{"id":38608,"date":"2013-11-25T16:26:35","date_gmt":"2013-11-25T21:26:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=38608"},"modified":"2013-11-25T19:21:55","modified_gmt":"2013-11-26T00:21:55","slug":"julia-pollack-the-militarys-sexual-assault-dilemma","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=38608","title":{"rendered":"Julia Pollak; the Military’s sexual assault dilemma"},"content":{"rendered":"

Paul sends us a link to Breitbart<\/a> which carries an opinion piece by Julia Pollak, who is a serving Navy reservist. But she addresses the military sexual assault discussion that Congress is currently having about taking the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) out of the hands of commanders. This piece is so good, I’ll try not to C&P the whole thing;<\/p>\n

When I joined the U.S. military in January 2011, a family member asked me: \u201cAren\u2019t you worried about being raped?\u201d And she wasn\u2019t the only one. Many people cautioned me that I would be entering an institution synonymous with machismo, authoritarianism, and violence.<\/p>\n

What I found instead was very different: professionalism, respect, and a strong presence of women in the highest ranks. I also found the most transparent, aggressive, and in-your-face Sexual Assault Prevention and Response (SAPR) program I had ever witnessed.<\/p>\n

At bases in Great Lakes, Pensacola, and San Diego, I have received regular and frequent sexual assault prevention training. There have been posters with information about how to report sexual assault in every workspace and bathroom. And forms for reporting sexual assault have been prominently displayed.<\/p>\n

Trained male and female Sexual Assault Response Coordinators (SARCs) and SAPR Victim Advocates (VAs) have made it a point of introducing themselves, sharing their phone numbers, and making themselves available to their fellow sailors. Chaplains and health care providers have similarly signaled their readiness to help. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What Ms. Pollak is saying and what I’ve been saying is not that sexual assault doesn’t happen, or that it’s not a problem, but that the military is not not doing anything about it. Education and repetitive training isn’t always the answer to all problems, though. Drunk driving has been frowned upon in the military for the last thirty years, but the troops still get arrested for it, don’t they? <\/p>\n

Using the old hammers seeing nails everywhere analogy, when you’re in Congress, every problem has a legislative answer, whether it will help or not. In this case, Congress is undermining good order and discipline in the military by thinking that they legislate justice. It’s unnecessary and ill-considered. And even if they do, it won’t change people’s nature. It will still happen. And, worse, innocent people might be punished for things they didn’t do.<\/p>\n

But you should read Ms. Pollak’s whole article – she does a much better job on the subject than me.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Paul sends us a link to Breitbart which carries an opinion piece by Julia Pollak, who … Julia Pollak; the Military’s sexual assault dilemma<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-38608","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-military-issues"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38608\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}