Monday, August 24, 2015

From the White House to the Military: (Mostly) Gender Good News

Good News:   The National Center for Transgender Equality celebrates the appointment of Raffi Freedman-Gurspan who was appointed by President Obama as the first openly transgender staffer.  Freedman-Gurspan is appointed as an Outreach and Recruitment Director for Presidential Personnel.  Freedman-Gurspan advocated for the Center's Racial and Economic Justice Initiative.

Mixed News:   Also last week, A U.S. Navy admiral says that SEAL teams will be opened to women and last Friday, two soldiers became  the first women to graduate from the Army's Ranger School located at Fort Benning Georgia.  1st Lt. Shaye Haver and Capt. Kristen Griest are both West Point graduates. This is the first year that women were permitted to attend Ranger School. 

In a gratuitous statement reassuring us that the females soldiers are expected to become an alternate form of  male soldiers, the Army spokesman said that in accommodating the female rangers, the Army did not change its standards at all. Whew!  

These changes follow the 2013, Pentagon announcement that it is considering lifting its ban on women serving in combat roles and gave the military until the end of 2015 to take a position on whether any jobs should continue to be off-limits to women. 

https://lawprofessors.typepad.com/human_rights/2015/08/more-gender-good-news-from-the-white-house-to-the-military.html

Gender, Margaret Drew, Military | Permalink

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