A few good women

“Anything you can do, I can do better. I can do anything better than you.” —Annie Get Your Gun

It hasn’t been that long ago since the papers were full of this story from somewhere back East—some big city back East, if we remember—in which the physical standards for firefighters were lowered to make room for more women in the ranks. The brass had decided they needed Diversity among the crews, so they lowered the amount of weight women had to move in a certain qualifying test. Back then, some of us thought: Wha—? If we were pinned down in a burning building, we wouldn’t give a darn about the makeup of the fire station’s first responders—or how many women or left-handers or Turkish-speaking Libertarian vegan teetotaling college graduates were on staff. We’d want to be carried out of said building before burning up. Any woman who wants a shot at being a firefighter should be given that shot. But she should be able to pull folks out of a burning building like her male colleagues.

We were reminded of that story last week when a different kind of brass began arguing about letting women in other jobs—combat jobs, specifically in the Marine Corps.

The secretary of the United States Navy, Ray Mabus, has made it clear he wants to allow women to compete for combat jobs in the Marines. For his part, the commandant of the Marines, General Joseph Dunford, doesn’t like the idea and has a proposal on the table nixing it. The Marine Corps is a part of the Navy. Now there’s a public fight.

All in all, we’re more inclined to agree with the Navy on this one. Over on the Army side, the Rangers just graduated two women into their ranks. And it took a while. Many women couldn’t make it through the Ranger course over the years, and were sent back to their units. As they should have been.

If a woman can prove she can do anything the men can, let her in, boys. But . . . (There’s always a but.) In trying to defend his most reasonable position, Ray Mabus fell back on the tired old Diversity Is Strength argument that didn’t work in that big city back East:

“I think [the Marines] will be a stronger force because a more diverse force is a stronger force. And it will not make them any less lethal.”

A more diverse force—at least when it comes to gender—is a stronger force? Why? Is that so self-evident that the secretary of the United States Navy can just proclaim it these days, as if everybody would agree to such an undeniable fact?

A more diverse force—at least when it comes to gender—is a stronger force? What studies back up the secretary’s assertion? Or are there any? Or is this one more talking point he picked up at a Power Point presentation at the Pentagon?

A more diverse force—at least when it comes to gender—is a stronger force? Shouldn’t he qualify that statement to suggest that women in those combat jobs must meet the same physical requirements that men do? Instead of suggesting that diversity for diversity’s sake is strengthening enough? Or will the enemy flee in the face of a unit partially made up of women?

There are arguments to make to allow women in combat, Mr. Secretary, or at least certain women. There are other arguments, good arguments, to be made that women already see combat every day in this war against terrorism. Use those arguments. They work. Diversity Equals Strength is no argument. It’s Newspeak used in boardrooms, Dilbert cartoons and certain college classrooms. The United States Marine Corps deserves better.