In its rush to social engineer the Navy and Marine Corps into something that resembles an urban college campus, Pentagon leaders have hit a snag according to Master Chief of the Navy, Michael Stevens, as reported by the New York Times. The Pentagon’s self-appointed chief of social engineering, Navy Secretary, Ray Mabus, ever eager to remake America’s fighting forces into Obama’s UniCorps, has determined to rename all military specialties to reflect their increasingly bi-gender status. According to Mabus, job titles with the suffix man, rifleman or mineman, can be replaced with specialist, technician, professional or something of the sort.
The problem is with the time-honored naval term yeoman which designates a clerk. In the case of yeoman, the ‘man’ syllable is not a suffix but the second syllable of a Middle English term for young man. So the Navy is up the Potomac without a paddle and I thought, knowing the generous nature of all you creative types who comment here at TAH, that perhaps you could suggest a proper nomenclature for this naval job specialty. As you can see, I have started off the process with yeomama. Any help out there?
Comments
104 responses to “Yeomama?”
Secretary
It seems to me that George Orwell addressed this whole “lets change the language” as far back as 1949. Rememner folks “Big Mabus” is watching!!
Yeomang?
That would be the Tony Montana pronunciation IDC
Say ello, to my yittle Yeomang!
I think this sidesteps the more important question for the Navy, which is, are job titles like “Gunners MATE” an invitation to sexual assault? 😉
Try powder monkey and see what you get in response.
Yeophrodite?
Boom! That’s the one! We have a winner!
And he’d hit it too…
IDC SARC wins the interwebs today!
Shack!!!
BDA: 100/100.
Yeo-ho.
Yeo ho HO!
Yeomabus, maybe?
Yoepeep?
Little Yeopeep??
Having worked in the NCR (National Clown Region) for the last few years, the ringmaster for this particular circus, Dingus Ray Mabus, will be long gone before this stupidity makes it out the first round of staffing.
Because Clerk isn’t as glamorous as Yeoman?
Most likely it will become Data Specialist/Technician…
However in keeping with the spirit of the request I would offer:
YeoYeo
to more accurately reference either a young(yeo) man or young(yeo) woman
What’s wrong with Administrative Assistant? That’s a common civilian name for that job.
I prefer “TPS-report-cover-sheet-putter-onner.”
Did you get a copy of that memo?
Copies in triplicate of course in the finest Pentagon tradition.
Why not just throw mabus out on his pathetic, liberal, moronic, scrawny little ASS! simple bas-ard!
Actually I’ve heard that as a nickname for a yeoman.
The Quills? “Award Engineers?”
Oh shit, I suppose the e-3 and below ranks are next. Seaman/airman/fireman/constructionman could all just be called “paint and floor wax technicians,” or “Boots.”
Buffer Technician
Will ‘Wo-man’ have to be shortened to just ‘Wo’?
Inquiring minds would like to know!!!
I heard it’s ‘womon’ (singular) and ‘womyn’ (plural).
Just to get that in so Lars doesn’t have to. You’re welcome, Lars. ;o)
Yeowo.
Sounds like something my cat would say.
Yeogina?
I was going to go with “Yeo-mangina”, but I like yours better.
The merchant marine has gone this road too. The USCG did away with the ratings of Ordinary Seaman and Able-Bodied Seaman, renaming them instead Ordinary and Able Seafarer. I thought at first it was just a lot of hot air, but on my qualifications records it clearly states that in a pinch, I can sail as “Able Seafarer.”
For clarification: The USCG did away with issuing merchant seaman’s documents to those ratings under those titles, not that they ever had them within their own enlisted structure.
They could go with “tir” which should be obscure enough to be suitably nautical.
Yo Yo Ma ?
Yeo-ho-ho.
YeoTurk?
Along with asking that titles be gender-neutral, Mr. Mabus wanted Navy officials to come up with names that would be easier for people outside the services to understand. Titles like “hospital corpsman” — used for medics — can be confusing, making it more difficult for sailors to market themselves to potential employers after they retire.
err…If a Corpsman can’t market themselves using what they learned in the Navy, that’s a problem with the Sailor. Hell, I gave a machine gunner an idea on how to describe his job on a resume.
Job candidate attained expert status in the controlled and selective distribution of the production results of a highly repetitive machine process…
Something like that?
…”selective RE-distribution of” mission critical assets in a timely and accurate manner.
Marine down!!!
Corpsperson…up!!!
That would be Corpesperson, per Dear Leader.
You are correct, sir; my apologies.
Corpseperson, aye.
But can I still salute with my coffee cup in my right hand?
And the Marine will be holding your umbrella.
I’ll tell you what: that Marine’s close order umbrella drill better be totally squared away the next time that it rains, by golly.
The last time that he held the umbrella for me, he let the teleprompter get wet, and I couldn’t read my speech.
First, we start with Ray Mabus, and change his last name to Maybee, or Manless.
Then, we go into history back and find terms like powder monkey, cannon cocker, coxswain, bosun, etc.
