[blowfish]

Goober, your argument seems to stem from the belief that there is something about women that is inherently suited to staying home and raising a family.  Beyond pregnancy (and possibly lactation) there doesn't seem to be any inherent difference between males and females in the family (aside from historical gender roles).  So why should it be women who stay home and look after the family?  Besides, it's not like they can have more children if all of the males are off fighting a war.

[Dilmah G]

They will be home to serve as flight instructors within a few years. They can have as many kids as they like then.

I'm not going to get anymore involved, but I'd like to point out that I'd rather the bolded point should NOT happen. Instructor assignments are probably going to be about 3 months during a time of war, where experienced pilots are needed. If they need more than three months to recoup, then they can **** themselves, because we have a war to fight. About the last thing we need is female pilots getting pregnant, being moved off the flight roster (You cannot instruct people on FJ's when you're pregnant, remember?) And being lost from the pool of available pilots for nine months. Which in turn, means we need to find more instructors, etc and so on.

Nice assumption there. I like how you assume that today's skewed gender ratio (less than half a century after the option became available) is because it 'doesn't appeal to women'.

Today's Air Forces have steadily increasing numbers of women. The female candidates for the Mercury program were far more experienced and capable than the men.

Moreover, it would never happen. It's akin to saying 'with extinction so close, we can't afford to pay our workers. The logical thing to do is to enslave a quarter of the population again.'

Uh, pilots have something in common. They are all attracted to precise manual activities, most notably, hands-on trades. I have never, ever, seen a female carpenter, a female bricklayer, a female draftsmen, or anything of the sort. I know females do work those occupations, but not to the same extent men do. (Fun Fact: A few of the pilots in the ADF were tradies before joining.) And how many female massage therapists are there in contrast to male tradies, and how many would enjoy being pilots?

Women are by no means inferior pilots, their capacity to multitask in fact makes them inherently better at instrument flying than males, or so common sense would say. But in my experience, not as many women desire a career as a pilot. Also, Fast Jets have been open to women for about 20 years now, in Australia, and we haven't had a single female Fast Jet pilot (but we've had female pilots go through No. 2 OCU.)

Also, keep in mind that just because Pilot Training is open to men and women, doesn't mean every little boy and girl is going to pass. You are always going to have people wash out, men, and women. I daresay we'll have enough of both to have happy little Terrans repopulating the universe.

[blowfish]

I have never, ever, seen a female carpenter, a female bricklayer, a female draftsmen, or anything of the sort. I know females do work those occupations, but not to the same extent men do. (Fun Fact: A fair few of the pilots in the ADF were tradies before joining.) And how many female massage therapists are there in contrast to male tradies, and how many would enjoy being pilots?

Women are by no means inferior pilots, their capacity to multitask in fact makes them inherently better at instrument flying than males, or so common sense would say. But in my experience, not as many women desire a career as a pilot. Also, Fast Jets have been open to women for about 20 years now, in Australia, and we haven't had a single female Fast Jet pilot (but we've had female pilots go through No. 2 OCU.)

So the question is, is this something inherent, or is it really just defined by society's gender roles.  Frankly I am more inclined to believe it is the latter.

[General Battuta]

Dilmah, you are confusing socially defined gender roles with something predetermined.

[Dilmah G]

Eh, I spoke about what I know, I'll leave you guys to it. 

[General Battuta]

I spent some time in IRC discussion with Goober500.

While the discussion began productively, I was ultimately taken aback by Goober5000's repeated assertions that Rian's departure was irrational and emotional, which seemed to me to be rooted in a stereotypic view of women. (Rian, when informed, handled these allegations with humor and good grace, and talked about Goober in an understanding and sympathetic way at some length.)

When I pointed out that his grounds for this belief were incorrect, he accepted the correction gracefully, but nonetheless I cannot help but view this as partial confirmation of allegations leveled against him. I am doubly hurt by this because I have strained my own friendships in Goober's defense in the past.

I will review my current status re: HLP and present a decision via appropriate channels. In the meantime, will accept any criticism that people feel is appropriate with humility.

I consider Goober's original argument in this thread to be essentially destroyed. However, his treatment of the issue has raised larger concerns regarding my relationship with Goober5000, Hard Light Productions, and the issue of misogyny which I feel the need to examine. I would like to stress that I do not view this situation as the personal fault of anyone, and it does not impact my personal assessment of anyone involved, especially Goober5000.

Although I believe he evinces evidence of sexism as a deep and unrecognized psychological fixture, this does not make him a bad person, nor does it make him necessarily deserving of condemnation. It would have been easy for me to blow the issue off; it is, after all, not particularly critical to my life to correct the sexist injustice of a fan projection about a fictional science fiction universe. I am, perhaps, too combative for my own good.

My decision to engage with the problem of misogyny here rests in the fact that I believe that a) it caused distress to my loved ones, and that b) Goober5000 firmly believes that this distress is due to a fault with these loved ones and not with his own actions.

In this case, he substituted accusations of hypersensitivity and irrationality for the most basic human consideration that he might be wrong.

