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Trump - No transgender individuals in the military

Archie Gemmill Goal said:
Cool. The great thing about the internet is we don't need to speculate on the history of the conversation. Can you link me to the post where you asked for a scientific study that showed evidence that excluding transgender people from the military aids its effectiveness? Cos I can't see it.
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I didn't ask for evidence showing that excluding transgender people from the military aids its effectiveness. Nor did I ask for evidence showing that excluding transgender people from the military hurts its effectiveness. I asked for evidence of what the effect of including them was, positive OR negative. The effect of excluding them is logically just the inverse of that, and need not be asked as a separate question.
 
Meadmaker said:
The only thing I would quibble with is that what matters is not the ability of a soldier, but the ability of the unit of which that soldier plays a part. If a given soldier's presence in a unit makes that unit better, he, she, or it (robots) should be part of the unit.

If not, too bad.
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Are soldiers only ever added to a unit if it will make that unit "better"?
 
The Don said:
Evidence ?

I guess the first question is what you mean by "near the bottom of the physical ability scale". If you're just talking about raw strength or endurance then that doesn't take into account skill. I may be stronger than an experienced and skilled swordswoman but that doesn't mean that in combat I wouldn't easily get skewered by her in pretty short order.

I also think that there's much more of an overlap between the two sexes than you're suggesting. I (sort of) compete in foot races and finish about half way up (or down) the male competitors. There are plenty of female competitors who beat me hollow. The very best females may very well be better than all but the most elite men in most tests. Finally, there's the concept of roles in the military. In order to make the inclusion of women or transgender individuals as tricky as possible, it seems that the trend seems to be to assume the least suitable roles would be performed by each person - I don't think that's necessarily a good idea.
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The highlighted part

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helene_Diamantides

There is still discussion about whether women do have a fundamentally better capability for ultra-endurance events.

I am particularly taken by the fact that 20 years after she and her teammate came first in the first Dragon's Back Race, she came fourth in the second Dragon's Back Race.
 
quadraginta said:
Are soldiers only ever added to a unit if it will make that unit "better"?
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If your high command isn't adding soldiers to units to make them better, then you should probably demand a refund on your taxes.

But your scare quotes tell me you have some other dishonest bull **** argument in mind. Why don't you just speak plainly?

This signature is intended to irradiate people.
 
theprestige said:
If your high command isn't adding soldiers to units to make them better, then you should probably demand a refund on your taxes.
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Is replacing personnel who have to leave for whatever reason in order to keep the unit up to strength making it better? (I left the quotation marks off since they seemed to scare you.)

But your scare quotes tell me you have some other dishonest bull **** argument in mind. Why don't you just speak plainly?
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Sometimes a quote is just a quote.

Sorry. I didn't know you scared that easily.
 
quadraginta said:
Never to keep it the same, or get it back to where it was?

A ten man squad loses one of its team. Is the replacement always better?
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One has to work from what one has, so it would be to make it better than the nine man squad it is at this moment, irrespective of whatever it was before.
 
I am frequently surprised what directions threads take.

The concept of favoring the quality of the unit over the abilities of an individual soldier I might expect to lead to some conversation and perhaps dispute. However, I never expected any sort of exchange on the actual concept of making a unit better.
 
d4m10n said:
Assuming the U.S. military has already solved the problem of integrating women into the armed forces (bit odd that this thread has focused so much on that issue) then what new problems arise from allowing transgender folks to serve openly as such?
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Man, give straight guys some credit. I have been the first bi friend in many a group, and they adapt very quickly.

The only problem are the ******** on both sides, kick them out of the military, and I assure you the various sexual orientations and gender configurations that want to kill people for a living will Excell at it.
 
quadraginta said:
Are soldiers only ever added to a unit if it will make that unit "better"?
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Other than if there is friction between the members, or person of less competency in leadership is added above someone of greater competency and then refuses to listen to advice, is it actually possible to add a competent soldier to a unit and make the unit worse?
 
quadraginta said:
Never to keep it the same, or get it back to where it was?
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If adding a soldier keeps a unit the same, there's no point in adding a soldier. And getting a unit back to where it was perfectly compatible with improving it from where it is.

A ten man squad loses one of its team. Is the replacement always better?
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It should be better than a nine man squad, yes.

Why is this not obvious?
 
