The US Supreme Court has been asked to rule on whether women should be required to register for the draft at age 18. (Men are already required to). Should women be required to register?

Yes, and yes, although I cannot, in good conscience, ever advocate for conscription.

If it gets approved, what the population suddenly explode with more pregnancies).

Yes. If there is to be conscription, I think both men and women should have to register.

Um, I don’t think anyone should be forced to register. Is that an option?

There is another factor to consider.
Training would take up to three or more years so at age 20 or 21Yrs old I assume those that want to stay in would and those that don’t will find another way of leaving it through marriage, or pregnancy’s?

The law:
Almost all male US citizens and male immigrants, who are 18 through 25, are required to register with Selective Service.

It’s important to know that even though he is registered, a man will not automatically be inducted into the military. In a crisis requiring a draft, men would be called in a sequence determined by random lottery number and year of birth. Then, they would be examined for mental, physical, and moral fitness by the military before being deferred or exempted from military service or inducted into the Armed Forces.

The details

Yes. To be perfectly fair.

I don’t that that is necessary.

Yes, I also think the kids/grandkids of all politicians should be put on the frontlines any time war is declared.

Should they both register. Yes. And I think both should be required to serve at least some time in the military unless they have a physical ailment or condition that would require a waiver. However, my biggest worry for women is the amount of sexual abuse that seems to take place in the military. Until men see real consequences for abusing their status in commands, I don’t think it’s wise to make women join a service that brushes accusations aside and punish the victim before really punishing the man. Now on the flip side, maybe more women of power in the military will help correct that. So it’s hard to say.

One other thing. Before they do that, maybe they should also work on rich brats being able to avoid the draft.

Any time military action is taken, only the CEOs and management at Raytheon, Boeing, Lockheed Martin, and any company involved in fossil fuels, resource extraction, or does any labor outsourcing or overseas manufacturing, or makes over $250k per year should be forced to fight.

Just kidding. Any time military action is taken, all of the people I listed need to be imprisoned.

I suspect the Supremes will duck this until we actually have a draft.

I don’t like the concept of a compulsory draft, but if there is one, then I think apply to everyone (not just one gender).

@elbanditoroso—part of the excerpt you pulled, about physical fitness exams, reminds me of a story I heard a while about barriers of entry for female firefighters. One of the barriers is the physical exam. I grabbed an article discussing the topic, which I realize now is from 2000… I definitely heard about this issue more recently than that, so maybe this is a bit outdated: NY Times: Despite Recruiting, Few Women Do Well in Firefighter Tests. The issue is a bit more nuanced than simply the average difference in strength between men and women, but that does play a role. I wonder how much of a role that would play in a draft selection process as well?

@sadiesayit No idea. I am pretty sure that when the Navy allowed women to be Seals, and Army and Marines to have their special operations groups, that the women had to meet the same physical requirements as men.

But it’s different being a lowly grunt soldier than it is being in a special group. I have no idea how they would treat women draftees.

There should not be a draft. If there is a draft, everyone should be required to register when they turn 18.

It doesn’t even make sense to me that there is a need to register. Every single young person in America has a social security number. Even people who are here on green cards, student visas, work visas, they all have social security cards. The fed already knows everyone who legally exists in the country and has their information. Seems like a computer could easily find 18–25 year olds if the military needed to draft people.

Should women be eligible for the draft? I guess to be fair yes, but should they be put into front line combat? That’s more questionable. I’m not sure how I feel about it. Women are not just like men. I guess in the US we have plenty of population that we don’t need to worry about needing women to have babies to keep the population growth going. I guess also fewer people die in wars compared to 100 years ago.

No.

Absolutely. As long as men have to then women should have to as well.

@JLeslie “Seems like a computer could easily find 18–25 year olds if the military needed to draft people.”

The Selective Service System was originally established in 1917, and the current version was established in 1948. The kinds of computers you are thinking about did not exist back then, and no legislation has been passed since then allowing the Selective Service System to access or track registrant information via computer. The US military also has notoriously out of date computers and systems for tracking data. Some states do automatically pass on information when eligible registrants receive their driver’s license, however.