What perhaps troubles me most is Goober5000's belief that his words here, since they concern a fictional scenario, do not impact women who read them. This saddens and disappoints me.

it's irrelevant whether it's a boys club or not (I don't doubt it is) -- the point is that her exit was an irrational, emotional retreat

This remark by Goober in particular appears to me to be self-contradictory. He later recanted the statement, but nonetheless I believe it evinces a deeply problematic attitude: the belief that his actions were not hard-hitting and painful, and that, if they were, it was the problem of someone else, and not his responsibility.

[NGTM-1R]

I'm not going to get anymore involved, but I'd like to point out that I'd rather the bolded point should NOT happen. Instructor assignments are probably going to be about 3 months during a time of war, where experienced pilots are needed. If they need more than three months to recoup, then they can **** themselves, because we have a war to fight. About the last thing we need is female pilots getting pregnant, being moved off the flight roster (You cannot instruct people on FJ's when you're pregnant, remember?) And being lost from the pool of available pilots for nine months. Which in turn, means we need to find more instructors, etc and so on.

Instructor assignments are typically handed out on the basis of merit; some people are good at teaching what they know, others are intuitively skilled and so cannot offer their skills to others. There are classroom instructor posistions, and this is an environment with advanced simulator training indistingushable from reality; it would not be difficult to have an instructor "backseat" for a pilot undergoing simulated or even live training while not being actually in the cockpit. (In truth it's probably quite possible to manage a complete virtual copy of any combat craft's environment to allow other personnel to assist the pilot; we can actually do such a thing now if we try. Chronicling a pilot program for such is a thing would make for an interesting campaign.)

As we know nothing about the GTVA's pilot rotation policies this statement is completely without factual basis. The best guess we can make is that the GTVA is unlikely to push a combat tour of duty longer than three months, as historically this has been the limit before unacceptable degradation of skills sets in, and pushing them beyond three months typically results in someone who can never safely be returned to combat when they come off the line.

However, other pressures must be accounted for. The GTVA is pitted against the threat of species-wide annihilation. Their need for trained personnel and capable pilots means that they will almost certainly go to great lengths to retain both. Liberal maternity leave policy is almost assured. Post-Capella a need for more of everything, quickly, means that the existing GTVA forces can probably only be regarded as cadre for a new and significantly larger force structure. The GTVA would almost certainly offer instructor jobs to whoever wanted them.

[Dilmah G]

However, other pressures must be accounted for. The GTVA is pitted against the threat of species-wide annihilation. Their need for trained personnel and capable pilots means that they will almost certainly go to great lengths to retain both. Liberal maternity leave policy is almost assured. Post-Capella a need for more of everything, quickly, means that the existing GTVA forces can probably only be regarded as cadre for a new and significantly larger force structure. The GTVA would almost certainly offer instructor jobs to whoever wanted them.

That's correct, but if, like I said, they were all buggering off on maternity leave, we're going to have some problems, pilot wise.

[General Battuta]

Combat pilots can start at 19 and be out by peak fertility. No problems at all.

Never mind that it's COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT. If every female combat pilot was forcibly sterilized, it would have no effect demographically. There aren't enough to make a difference.

[Dilmah G]

They can start training at 17, over here, actually. (If you have a really late birthday ) It's something like 21 or 22 over there for you guys, since your boys and girls need to be degree qualified.

But if it's during a war, and we're having our pilots come off the front lines for an instructor posting for three months, and hey, four of the girls show up pregnant, we've now lost four instructors who need to be replaced, four pilots who are most likely not going to be heading back to the front for the next 1-2 years, and about <900 hours of combat experience between the four of them. If this keeps happening, we are going to have a problem.

[NGTM-1R]

Never mind that it's COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT. If every female combat pilot was forcibly sterilized, it would have no effect demographically. There aren't enough to make a difference.

I like to think that contraceptives are mandatory for people male or female serving in active combat posistions, but I doubt such a thing will ever fly in reality.

[Dilmah G]

Oh, I don't know. I saw birth control pills on the list for women heading off to Officer Training School.

[NGTM-1R]

Oh, I don't know. I saw birth control pills on the list for women heading off to Officer Training School.

Yes.

But will they ever demand oral contraceptives for males, as well?

[karajorma]

They'd only really need to if the laws on paternity leave ever match those for maternity leave. AFAIK you can't get out of the army durin war time just cause you have a kid on the way. If you could the entire population of south Vietnam would probably be half Caucasian .

[Spoon]

This whole thread.

[Desertfox287]

This whole thread.

It all started from voice acting roles....

[JMN]

I applaud Goober5000. As Orwell said: "In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act."
Anyone read SF classic William Tenn's (Philip Klass) - "Down Among The Dead" novel?

[Dilmah G]

I applaud Goober5000. As Orwell said: "In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act."

Is this sarcasm?

[JMN]

Nope.
In times of ideologically forced counter-natural way of things, saying what Goober said, is as we can see a revolutionary (and for some revolting) act.

[Woolie Wool]

I applaud Goober5000. As Orwell said: "In a time of universal deceit — telling the truth is a revolutionary act."
Anyone read SF classic William Tenn's (Philip Klass) - "Down Among The Dead" novel?

You know, it's not a good idea to suddenly jump to the defense of an indefensible position after it has already been completely defeated.