PhantomWolf said:
Other than if there is friction between the members, or person of less competency in leadership is added above someone of greater competency and then refuses to listen to advice, is it actually possible to add a competent soldier to a unit and make the unit worse?
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I've never been in the military, so I can't speak to the kind of team dynamics that exist there, but I am very familiar in business with the concept of a "toxic employee". The classic toxic employee is highly competent and extremely productive, and the team he is part of is dysfunctional and failing. He brings out the worst in everyone else.

I don't know if the same thing exists in the military, or if the clearly defined chain of command combined with military discipline makes that dynamic less likely.

ETA: Basically, though, the real problem is what you describe in the "other than". Some people create friction, and some people of "greater competence" are convinced that they shouldn't have to listen to superior officers who are "less competent". I don't know if today's army is different from yesterday's, but that sort of behavior could land the "more competent" subordinate in a heap of trouble in the old days.
 
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Meadmaker said:
The only thing I would quibble with is that what matters is not the ability of a soldier, but the ability of the unit of which that soldier plays a part. If a given soldier's presence in a unit makes that unit better, he, she, or it (robots) should be part of the unit.

If not, too bad.
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What weaksauce ass unit can't figure out that what the mission requires comes before their squeamish hangups?

Once again, if there's enemy units actively trying to kill you and your mind is currently engaged trying to assess the state of Tony-oops-I-mean-Toni's genitals, guess what? Tony/Toni isn't the problem.
 
Meadmaker said:
I've never been in the military, so I can't speak to the kind of team dynamics that exist there, but I am very familiar in business with the concept of a "toxic employee". The classic toxic employee is highly competent and extremely productive, and the team he is part of is dysfunctional and failing. He brings out the worst in everyone else.

I don't know if the same thing exists in the military, or if the clearly defined chain of command combined with military discipline makes that dynamic less likely.
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We call them "Blue Falcons" in the Army (no, I don't know why, nor do I really care; it's just a title given for a soldier who is bringing the rest of the unit down). The difference is, there are multiple ways to deal with such a soldier that are probably not available to someone in a more corporate environment, up to and including discharging them from the military if they do not improve. Generally they don't last long in the military.

Ultimately, while the overall competence of the unit is paramount, having one soldier who is marginally less competent than another soldier doesn't drastically affect the overall capability of the unit, so they wouldn't be moved or kicked out simply because they aren't up to the standards of another soldier so long as they meet the general standards in order to actually serve. The one who are drastically less competent than the majority of the other soldiers are, generally speaking, dealt with relatively quickly. I've seen multiple soldiers be discharged for failing to meet standards in my time in the military, typically physical fitness standards; I've also seen multiple soldiers start out badly and improve over time to become some of the best soldiers an officer can ask to have. The gender (birth or otherwise) of the soldier has very little to do with whether said soldier will be a good soldier in my experience. I've had excellent male and female soldiers serve with me; and quite frankly so long as they could carry out the mission I didn't really give two ***** what equipment they were born with; it was none of my business so long as they could do their job.

For reference, I'm medically retired (chronic back injury) from the Army with seventeen years and change time in service, and I've served with both good and bad soldiers, NCOs, and officers. The bad ones typically don't last long.
 
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I was in the military, as I believe I have stated more than once.

When I transitioned out of the Navy, I was as qualified as I could be for my rating.

My replacement was not, the readiness of my unit went down when I left, and those who were as qualified as I was had to take up the slack until another person qualified as I did.

When I left there were two TDU weights in my division, of about 20 sailors, that were unqualified to stand the watches I stood even though they out-ranked me, so who knows how long it was going to take for readiness to return to normal levels.

Replacements typically came in two flavors with equal frequency, fresh out of school and sailors who had served on another vessel for a rotation, 3-5 years. Even those experienced ones took awhile to qualify as every sub is different, even ones of the same class. And some, like one of the TDU weights I mentioned would take an act of congress to get rid of.

Bottom line is you get what the detailer sends you and you have to make due with what you get and continue to work to improve your units capability.

TDU = Trash Disposal Unit
Submarines add weights to trash to make sure it sinks.
 
Dangitall, there is something I actually know quite a lot about (the battle of Agincourt, longbow archery and use of bows in war), in a thread I am interested it, but the former is a derail of the latter!

And it is because we don't use archers in battle anymore (unless you're in the Swedish or Norwegian armed forces that is).
 
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