“Should [women] be put into front line combat? That’s more questionable.”

There are already qualifications that must be met to be placed in a combat role. Is there any reason to add sex or gender to that list?

@SaviorFaire Social Security numbers have come a long way just in the last 30 years. Now, basically everyone has a number. Back in the day people didn’t bother until they opened a bank account or got a job.

Like I said probably gender isn’t an issue for combat since we have a large population. If our country was just 4 million people I would question it more, but Israel seems to do it. I think some women stop their periods for combat, I don’t think anyone should be forced to do that, so maybe that’s an issue for some people, I’m not sure.

I don’t think anyone should have to die or become severely mentally ill for rich white men.

A more realistic answer is that yes, maybe more women should potentially die for people to get the message that the industrial complex is terrible. Things will get more attention when American women start dying.

@Blackberry You think there will be more attention if women die. I think there will be more attention if there is a draft and people who didn’t volunteer die. Especially if it’s children of the wealthy, but if it’s similar to previous times in America the wealthy can more easily dodge the draft. Previously, young adults could go to college and avoid being draft. That’s not the case now, unless it was changed again and I don’t know it.

Do any of the Republican families in the last 20 years who agreed with the wars we have been in when we first engaged ever flip from being beaming with pride that their child served to being disgusted we were even in a war if their child is permanently disabled or killed? I’m sure they are still proud of their child, but do they change their position politically or change their opinion on the war being fought? I imagine that would be difficult for families to change their mind.

@JLeslie “Social Security numbers have come a long way just in the last 30 years. Now, basically everyone has a number.”

This has nothing to do with anything I wrote, so I’m not sure why you think it constitutes a response. My answer was about the Selective Service System, which is not the same thing as the Social Security Administration.

“Like I said probably gender isn’t an issue for combat since we have a large population.”

This also does not answer my question. You already said that population size wasn’t a good enough reason to prevent women from serving on the front lines. You also said that the number of women who might die wasn’t a good enough reason either. But you did not retract your claim that it is “questionable” whether women should be allowed to serve on the front lines. So again: why do you think it is “questionable,” and what qualifications do you think women should have to meet over and above the current standards?

@SaviorFaire I wrote _ I guess to be fair yes, but should they be put into front line combat? That’s more questionable. I’m not sure how I feel about it._ What that means is I’m not sure how I feel about. I’m reading the answers and arguments here.

Everyone having an SS number means the government has data on everyone of eligible age and status. All the military has to do is access that system.

@JLeslie “All the military has to do is access that system.”

And like I said above, that’s not legal under current law.

Ok. I’m just stating what I think seems logical. It might involve having to change a law, that’s fine. Now the jellies know there is a law because of your information and they know my thoughts on the matter. I didn’t give a strong opinion, I gave my thoughts. Things to be considered.

@JLeslie
I’d imagine not. Some people still fall for the propaganda of dying for your country being a noble cause, unfortunately. I guess people justify a lot of stuff either way.

@Blackberry Absolutely, there are a lot of people like that. I myself am grateful for sacrifices military families are willing to make and especially the people who serve, but not to the point that we put our soldiers and sailors in unnecessary harm’s way for wars that should never have happened.

I’ve been thinking about this for days. In my opinion, until the military addresses their culture of rampant sexual harassment and assault, women should not be required to register for the draft.

Instead of adding women, I would argue that we remove the requirement for men to register.

The draft these days is a real “shit has hit the fan” kind of scenario. In that case, if we’re still being sexist about who will or won’t be a useful kind of person to the military, then we’re probably going to lose.

@Cupcake
Yes you’re correct.
I was in the Navy for almost 10 years, and it was common for the phrase “settling things in house” to be used a lot.
Basically solving as many issues as you can without getting higher authority and paperwork involved.
This was obviously referring to things like petty arguments and disagreements, but it’s clear the military has an environment similar to police where they try to handle everything without getting “outsiders” involved.