Poll: Americans favor allowing women in combat
Nearly three-quarters of Americans say that, given the opportunity, they would vote “for” allowing women to serve in combat roles. These results are from a Gallup survey conducted just after U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced that the Pentagon is lifting the ban on women serving in direct combat. …
There are modest partisan differences. Democrats, including independents who lean Democratic, are more likely than Republicans and Republican leaners to support allowing women to serve in combat — 83% vs. 70% — although clear majorities from both parties favor it.
Those who are younger are more likely to favor the policy than are those who are older. Among those aged 18 to 49, 84% favor the policy, compared with 63% of those aged 50 and older — a difference of 21 percentage points.
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Yea for the Marxist liberal propaganda and indoctrination machine…
SWalker on January 26, 2013 at 11:48 AM
This is evidence that few Americans have been in combat.
Mason on January 26, 2013 at 11:51 AM
Clueless Americans. When the military assigns a female to the front lines there are no tests. The soldier or Marine goes where they’re assigned. If they need the numbers, they send a warm body. So what happens when Susie Q., who weighs 125 lbs., is in a battle and has to carry her 185-210 lb.–male or female–comrade? Doomed to fail. Liberals will destroy the U.S. military from the inside.
conservative pilgrim on January 26, 2013 at 11:54 AM
The “war is just like the videogames” poll.
Protip: it’s not.
Rebar on January 26, 2013 at 11:54 AM
Yeah, until it’s their ass on the line in combat — then they want Vinny from the Bronx covering their ass.
Rational Thought on January 26, 2013 at 11:56 AM
Women In Combat: 80% Does NOT Equal 100%.
M2RB: Goo Goo Dolls
Resist We Much on January 26, 2013 at 11:56 AM
There should be a poll within the actual combat MOSs and Rates. Who cares what the majority of Americans say. The majority of Americans haven’t served.
Gatekeeper on January 26, 2013 at 11:57 AM
Women seem to handle it pretty well on TV and in the movies.
Hey.. maybe it’s time to stop discriminating based on age. Lets send our teenagers and toddlers into combat too. If they can pass the test, why hold them back? It’s a new day and a new age.
That’s probably what they were saying just before the world plunged into the dark ages.
JellyToast on January 26, 2013 at 11:57 AM
That’s the plan. The only ones left will be those who find firing on their fellow citizens entirely acceptable.
Rational Thought on January 26, 2013 at 11:59 AM
GREAT post! As a female, I view this issue the same way. Especially love this quote:
conservative pilgrim on January 26, 2013 at 12:00 PM
Men being men–is it fair to them to put them in combat and have to worry about some dame in their unit being captured and gang-raped on top of everything else they have to think about? Or is that the kind of situation–jihadis targeting female soldiers–that just won’t happen?
vityas on January 26, 2013 at 12:01 PM
What we need to do is make a new Geneva convention thingy. Get all the sides in a conflict to agree that if a male soldier faces a female soldier they have to ease off a little. Not fire too many bullets at them. No one on one struggles. That kind of thing. Give them a head start if you’re in a position of chasing a female.
It’s only fair.
JellyToast on January 26, 2013 at 12:02 PM
Load a standard ruck with 60 pounds of sand and let whatever female hump it. Along with an M-4 and 120 rounds, standard load bearing gear, two quarts of water and 100 rounds of belted .5.56 for the squad’s SAW all night long. While maintaining noise discipline. And then we’ll talk.
Until then. All you are doing is needlessly endangering lives!
Jack Deth on January 26, 2013 at 12:06 PM
I am not sure if this has been answered before:
Do women get to choose to be in combat roles while men can be ordered?
CW on January 26, 2013 at 12:07 PM
Yes, it would indeed seem that that is the plan…
SWalker on January 26, 2013 at 12:08 PM
So what? Americans watch Jersey Shore and made Snooki a semi-household name (I couldn’t pick her out of a lineup).
Ultimately, it’s up to the generals, and we haven’t heard what they’re saying yet.
Meryl Yourish on January 26, 2013 at 12:09 PM
Did the poll stipulate that women in combat would occur only in “gun-free zones”?
Did those polled recognize that these women might have to face Obysmal’s Muslim “brothers,” who have no compunction about abusing and raping women?
onlineanalyst on January 26, 2013 at 12:17 PM
in addition to emeting the same demands, women now (if they want to be so equal) should be required to register with selective service between the ages of 18 – 30, same as the guys.
pabo on January 26, 2013 at 12:18 PM
*meeting the same demands, sorry bad typo.
pabo on January 26, 2013 at 12:19 PM
“If we can’t kill them in the womb we’ll kill them on the battlefield.”
Liberals hate women from birth til death.
fogw on January 26, 2013 at 12:20 PM
So do they also favor women signing up for the draft? Since we are all equal here I think that is only fair!
Crickets…..
gator70 on January 26, 2013 at 12:23 PM
Sure they do. They just can’t come up with one good reason for doing it. Hmmm……..sounds a bit like something else the American people got poled on.
