Why is the boonie cap so demonized in the army?

The only thing we were authorized to wear in the field was a helmet complete with chin strap. The boonie was OK to wear on the FOB as long as we were not under attack, then the helmet was preferred by all. I was not a fan of the beret taking the place of the patrol cap. It felt disrespectful to the units that were authorized the beret. And I thought it made me look silly.

Isn't that head gear authorized for Special Forces/Recon/Seals for example?!

Great question and I love reading the comments. I always wore mine while in Kuwait. It worked much better than the patrol cap keeping the sun off your head and neck and folded up nicely in your pocket. For whatever reason, our CSM hated it and very few people wore it. I wore mine so often as a going away gift, I was given an embroidered boonie cap and a hat rack.

Well it should only worn in the field so it can be worn then. Semper Fi

I love the bonnie cap. Honestly I have no idea why the boonie cap is demonzed. I think its one of the greatest caps that is out there. I can say maybe its mostly the old school guys/women. No offense to
them. I get it though there are things that I like to keep traditional as well. I guess you can say that the word demonized should be change too frown upon.

Don't know about that . . . in Vietnam most regulations went "out the window" as far as proper dress was concerned. I was even awarded my Bronze Star while standing on a concrete basketball court in Nha Trang, wearing pretty sloppy-looking fatigues and my boonie hat!

The long and short is that it is a crumpled mess and looks to individualized ie not uniform. That said I was a sniper and always worn mine in the field.

I never had an issue with Bonnie covers or watch caps. Boony covers protect the rats from the sun. As do the watch caps

Of course I enjoyed over ruling the 1st sht

We never had a problem with being allowed to wear the Boonie hats, but I was in Desert Shield Desert Storm and if we weren’t wearing the Boonie, we were wearing the Kevlar!
I guess not wearing it properly was a bit of the issue. As one other person commented about wanting to wear it Australian style that defeats the purpose of having the brim to protect your face, neck, and ears from being scorched. I was a senior NCO then, and some of the younger troops would tease me about how I wore my cap because I wore it with the brim straight all the way around. But then some of those younger enlisted individuals had such badly burnt necks and burnt ears that they got hell from the Top and Company Commander regarding the design and proper wearing of the Boonie hat. By the way, our Top and some other senior NCO‘s were Vietnam veterans and they would get on the young enlisted also about how to wear the damn hat!

So my question to you is why is it so important that you wear it? Is it because you can wear it in whatever fashion you want or is it really for the purpose of protecting your face neck and ears from the blistering sun??

I was in the intelligence corps. Quite often, once we ere dropped off by the ground vehicles or choppers near our AO and the sound of the engines had faded into the distance, K-pots went in the bottom of the ruck and the boonie caps came out. No one was coming to see us without asking for the grid coords to our hide site so it worked for us.