While at War, Female Soldiers Fight to Belong. What are your thoughts on this article?

Growing up in a small town and being the only girl in my class of 12, I learned really fast, you need a tough exterior, but a tougher core, if you want to have male friends. If you want to be "treated as one of them" you have to be able to take it and give it like them. But girls can't fake the funk to fit in with the guys. Sorry just because we have the same jobs, doesn't mean we all have all common interests and a common ground.

If you do the job, cover your sector of fire, and have my 6; you belong. That goes for anyone.

Interesting GySgt Wayne A. Ekblad and certainly a good insight into how a female leaders feels in the male dominated world of the military. I believe there is difference between between respecting and accepting. Women have been in the Army for a long time now, and they continue to venture into more and more career fields. From the women I have worked with along the way (there have been women in my career field since I came in in 1980), I know that most feel they have to be as good physically, if not better, than the men; that is a hard standard to meet and keep. I have never walked in those shoes, but I know most of my female military friends are under tremendous stress and pressure, that most of us males never know.