Women And Their Role In War
Women have always participated in war in one way or the other. Be it opposing wars by forming women-only groups, being spies for the state, or engaging in violence, women have done it all. More often than not, women have been the biggest victims of such political violence. Feminists must reconcile their opposition to masculine militarization with their acceptance of women's diverse roles and gender displacement in militarised initiatives.
Personal experience has always been an explicit feature of feminist theorising. Making sense of one's own life has been seen as a way of making sense of the lives of others. The personal, the political, and the international are a seamless web. In this chapter I want to make some reflections, in a similar spirit, about self, profession and world politics. Instead of purporting to describe or explain the world `out there', as is one's professional training, I want to reflect on the world `in here'—as `part of our innermost being' (Berger, 1966, p.140). When it comes to the military, even though women always played a vital role in the defence of the United States, they were recently in 2015 allowed to train for combat in frontline positions by the Secretary of Defence. While this was a step in the right direction, there are several points overlooked such as, to what extent does engaging in militant activities and armed warfare allow women to break free from traditional gender roles and does this mean they have actual decision making powers. Decisions like these a lot of times are just politically fueled moves to gain support from women centric lobbies as they use women in defence as a token while making no real change towards equality. The real question is, where does feminism stand between all of this? Feminism has had a troubled relationship with wars, decrying the masculine politics of militarization behind wars while at the same time making space for analyses that can recognize and challenge gender hierarchies entrenched in wars (Parashar, 2009).
The assumption of essential differences between men and women is part of patriarchal ideology, feeding into stereotypical notions of how such men and women should behave, which in turn constitute recognisable discourses of gender: sets of narratives about masculinity and femininity and how these are, in general, respectively privileged and marginalised (Shepherd). Many feminists have varying views over where gender stands in the midst of war, while some place women in the forefront, others such as Tickner suggest that radical feminists have rejected the idea of women fighting in men’s wars, claiming a special affinity of women with peace. During their military service, women soldiers in “masculine” roles adopt various discursive and bodily identity practices characteristic of male combat soldiers, which signify both resistance to and compliance with the military gender order. By drawing her readers’ attention to the ways in which discourses of gender (ideas about how ‘proper’ men and women should behave) function, Enloe reminds us that adhering to ideals of masculinity and femininity is both productive of violence and is a violence in itself, a violence against the empowered human subject.‘Ideas matter’, she concludes, ideas about modernity, security, violence, threat, trust. ‘Each of these ideas is fraught with blatant and subtle presumptions about masculinity and femininity. Ideas about both masculinity and femininity matter.This makes a feminist curiosity a necessity (Shepherd).
According to Lt. Col. Kate Germano (Retd.) the separation of both men and women leads to the women cadets performing less than their male counterparts as women are not expected to perform at par with men. She believes that the separate training projects a perception that women are trained differently or even have easier drills which leads to the discrepancy in their performance statistics as Germano rightly states "regardless of where and when, separate is never equal". Germano herself led a battalion in Parris Island but was let go as she was accused of 'creating a hostile command climate' which could easily be a reaction to her outspoken opposition and contradiction of the separation during training. Germano claims that she was just pushing to improve the performance of women recruits as when she first arrived she noticed how women were doing far worse than men. This leads us to think about how women are criticised and even punished so often for simply raising their voices for what they believe in. When the Pentagon asked the military to open all combat jobs to women in 2015, only the marine corps resisted and tried to look for exceptions so much so that they put together a research and months-long experiment to prove to Pentagon officials that women were unsuitable for the positions. They claimed that in 'physically demanding' tasks, the teams that had both men and women performed less than the ones with only men. They failed to take in notice that the men in these teams were far more trained and experienced than the women who had no real combat experience. This test was criticised by many including the Secretary of Navy due to the lack of a level playing field.
While there has been intense intra-disciplinary debate within contemporary feminist security studies over the necessary ‘feminist credentials’ of some gendered analyses, it is important to recognise the continual renewal and analytical vigour brought to the field by such debates (Shepherd). My interest in the role of women in the US Military stemmed from my lack of knowledge and interest in the topic itself. The way we see women in the field of security today is very different from how things were a few years ago. Even today, the playing field is not levelled.
Booth, Ken. “SECURITY AND SELF REFLECTIONS OF A FALLEN REALIST.” 1994. Accessed 21 February 2022.
Levy, Orna Sasson. “Feminism and Military Gender Practices: Israeli Women Soldiers in “Masculine” Roles*.” vol. 73, 2003. Accessed 22 February 2022.
Parashar, Swati. “Feminist international relations and women militants: case studies from Sri Lanka and Kashmir.” 2009. Accessed 21 February 2022.
Shepherd, Laura J. “Gender,Violence and Global Politics: Contemporary Debates in Feminist Security Studies.” vol. 7, 2009. Accessed 21 February 2022.
