- Joined
- Jun 18, 2018
- Messages
- 54,776
- Reaction score
- 51,661
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- Male
- Political Leaning
- Progressive
"The far right is fixated on the idea of “natural” gender roles, with men cast as the protectors of white identity in their countries and their women as fragile victims needing to be defended. Their worldview dehumanizes and threatens with violence non-white populations, feminists, and the LGBTQ+ community, whom they consider agitators and subversives not entitled to full rights of citizenship. The far right fights to keep gender equality, LGBTQ+ rights, racial equality, and other human rights causes out of national institutions under the banner of fighting “wokeness,” and their approach to the military is no different. …Events in Ukraine expose how hollow this thinking always was.
Many of these far-right talking points have entered the mainstream. Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted last year that “[p]erhaps a woke, emasculated military is not the best idea,” as he fawned over a video comparing a hypermacho Russian military recruitment ad featuring shirtless, muscular Russian male recruits to a U.S. ad showcasing diverse American recruits representative of what the country actually looks like. In the same vein, BlazeTV host Dave Rubin of The Rubin Report said when comparing the U.S. and Russian recruitment videos: “We’re screwed, people. … Can you imagine that Russian guy coming up against that girl? … If you give me an East Village lesbian versus Vladimir Putin, who’s going to win?” A Fox News article surveying these responses to the opposing recruitment strategies between Russia and the United States highlighted posts by conservatives on Twitter, including one that read, “Pick your fighter.”
The reasons for Ukraine’s military successes to date are myriad and will be studied by military scholars for years to come. Some aspects, though, directly refute the far-right narrative and are worth highlighting: Women make up an estimated 15 percent of Ukraine’s armed forces and contribute heavily to noncombat support roles. Ukrainian LGBTQ+ soldiers are participating in combat operations and fighting for their country and their lives. And, in reforming its military, Ukraine did not look eastward to Russia but instead west toward meeting NATO military standards, which has included embracing NATO’s common values, rules, and processes, as well as promoting civilian control of the armed forces. This outlook has paid dividends for Ukraine, in contrast to Russia’s mounting death toll, low morale, and inability to control criminality and looting. Accusations of Russian war crimes abound, exposing the vacuous, and often gendered, Russian tropes that assert that their military defends the defenseless."
Link
This would be a good topic for discussion in the classroom. You got to teach them young. But it would surely be illegal in a place like Florida.
Many of these far-right talking points have entered the mainstream. Sen. Ted Cruz tweeted last year that “[p]erhaps a woke, emasculated military is not the best idea,” as he fawned over a video comparing a hypermacho Russian military recruitment ad featuring shirtless, muscular Russian male recruits to a U.S. ad showcasing diverse American recruits representative of what the country actually looks like. In the same vein, BlazeTV host Dave Rubin of The Rubin Report said when comparing the U.S. and Russian recruitment videos: “We’re screwed, people. … Can you imagine that Russian guy coming up against that girl? … If you give me an East Village lesbian versus Vladimir Putin, who’s going to win?” A Fox News article surveying these responses to the opposing recruitment strategies between Russia and the United States highlighted posts by conservatives on Twitter, including one that read, “Pick your fighter.”
The reasons for Ukraine’s military successes to date are myriad and will be studied by military scholars for years to come. Some aspects, though, directly refute the far-right narrative and are worth highlighting: Women make up an estimated 15 percent of Ukraine’s armed forces and contribute heavily to noncombat support roles. Ukrainian LGBTQ+ soldiers are participating in combat operations and fighting for their country and their lives. And, in reforming its military, Ukraine did not look eastward to Russia but instead west toward meeting NATO military standards, which has included embracing NATO’s common values, rules, and processes, as well as promoting civilian control of the armed forces. This outlook has paid dividends for Ukraine, in contrast to Russia’s mounting death toll, low morale, and inability to control criminality and looting. Accusations of Russian war crimes abound, exposing the vacuous, and often gendered, Russian tropes that assert that their military defends the defenseless."
Link
This would be a good topic for discussion in the classroom. You got to teach them young. But it would surely be illegal in a place like Florida.