Recruits with first partially gender-integrated Marine boot camp company earn the title Marine

Boot camp in and of itself is a competition. Those who excel rise to the top. As young women arrive after being told they can do anything a young man can do their whole lives, their egos will be crushed when they fail to be the top dog hurting their self-esteem. Having a separated boot camp gives them equal footing among their gender peers. I'm all for women participating with or in combat rolls as long as they are equally qualified, both physically and mentally, with their opposing gender peers.

Cpl (Join to see) - I agree. I think another reason to have gender-segregated basic training is it fosters better unit cohesion as new recruits make the transition from civilian to service member. It helps I think when everyone in the platoon is always together in the same environment.

I attended basic training at Ft. Benning before women were allowed to join combat arms. There was never any doubt that anyone in the platoon was treated differently then the next guy. We all had to get the exact same haircut. If the open bay room or latrines weren't clean enough, we all had to do corrective training and then clean everything a second time. If a "hurricane" hit the bay area because one guy forgot to square away his bunk and wall locker, we all learned the lesson to look out for our battle buddies.