- Share This Post
- Pin It
- 3
-
Sparkle (0)
Recently, Marie Claire featured an article titled Life as an American Female Soldier and three women were brave enough to share their experiences in Kuwait and Iraq.
Sergeant Stephanie James described the pain of losing another soldier in an explosion and the devastation of seeing her squad leader carrying the sergeant's duty cap that was covered in blood. "No way around it," she writes. "Female soldiers deal with issues men don't even think about." She said she took the Depo-Provera shot so she wouldn't have to deal with her period overseas and her hair started falling out due to the stress.
James writes:
"In the military, they try to make things equal. Mainly, that means women are supposed to look like men. You can't wear earrings. Makeup can't be excessive. I didn't wear any, but I always carried ChapStick."
-----
Captain Jennifer Errington described being sexually harassed by a master sergeant:
"Shortly after I got to Kuwait, a master sergeant asked if I'd join him to pick up some civilians at the airport. He was a well-respected man — married, with five daughters. At the airport, we got dinner from Burger King. Over dinner, the sergeant started telling me how he'd put my computer near his in the office so he could work closer to me. Later, as we were driving back to the base, he leaned over toward me and started to undo my seat belt. I was scared. He stopped the car. It was midnight. I had no idea where we were, and getting out of the car was as scary as staying in it. At some point, he placed my hand on his penis. I just looked out the window. You tell yourself, "It's fine," so nothing worse happens."
Specialist Ashley Pullen slept with her back to the wall so she could protect herself. She writes:
"When you looked out the window of my trailer in Iraq, all you could see was sand. My roommate was female, although the trailer was coed. At bedtime, I'd change into a pretty nightgown I brought from home. But I only wore stuff like that inside the trailer. Outside, we always had to wear our uniforms. At night, my roommate and I would hang mosquito netting on the door and turn the music up loud — everything from Avril Lavigne to the Dirty Dancing sound track. The guys would come over, and we'd dance. It was fun. After they left, though, I slept with my back to the wall so if somebody reentered the trailer, I could protect myself. The chance of rape during wartime is high."
PBS's NOW offers this statistic about sexual abuse in the military:
"Roughly one in seven of America’s active duty military soldiers is a woman, but a NOW investigation found that sexual assault and rape is widespread. One study of National Guard and Reserve forces found that almost one in four women had been assaulted or raped. Last year alone, almost 3,000 soldiers reported sexual assault and rape by other soldiers."
This abuse has a label: military sexual trauma, or MST. NOW aired this story and interviewed several women who were brave enough to speak out against the abuse that is causing the military so much shame.
Watching this twenty-five minute program brought tears to my eyes. These women enlisted in the military to serve their country only to be raped and assaulted by male soldiers. What's worse is that this abuse has been going on for decades.
During the first Gulf War alone, one in seven women were raped and that war was only a few months. In 2005, the Veterans Administration released the study of the National Gard and Army Reserves that found one in four women were sexually assaulted during active duty.
Because of the outrageous number of sexual assaults, Congress mandated the Department of Defense to control the issue. In 2005 the DOD created an office specifically to deal with sexual assault, and a toll free hotline was implemented to report incidents. Trained victim advocates are employed in every military installation.
The NOW investigation found that the military has done far too little to prevent sexual assault in the military and they've acted too slow.
Many female soldiers do not report the incidents for fear of how it will affect their careers. Too often the rape against a female soldier is carried out by a commanding officer. This is called Command Rape.
