Re: ERA War and the Draft

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Being a women myself, I have to agree that women should be
included on the military draft as well as men. We, as women,
have fought so hard in the past to get equality, but we
shouldn't we take the same risks. I believe equality requires
the good stuff and the bad. You shouldn't be able to pick and
choose all the good stuff, you have to take some of the bad.

On 1/05/03, Dave Behrens wrote:
> With very rare exceptions, every man residing in the United
> States 18 to 26 years of age is required by the Military
> Selective Service Act to register with the Selective Service
> System, and thereby subject himself to the possibility of
> involuntary military service. Yet, on the eve of war with
> Iraq, the prosecution of which may require millions of U.S.
> military personnel, absolutely no woman in the U.S. is
> required to register. This clear fact of gender
> discrimination has not been focused upon in public
> discussions, I believe, because an active draft has not been
> in effect since 1973.
>
> The United States Selective Service System offers on its
> Website a short history of the draft with respect to women.
> The primary reason given for non-registration of women is a
> twenty-year-old Supreme Court decision, Rostker v. Goldberg,
> 453 U.S. 57 (1981).
>
> Simply stated, this decision says that since all men
> registered with the Selective Service are considered combat
> replacements, and since Congress forbids women to go into
> combat, women should not be registered. Of course, this
> reasoning is absolutely absurd, since it presupposes that
> every man called for involuntary military service will be
> used exclusively for combat, and that no man called will be
> used for the approximately 90&37; of military jobs which are
non-
> combat related.
>
> Twenty years after Rostker, the Uniformed Military Training
> Service Act (H.R. 3598) attempts a draft reformation by
> shortening the length of involuntary service, but still
> perpetuates gender discrimination by maintaining the
> requirement of involuntary service for all males registered
> under the Military Selective Service Act and exempting
> absolutely all females.
>
> Some questions arise as a result of these blatant facts of
> gender discrimination:
>
> 1. U.S. women enjoy the same civil rights as U.S. men; they
> comprise 50.9&37; of the population and18.8&37; of all
military
> personnel. Why is the pretext of a ridiculous Supreme Court
> decision used to exempt the majority of the population from
> even the possibility of involuntary military service in any
> capacity?
>
> 2. Should women be permitted to vote in elections for
> candidates who may have to decide on war for our country, in
> light of the facts that women will never serve involuntarily
> in any military conflict and that even females who do
> volunteer for military service are exempted from life
> threatening combat jobs?
>
> 3. Title IX demands that proportionately gender-equal funds
> be used for all school-based activities that receive any
> federal funding, including athletics. Many schools have had
> to abandon male team sports that earn revenue in excess of
> their costs and which aid in the preparation of males for
the
> teamwork and organization of military service, in order to
> provide gender-equal funding for female sports which
> perennially lose revenue. Yet there is no requirement for
> females to utilize the skills and strengths learned on the
> athletic field and the classroom in the military defense of
> their country. Should Title IX continue?
>
> 4. Do equal civil rights for women obligate women to equal
> civil responsibilities?
>
>