there will be mixed sex accommodations, toilets, etc. With potentially little or no possibility of privacy.

There are also questions around things like access to contraceptive medications, and a lot of women in active combat roles use these to suppress menstruation. Menstruation itself can be a problem where there is no privacy or where it affects performance.

But can we agree that a transman (someone who would in times past have been more likely to identify as a butch lesbian) who isn't on any cross sex hormones and doesn't require any ongoing medical or surgical treatment but just wants to be treated as a man, should have no additional barriers to serving in the armed forces? The restrictions against people who need ongoing medical treatment, particularly if they are joining the armed forces with a view to getting that treatment funded by the state in a country that doesn't have universal state healthcare, is a separate issue. If a trans person needs no medical accommodations then these medical arguments won't wash.