Posted by
daddontsk8 on Thursday, April 05, 2007 5:33:21 PM
The recent capture of the 15 British sailors by Iran has provided an interesting study of the war and women’s roles in combat units. Western society, especially Britain and the United States have military systems that allow for limited participation by female soldiers in combat units. This event highlighted society’s attitudes toward current military policy. Interestingly, the most profound statement came from Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
The President of Iran puzzled at why the British military would allow a mother to serve in such an openly hostile environment. As a corollary, much of the press accounts of the capturing of the British sailors tended to include statements like, “...15 British sailors were captured…, including one woman, Leasing Seaman Faye Turney, who is also the mother of a 3 year old….”
If there is one thing our modern, progressive society has in common with that of the Middle East, is an inherent, subconscious understanding of the roles of mothers. We know at the core of our being that a mother’s role is to care for and nurture her children. We know at the core of our being that a mother would not intentionally place herself in harm’s way. There are many voices in our society that will deny this until they are blue in the face. They will say that women, mothers, have every right to pursue careers and hobbies that may be inherently risky. They will say that fathers can be just as nurturing and just as capable to care for children as mothers. But they are lying. First they are lying to themselves, and then, to justify the lie they’ve bought into, they yell from the highest mountain about how this thing they preach has to be true.
But buried in the pit of our society’s subconscious, we know that mothers should not be soldiers.
We can place the blame for LS Faye Turney’s decision to enlist in the British Royal navy on a number of factors. We can say that she must be a selfish woman, more interested in her own career than her daughter’s well being. We can say that she was influenced by an element of society that convinced her of the lie. We can say that all sorts of outside influences clouded her ability to make a proper decision. We could even imagine that her own personal circumstances gave her little choice in the matter. All these things we can put forward as the reason for Leading Seaman Faye Turney’s career decisions, but the reason or reasons she enlisted are irrelevant.
What is relevant to Leading Seaman Fay Turney is that for whatever reason, she pursued something that is important to her. And in that pursuit, she will see that her choices, what she considered important, only reveal the lie.
The CommonMan Commentaries