Military sexual assaults far exceed DoD estimates, new report finds

authority (and corresponding victim helplessness and defenselessness) breeds sexual assault and harassment. Military is by far among the most authoritarian institutions (only prison probably beats it by a thin margin).

[1] https://bjs.ojp.gov/document/cv22.pdf

You would need to identify the rate among an equivalent population that isn't military.

The military can’t question the orders they receive from the president and Secretary of Defense. That’s an important part of maintaining civilian control over the military. The military can only try to carry out whatever goals and decisions they’re given by the politicians, and in Iraq the politicians (from both parties) got it wrong.

There is a lot of victim blaming for something that is clearly systemic -- where these incidents are dismissed because "boys be boys..." -- and could be worked around by making those responsible accountable, but that will step on some very shiny and important toes, which is why you don't see a push for the correct kind of change in the military that this needs.

Because housing is separated (male barracks, female barracks for E-1 thru E-3 exactly with minor exceptions) throughout the military. But are you saying basically have a male section of the base and female section of the base?

And how would this prevent sexual assaults?

This is either really sad or maybe I'm just naive?

Since when is the "reality" of putting 18-22 year olds together (dysfunctional background and high school completion or not) sexual assault?

I remember being 18-22, coming from a fairly dysfunctional background, and yet I managed to never sexually assault anyone. Even when I was in co-ed housing!

https://warontherocks.com/2017/03/the-dark-side-of-gender-se...

> It may seem intuitive that gender segregation would lead to less sexual harassment and sexual assault, but there is mounting evidence that shows the opposite might be true. Studies on workplace sexual harassment show that encouraging social integration at work can reduce sexual harassment. Other studies show that increased contact with an “outgroup” (in this case, women), improves attitudes towards individuals in that outgroup. These improvements are more likely to take place when group membership is de-emphasized during the interaction.

But we're hobbled in discussing this on HN because it skews overwhelmingly male — and there's even less enthusiasm for confronting that than there is for confronting sexual assault in the military.

>there's been a lack of realism from leadership about the actual realities..

I can assure you most Platoon leaders, Company commanders, etc. are very aware of the realities in enlisted living quarters; they are simply apathetic about them. A SHARP complaint becomes another pile of paperwork on their desk they don't want to deal with (see [2]).

I think the tendency to blame the 18-22 year olds with "dysfunctional backgrounds" who "barely made it through high school" places the blame on the lower enlisted while ignoring the military leadership's responsibility for decades of documented failure in addressing this issue.

Consider the following:

> Most Service members identified the alleged offenders as men and often of the same rank as the victim or some other higher ranking military member in their unit. However, an estimated 44 percent of women and an estimated 35 percent of men identified at least one alleged offender as someone in their chain of command [3].

Also consider reasons for not reporting:

>Despite these differences, the top three reasons provided for not reporting were consistent between men and women: (1) did not think anything would be done; (2) thought it was not serious enough to report; and (3) worried about potential negative consequences from military coworkers or peers [3].

In my opinion, the problem is at the top of the hierarchy, not the bottom.

(Sorry to throw so much in this comment, but I grow really tired of people thinking this problem is some case of lower enlisted being dumb hooligans who can't control their urges while ignoring the consistent and systemic failures of senior officers and NCO within the DoD to address the problem at all.)

[1] https://taskandpurpose.com/news/army-reserve-416th-sexual-as... [2] https://www.armytimes.com/news/your-military/2023/12/28/sexu... [3] https://www.sapr.mil/sites/default/files/public/docs/reports...

Yes, but...

> The integration of women into the service was a good thing

Was it?

I, for one, would reject this thesis, except in a qualified sense. That is, I can imagine a place for women in certain roles, sure, but not all roles. Same for men. The most obvious problem is that putting men and women in a position that places equal physical demands on them either does a disservice to men by making these demands lower to allow women to meet them, or to women by imposing on them a physical regime that is wholly inappropriate for the female body.

We know that men and women respond different to various physical activities. In sports, men tend to become healthier with moderate physical activity like weight-lifting. When women take up similarly rigorous exercise, you see negative consequences to their health. Menstruation can be disrupted, for example. That doesn't mean women cannot exercise, only that the range of exercises that benefits women is not the same as the range that benefits men.

Sex blindness where sex is relevant is a great disservice to each sex. It ignores the needs of each sex for the sake of ticking off some kind of ideological check box. It is not kind or loving to either sex.

Plus if a soldier is captured, now they have footage of their base and info?