Posted on Dec 31, 2013
Marine Corps Delays Pull-Up Requirement for Females
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http://www.stripes.com/marines-delay-changes-to-female-pull-up-rules-1.259871
45% of Females and 1% of Males unable to meet standard, but according to one female Marine Capt, it's not an issue of capability..........
What are you thoughts?
The Marine Corps has delayed changes to its female pull-up standards after data showed that many potential Marines were unable to meet the new standards.
Marine Corps
Standards
Women in the Military
Posted 12 y ago
Responses: 13
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CSM
This is just fine and dandy for Marines but I would be pissed if the Army tried implementing this! Women want equal opportunity not equal treatment.
Equal opportunity means having the same chance as everyone else to perform the exact same standard.
Equal treatment means everyone gets to wear ASU skirts, shave their heads and see the same docs. Equal treatment is stupid because the two genders are not equal. This whole issue is beyond ridiculous.
This is just fine and dandy for Marines but I would be pissed if the Army tried implementing this! Women want equal opportunity not equal treatment.
Equal opportunity means having the same chance as everyone else to perform the exact same standard.
Equal treatment means everyone gets to wear ASU skirts, shave their heads and see the same docs. Equal treatment is stupid because the two genders are not equal. This whole issue is beyond ridiculous.
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SSG Robert Burns
Yea the bad part was I had to go get on the t-cups equivalent ride at Bush Gardens to make up for it. 6'2" 215lbs crammed up in there looking like a clown. Parenthood....
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CPT (Join to see)
...but using your same analogy of height, there's an important point to be made. At the amusement park, height rules have a good reason behind them. On the other hand, the Florida State Troopers were forced to change their hiring standards because they required that all Troopers be a minimum of 6' tall. The problem was that they could not prove that the height standard was an absolute requirement to successfully do the job (but there is definitely an intimidation factor there when you get pulled over). At the same time, since less than 5% of women are that tall, and since there are races that tend to be shorter than others, it was ruled discriminatory. <div><br></div><div>It is not just about whether a person can meet the standard, but whether the standard is actually relevant. How would you argue that Pull Ups are a flat out necessity to be a Marine, but totally unnecessary to be an Infantry Soldier in the Army? Why isn't emotional stability a standard? Or how about pain tolerance? Or whether or not you're a "bleeder"? </div><div><br></div><div>I am not saying standards should be lowered, bent, whatever. I am saying is that they should be relevant.</div>
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SSG Robert Burns
Fair point but I don't think it applies here. The Marine Corps has decided that pull ups are way to measure fitness capabilities of their marines and the Army has decided to measure it other ways. They are different organizations with different missions and different standards. It doesn't make either one irrelevant. I personally believe the pull-up is a great way to measure combat ability for individuals, especially when it comes to pulling yourself up a wall or out of a flipped over truck with a full combat load and maybe a wounded buddy.
Just like the ht req. is for a good reason for roller coasters, I believe that the ht req for state troopers when it was implemented was for a good reason too. I don't think it was meant to be discriminatory, just effective in intimidation, deescalation, and physical dominance.
We do the same thing (or did when I was there ) for soldiers on the DMZ. Heck we even do it for the color guard. LOL
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It's actually 55% were unable to meet the standard; 45% passed. I'd also be interested to know the rest of the APFT stats. What are the pushup percentages and are they the same as males?<div>You want to know why they "delayed" the changes? Because now they'd be chaptering out over half of all female recruits who come in. Pretty soon they'd just stop recruiting women at that rate.</div><div>If I know that 9 of 10 men I recruit will pass and only 4 of the 10 women I recruit will, well that's an easy decision.</div>
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SFC Jones - you hit upon a great point about "equal treatment" and SGT Woods touches on "equal opportunity". And some great back and forth from SSG Burns.
It can and never will be equal. We all know that "on the average" due to physiological differences, there will always be a performance difference. And as MSG Quick has pointed out, there are always those outliers that do better/worse than the average and against the opposite sex, but that is not the norm.
Now, when a recruit shows up at the MEPS station, do males/females have different options?
I know that it used to be that for males, the first screen that was shown was all combat arms and they really tried to push you to those jobs as that was what the army needed filled. Now, with equal opportunity, will new female recruits be "pushed" into those jobs at the same rate as males? or are we only going to allow those females who "want" to go combat arms do that?
Doesn't sound equal to me if I'm a male, sounds like I will have less diversity or opportunity for jobs than what females will have.
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My overall response to his topic can be summed up in the following statement:<br><br>A chain is only as strong as it's weakest link. <br><br>If you lower the standards, you are lowering the requirements of how strong your weakest link has to be. Thus you put the whole machine/system in jeopardy.<br>
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Bottom line: This makes the Marine Corps leadership look silly by back-tracking on such a revolutionary change.
I think implementing the pull-ups for females was a irresponsible 'quick' reaction by leaders without being given all the accurate data.
We can't always say, "Hey, that's a good idea (in theory)!" and just implement things without some sort of prolonged data.
I think it's GREAT that women want to serve in combat and be equal to their male counterparts, BUT we don't always get what we want just 'wanting' it. This isn't a knock on women (I know a few that can out-perform me on the APFT), but a knock on the specific training that should have been incorporated prior to implementation.
I think implementing the pull-ups for females was a irresponsible 'quick' reaction by leaders without being given all the accurate data.
