The military must open all roles to women by January or submit an exception request by the end of this month, and that exigence has given rise to lots of stories in the media lately about women in the military. The graduation of two women from Ranger training got a lot of coverage (and, wow, are those two Rangers impressive!), and now the Marines have released a study suggesting women don’t do as well in combat as men.
This study has its flaws. One thing I’d like to know more about is why the study apparently compared all-male groups to co-ed groups but did not also include all-female groups as a comparative element. This set-up doesn’t allow researchers to distinguish between differences in ability that result from performance/potential and differences in ability that result from sexist behavior. Not to mention that having an all-male group as the control group is not an objective choice and comes with its own problems. (Perhaps we should consider constructing a control group based on the requirements of modern warfare rather than tradition?) I’m excited to see how this all plays out come January.
Erin Clark Frost 