Honoring Women in the Military

Honoring the military includes honoring the struggles of women of all ages and ranks. The shocking fact is that a third or more of women who serve in the military have been raped by fellow members of the service. The prevalence of sexual assault upon women in the military has been brought to public attention repeatedly in recent years. It is amazing each time another facet of this problem comes to light.

Yesterday it was reported that women in the military, insured by TRICARE, must pay for their own rape kits, since TRICARE does not cover them. "Women in the military are twice as likely to be raped as their civilian counterparts" according to an article written by Penny Coleman. Of the 2688 sexual assaults reported in the military in 2007, only 8% went to court, as compared to over 40% in civilian courts. When Congress requested a report, Robert Gates prevented the officer in charge of sexual assault prevention from testifying until the Congress threatened a contempt citation.

When we honor those in military service, we must not exclude the women who serve.

The notorious Duke sexual assault case has been dismissed. I think it is accurate to say that the victim's account, the lack of evidence, and the missteps in the prosecutor's office really did not support a case. I am glad that when the evidence did not add up, young men accused of rape and sexual assault have been exhonorated.

However, I do not agree with one depiction of this case which I heard on the radio this afternoon. It said that the accused had "done nothing wrong." I will stand by the conviction that hiring and leering at a stripper is wrong, that participating in racist and sexist speech and carousing is wrong, that underage drinking is wrong, that promoting drunkenness is wrong, that writing an email which threatens to skin a woman alive is wrong, that disturbing a family neighborhood with despicable behavior is wrong, and that acting like none of these things matter is wrong.

Money buys attention. The evidence has been overwhelming lately.

For instance, I saw a magazine cover in the grocery store with a picture of an actress who is nearly my age of 49. The teaser line on the cover asked why she never ages. Any of us who aren't intentionally suspending reality to think about that question can already give the answer. She probably spends hundreds of thousands of dollars a year on personal coaches, physicians who mess with her skin and her subcutaneous adipose tissue, tailors and designers who adjust her clothing to cover or enhance her figure, and make-up artists and photographers who can hide the signs of age. With all this investment, her promoters and the publishers of the magazine collaborate to pretend that she has a gift, a discipline, and a cleverness to seem forever young.

A second example has been in the letters to the editor of the Durham Herald-Sun. I have never seen such a well-coordinated campaign of letter placement in our local paper. Well crafted letters which cover the key talking points and stay on message appear over and over, defending the three lacrosse players who were alleged to have committed sexual assault. Apparently the evidence is less convincing now than several months ago, and the charges of rape have been dropped. What amazes me is the way that the letter writers let their attack on the rape charges ooze over into saying that nothing wrong happened the night of that party. I am not fond of conspiracy theories. But never before have so many self-righteous people from all fifty states given so much attention to writing almost the same letter to our small local paper. There has to be something at work behind this, and I'm not blaming the Holy Spirit. Money can organize letter writers, too.

They pretend that it is easy to discern the truth among the "he said, she said" nature of sexual assault cases. They try to live in a pristine moment apart from the history of rapes swept under the rug and differential application of the laws according to gender and race. Even a young woman who grew up in my neighborhood has joined in the attacks on anyone who was critical of the lacrosse team, especially certain Duke professors and administrators.

Some professors seized the opportunity to speak about the ongoing presumption of privilege among many white Duke students who resist and resent their associations with blacks. It is real. I speak with black students at Duke often enough to know that although they have been 0fficially admitted to the school they seldom find the path to mutuality across racial lines, opportunities, understanding, or respect. But many propagandists are hard at work to hide all this for the sake of buying an untarnished future for the accused.