We can't always say, "Hey, that's a good idea (in theory)!" and just implement things without some sort of prolonged data.
I think it's GREAT that women want to serve in combat and be equal to their male counterparts, BUT we don't always get what we want just 'wanting' it. This isn't a knock on women (I know a few that can out-perform me on the APFT), but a knock on the specific training that should have been incorporated prior to implementation.
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SSG V. Michelle Woods
I'll admit, I am not EO compliant when it comes to this. The only male I'll compete against in push ups is my 9 year old nephew. Many of his push ups don't count because his form is not correct according to the grader...which is me lol.
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CSM and RP network, first and foremost my thoughts are exactly that my thoughts expressed in my opinion. I think that it is an issue around the service. This issue I speak of is gender equality. The biggest topic around my branch of service is female joining the ranks as 11B's. I believe that it is imperative to have an equal scale in which to judge physical readiness, in both males and females. Women and men should be held to a physical standard equal to the rigors required in a combat environment. Closing with and destroying the enemy, in any environment. There cannot be a double standard and feeding off that double standard cannot generate equality.
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SSG V. Michelle Woods
SGT McGhee
I agree. What I want to know is if the general military community agree about this, why is it such a hot topic?
It's simple: set a certain standard that matches the rigors of the job and then hold everyone to that standard.
If "the man" would only listen to us down here on RP...
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SSG(P) (Join to see)
SGT Woods, simpley because the Army in which we serve in today is more worried about politics that fighting wars so on paper everything sounds grand but when the metal meets meat it boils down to nothing more than a piss poor decision
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CSM,
I read this article. My wife and I were discussing this, as she is a National Guard MAJ currently on Active Duty and has been in about 14-15 years.
Both of us agree that if they can't meet the SAME EXACT standards as men, they shouldn't be allowed.
Women want to be treated equally. My God, you can't shove that down people's throats enough these days. Hell you can open a door for a woman and get your butt chewed off for treating her differently sometimes.
If they want equal treatment, they should be held to the SAME EXACT STANDARD.
If you want in combat arms, you should be able to ruck with the 240B and barrels just like PVT Smith has to. When I went to PLDC at Fort Sill (I was artillery at the time) we were all mostly artillery except we had one female CPL in our class who was supply. She couldn't carry the man pack, she couldn't carry the 249 let alone 240, yet she still graduated even though we had to pick up her slack.
All that does is create resentment.
In the Army the PU standard is ridiculous for women. 17 or so? Any woman that works out (yes I understand the physiological differences 100%) should be able to knock out at least 40. My wife does 55 or so, and plenty of females in my unit do as well.
Of course on the opposite end of this, the Army should quit being so lenient on the males as well. They need to GO if you can't pass.
I'll share this story real quick and get off my soap box. I get so sick of people saying that "oh I didn't have enough notice" or "oh boo I just worked out" or some crap. The standards ARE A JOKE!!! I had a private tell me last APFT when I was a grader "well I just took one and you can't make me take one more than once every four months". WRONG. AR 350-1, para 1-24 e. (2) states: Commanders may administer the APFT as often as they wish; however, they must specify beforehand when the
results are for record
So now for the actual story. When I was a newly promoted SGT, I decided to run my mouth within ear shot of my 1SG after recently finishing an APFT where people failed and said "you should be able to pass an APFT EVERY DAY OF THE WEEK!!!" to which my 1SG administered a record APFT to me the next week Monday - Friday, and I passed all five.
Sick and tired of these easy standards and people can't meet them.
But to bring it full circle - same standards for everyone. 1% of females passing doesn't mean the test is flawed, it means the treat them equally has more ramifications than people think. Same with allowing women into combat arms.
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SSG (Join to see)
SFC Jones this is an actual story in reference to AR 350-1, para 1-24 e. (2)
I went to drill once expecting to take a diagnostic like my unit does every month. So there I was standing in line about to do push ups when a SSG in my unit informs us that the APFT will be for record.
I went to drill once expecting to take a diagnostic like my unit does every month. So there I was standing in line about to do push ups when a SSG in my unit informs us that the APFT will be for record.
Talk about beforehand lol.
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My 2 cents; I know Female Marines can meet the requirements to do the pull-ups, and in some cases, max the pull-ups. It's all a matter of time. The problem is the length of Recruit Training. There is not enough time to focus on getting all up-to-speed on pull-ups and finish all the other training requirements IOT become a Marine.
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LTC Paul Labrador
Good point. Recruits coming in are only initially physically as good as the activities they did in HS made them. Most boys coming in played sports that emphasized development of upper body strength (football, basketball, wrestling, etc). But do sports that girls do have the same emphasis on upper body strength? IMHO, most don't, so they don't train young girls in upper body strength. It takes time to build that up from zero to 100% when the guys only have to build up from say 70 to 100%.
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They discussed this tonight on Anderson Cooper 360. Attached is the link and there are 2 good videos to go with it. What do you think.
The Marine Corps is delaying a new physical fitness mandate after 55% of female recruits failed to do the minimum of three pull-ups in boot camp last year. Some are questioning what this says about wo...
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I am not surprised. To say someone can meet the requirements for a snapshot in time is easy. To maintain the level for a career would be near impossible. Many new recruits that are female can pass the APFT on the male standard. Not many can 3 and 5 years down the road. That is why we have two standards.
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