Source: Military.com
Personal experience has always been an explicit feature of feminist theorising. Making sense of one's own life has been seen as a way of making sense of the lives of others. The personal, the political, and the international are a seamless web. In this chapter I want to make some reflections, in a similar spirit, about self, profession and world politics. Instead of purporting to describe or explain the world `out there', as is one's professional training, I want to reflect on the world `in here'—as `part of our innermost being' (Berger, 1966, p.140). When it comes to the military, even though women always played a vital role in the defence of the United States, they were recently in 2015 allowed to train for combat in frontline positions by the Secretary of Defence. While this was a step in the right direction, there are several points overlooked such as, to what extent does engaging in militant activities and armed warfare allow women to break free from traditional gender roles and does this mean they have actual decision making powers. Decisions like these a lot of times are just politically fueled moves to gain support from women centric lobbies as they use women in defence as a token while making no real change towards equality. The real question is, where does feminism stand between all of this? Feminism has had a troubled relationship with wars, decrying the masculine politics of militarization behind wars while at the same time making space for analyses that can recognize and challenge gender hierarchies entrenched in wars (Parashar, 2009).
The assumption of essential differences between men and women is part of patriarchal ideology, feeding into stereotypical notions of how such men and women should behave, which in turn constitute recognisable discourses of gender: sets of narratives about masculinity and femininity and how these are, in general, respectively privileged and marginalised (Shepherd). Many feminists have varying views over where gender stands in the midst of war, while some place women in the forefront, others such as Tickner suggest that radical feminists have rejected the idea of women fighting in men’s wars, claiming a special affinity of women with peace. During their military service, women soldiers in “masculine” roles adopt various discursive and bodily identity practices characteristic of male combat soldiers, which signify both resistance to and compliance with the military gender order. By drawing her readers’ attention to the ways in which discourses of gender (ideas about how ‘proper’ men and women should behave) function, Enloe reminds us that adhering to ideals of masculinity and femininity is both productive of violence and is a violence in itself, a violence against the empowered human subject.‘Ideas matter’, she concludes, ideas about modernity, security, violence, threat, trust. ‘Each of these ideas is fraught with blatant and subtle presumptions about masculinity and femininity. Ideas about both masculinity and femininity matter.This makes a feminist curiosity a necessity (Shepherd).
Source: Deccan Herald
According to Lt. Col. Kate Germano (Retd.) the separation of both men and women leads to the women cadets performing less than their male counterparts as women are not expected to perform at par with men. She believes that the separate training projects a perception that women are trained differently or even have easier drills which leads to the discrepancy in their performance statistics as Germano rightly states "regardless of where and when, separate is never equal". Germano herself led a battalion in Parris Island but was let go as she was accused of 'creating a hostile command climate' which could easily be a reaction to her outspoken opposition and contradiction of the separation during training. Germano claims that she was just pushing to improve the performance of women recruits as when she first arrived she noticed how women were doing far worse than men. This leads us to think about how women are criticised and even punished so often for simply raising their voices for what they believe in. When the Pentagon asked the military to open all combat jobs to women in 2015, only the marine corps resisted and tried to look for exceptions so much so that they put together a research and months-long experiment to prove to Pentagon officials that women were unsuitable for the positions. They claimed that in 'physically demanding' tasks, the teams that had both men and women performed less than the ones with only men. They failed to take in notice that the men in these teams were far more trained and experienced than the women who had no real combat experience. This test was criticised by many including the Secretary of Navy due to the lack of a level playing field.
While there has been intense intra-disciplinary debate within contemporary feminist security studies over the necessary ‘feminist credentials’ of some gendered analyses, it is important to recognise the continual renewal and analytical vigour brought to the field by such debates (Shepherd). My interest in the role of women in the US Military stemmed from my lack of knowledge and interest in the topic itself. The way we see women in the field of security today is very different from how things were a few years ago. Even today, the playing field is not levelled.
Works Cited
Booth, Ken. “SECURITY AND SELF REFLECTIONS OF A FALLEN REALIST.” 1994. Accessed 21 February 2022.
Levy, Orna Sasson. “Feminism and Military Gender Practices: Israeli Women Soldiers in “Masculine” Roles*.” vol. 73, 2003. Accessed 22 February 2022.
Parashar, Swati. “Feminist international relations and women militants: case studies from Sri Lanka and Kashmir.” 2009. Accessed 21 February 2022.
Shepherd, Laura J. “Gender,Violence and Global Politics: Contemporary Debates in Feminist Security Studies.” vol. 7, 2009. Accessed 21 February 2022.
ReplyDeleteThe post is a well written and elaborate piece on how women and 'self' factor in the realm of security. The section on women working in the United States military and the separate training and operations of men and women, how it affects the women, and the force as a whole were really good points. They helped substantiate the earlier section on the role of 'self' in personal, the political, and the international.
It was also quite impressive as to how you involved the fact that often decisions like introducing women regiments or troops in the armed forces or military often just ends up being a way of making the feminist lobby happy. It rarely seems to be making any real difference on the on-ground gender differences and biases. Even after introducing them in the forces, the stereotypes continue to prosper, and high offices be held by the men. It is also often seen that women are being looked down upon even though both men and women would be performing the same exercises and tasks in the military. The fact that mainstream war in itself drives from masculine thought and very rarely sees glimpses of a different opinion is also a point to be thought about.
However, one thing that I felt was that the article or piece was more based on or moved more towards gender in International Relations rather than focusing centrally on International Security. The reading by Ken Booth however was well brought in and the points were well structured and placed throughout the post. I feel the topic should have touched upon the gender roles issue in International Relations but largely be based on Security structures.