Bmore on January 26, 2013 at 12:27 PM
I have not read the fine print, so if anyone has please correct me if I’m wrong. I would expect them to follow current procedures: If the only openings are Infantry, then that’s where the women will go. The politicians may mandate a certain percentage of women in the infantry regardless and then x amount of women will be assigned to the combat units. They all have to complete boot camp, but the PT standards are different. Problem #1.
For example, currently, if the only openings are Boatswain’s mates (BM) the females have to do it. Almost always it isn’t their first choice of a job, but they go where they’re assigned according to needs of the military. It will be the same with combat, which is completely different from ship deck labor. And the different physical standards are already practiced from boot camp to regular PT tests (a lot get kicked out now bc they can’t pass the PT test or the tape test (bca) for weight). Will they change the physical standards for combat to one level like the elite groups? Doubtful. Nobody can deny that men are 9 times out of 10 stronger than women. But the pols can’t make combat a selective assignment for females or they admit that women are physically different than men. Then you add in unit cohesion, sexual harassment, pregnancy (it’ll happen), more politicizing of military standards, and problems are inevitable.
By the way–what happens when they bring back the draft and Obama’s daughters are called to fulfill their duty? It’s only fair, right?
conservative pilgrim on January 26, 2013 at 12:35 PM
It’s coming, and when inevitably women must register for SS and the draft is reinstated, their daughters first. And take Sandra Fluke and Lena Dunham with them.
pannw on January 26, 2013 at 12:38 PM
Seems to me from what I have read they will not force women into these roles but I could be wrong. If I am right…this is a joke from an equality measure.
CW on January 26, 2013 at 12:46 PM
Thank you and thanks for posting that snippet. I always do my best proofreading after someone else reposts what I’ve written. lol
It should read:
One of these days, maybe, I’ll start proofreading better…
Resist We Much on January 26, 2013 at 12:51 PM
Exactly. I nailed chumpThreads to death on this point the other day. His pretzelisation was so amusing.
Resist We Much on January 26, 2013 at 12:55 PM
Sure most voted yes; because if you don’t then you’re a woman hating, Neanderthal pig, who wants to keep women barefoot and pregnant. Ironically, from what I’ve read from posters with relevant experience, that is exactly what the women do to get OUT of unsavory assignments.
As I’ve said before: Women in combat? Sure. Sasha and Malia first.
teacherman on January 26, 2013 at 12:58 PM
Agree. I don’t like posting without reading the fine print first, but what I wrote is the common practice. Let’s see if the Libs deviate, and how they do, from standard practice.
conservative pilgrim on January 26, 2013 at 1:07 PM
As soon the horror stories come out about what happens to a captured female soldier, or of a family losing their Mother, the percentage will take a dramatic shift.
OxyCon on January 26, 2013 at 1:09 PM
Haha. Grammar girls unite!
conservative pilgrim on January 26, 2013 at 1:10 PM
In the US, civilian authority makes the rules for the military.
Not the other way around…
JohnGalt23 on January 26, 2013 at 1:14 PM
Laws are for little people.
Rebar on January 26, 2013 at 1:34 PM
wow i didn’t even realize that most REPUBLICANS support this. i made the mistake of assuming the comments here on this site were generally reflective of how republicans feel, haha. i kept arguing for women in combat even though i thought that my position on this issue was contrary to most republicans. but now i feel better knowing that i am far from being the only republican who supports this. =)
what are you talking about? so because people realize that some women are physically strong, that means they have been indoctrinated by propaganda? okay…
i haven’t seen anyone say they want a draft at all. i don’t want any MEN to be drafted either. so i want equality for both sexes in that i don’t want EITHER one to be drafted.
“dame?” did we just time-travel decades into the past? XD
anyway, men get raped as well. (didn’t that happen to amb. stevens in benghazi?) and even if that weren’t true, that is such a weak excuse to not allow women in combat. and yet that’s an argument i keep seeing from people. “women shouldn’t be allowed in combat because, men might worry about them!!” but actually, won’t both men and women soldiers worry about all their fellow soldiers, regardless of sex? it’s not as if men don’t worry about other men, in combat. and if, with women in combat, any male soldier ends up doing something irrational because he thought ‘i’m a man so i have to protect this woman even if it means doing something risky and unwise,’ then it’s HIS fault, not the woman’s.
you have to realize this: this argument a lot of people have made that “men are men so they have a natural male tendency to _______, so that’s why women should not ________” is pretty disturbing. that same line of reasoning is used in strict muslim countries where women have to totally cover themselves. they use the same argument, just filled in with different blanks. (and remember that woman in america whose male boss fired her for being “too irresistible?” his lawyer used a similar argument and that’s why i was mad about that case.) so if you’re going to be against women in combat then don’t use this argument. if it is true that men have a natural male tendency to _______, and that blank will make things worse in combat if women are allowed there, then they need to CONTROL that thing, instead of keeping women away.
Sachiko on January 26, 2013 at 2:24 PM