You just dotted a really dated "i" for me. I graduated HS in 1976 and was being very actively recruited by the Coast Guard and AF for OCS. Now I know why!
Lemme put it this way. The women of '80 are trailblazers who put up with a tremendous amount of unnecessary crap in pursuing equal opportunities. (Sound familiar?) Only today is USNA hitting the demographics (at least 20% women graduating) to call the process self-sustaining. However over 30 years later the '80 women still regularly get together for group therapy. And every once in a while I'll make a comment or my spouse (USNA '83) will read something that sets her off, leaving me in the middle of a minefield with no detection gear or exit maps...
When will this be officially changed to midshipchicks?
Hey, it's a rank, not a gender! That heritage is the only thing keeping us squids from being confused with the zoomies and the woops...
The photos, videos, and testimony are even worse. They had more than enough warnings and opportunities to amend their ways before they did it to themselves. It didn't help, however, when SECNAV John Lehman was getting right down there with the strippers at the 1980s Tailhooks.
My spouse said that when women were going into the academies (and later into combat billets) the more senior officers generally understood because they had college-age daughters. And their peers were mostly on board because they'd never known anything different. But a significant minority of the guys in between those two generations had to retire or die before things began to improve.
After Tailhook the nukes heaved a huge sigh of relief "there but for the grace of God". I hope they keep that in mind as women enter the submarine force today.
My daughter still doesn't understand why anyone would volunteer for submarine duty just to get a periscope tan around one eyeball. So I offered her more training, faster promotions, a higher caliber of shipmates, submarine pay, and $25K/year bonus pay. She's beginning to [-]feel the pull of the Dark Side[/-] see the light...