Then we also point out that during World War I, when women joined the Navy, they were called YEOMANETTES, to distinguish them from the Navy’s officially male rate YEOMAN.
Once that is taken care of, I write a pointedly snark letter to RayMANNED and tell him to shove it up his twohole.
It was bad enough when JO, PH, DM and LI were combined into a single job description.
But this?
RayMANLESS is possibly the biggest waste of salary on the planet. He really has no place in polite society. His real calling should be manhole cover inspector.
And I mean that with all my heart.
“His real calling should be manhole cover inspector.”
Bottom manhole inspector – Puts him in the sewer where he belongs.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_61IZp_RNYg
Sir and ma’am have to go, too. Borrowing from Ellen Haring’s line of thinking, the terms are separate, gender-based, and are thus unequal. This is the same as racial segregation in education or public accommodation, if Haring is correct.
I wonder how Raymie Maybee would like it if we called him ‘Hey, stupid’?
Any thoughts on that?
Civilian to civilian. What’s “he” going to do to you? Pout?
Sir and Ma’am, soon to be replaced with
Comrade
Mabus is a manpuss.
Cockswains will now be referred to as…Countersunkswains. 😀
(I do crack myself up sometimes!)
Old Navy referred to Yeoman as “Titless Waves” because of the secretarial nature of the Rate, the small number of actual women in the Navy at the time, and none on ships of war.
Hmmm, prolly wouldn’t work well these days.
Yeocentric
Upon arrival at their first duty station they will also attend Asiantation. (if we are to keep everything politically correct)
No, they won’t attend asiantation,
The word ‘orientation’ is derived from the Latin word oriens, which means aligned with the sun, and eventually came to mean eastern direction – where the sun rose. Had nothing to do with Asia until much later.
Yes, I took Latin for 4 years. This is a pun based on the understanding that ‘orient ‘ is now considered unacceptable.
I recall not too many years ago referring to someone as Oriental. I was corrected on the spot. You would have thought I said Chink. Cripes.
Wait, what? Since when? You don’t use ‘Oriental’ and ‘Occidental’ anymore?
Didn’t mean to put ‘You,’ meant to put ‘We.’
Sorry.
Only by Occident.
“Asian” is now the preferred term. Any other term would expose a Chink in your linguistic armor and must be Nipped in the bud, let you get verbal Gook all over yourself.
That’s a rather slant-eyed view don’t you think?
You’re headed down a slippery slope
You’re right Blaster. Time to zip it right now.
But they were worth a good laugh.
Effective immediately, all work done on ships, subs, etc. will be referred to as Squid Pro Quo. If Sailors are unavailable for said work, go downtown and find civilian replacements on Squid Row. Meanwhile, personnel doing said work will each be called a Yeoyeo.
The Yeo-Dee-Yeo rode a horse at the rodeo.
I say again.
The Yeo-Dee-Yeo rode a horse at the rodeo.
Yo-diddley
Yocephus
Yocephus Daniels?
Would that be a Cup o’ Yo?
Ray Mabus is the worst thing to happen to the US Navy and USMC since Yamamoto.
Yolanda/Yolando
Whatever they come up with, you just know that Daniel Bernath will claim it as an honorary title.
Next up, tweak the UCMJ. For now on, manslaughter will be referred to as personslaughter. Once society accepts that, then we will get to work on changing suicide to self-murder.
You can’t have manslaughter without laughter.
If “Yeoman” is good enough for the future, it’s good enough for today.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1NbQSAFMFFg
MrBill, you beat me to it. In the future, Yeomans will be hot women in red miniskirts and big sixties hair. And they will still be called Yeomans. And speaking of beating, I’ll be in my bunk.
I’d hit it…twice!
I think what this really boils down to is that Raymie Maybee wants everyone to have a special title and a special trophy for showing up to work. Discipline is bad because it hurts feewings.
Okay, I’ll see what I can do with that.
Here’s Maybee’s title: Premier Asshole of the Military. (PAM)
And if that upsets him, tough shitksy. Let me know when or if he ever finds his testicles.
PAM spray? Is he as slick as a politician’s eel?
Nicely done, BWoodman.
I dunno, but he may use that PAM spray to shellac that ol’ dolphin.
Raybee has it in hand.
More than likely it’s all just more talk from the premiere pencil pusher in Washington… however, who knows with this administration.
I remember about 10 years ago when they said they were going to merge all OS, QM, and BM rates into one. PM or Proffesional Mariner. That way sailors can know a little about everything and a lot about nothing.
Somebody in DC eventually came to their senses.
FFS are there no adults in the military any longer? Somebody needs to relieve this old balls for lack of confidence.
Floccinaucinihilipilificator
🙂
Yoeomnisexual …
I think that will cover it.
Out!
BTW: Boileman was changed to Watertender to Boiler Technician … And now we have no more biolers in the Navy. Keep changing shit and it will go away forever. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it!
You know we are suppose to be making budget cuts correct. Doing this shit right now is dumb as shit. Has anyone sat back and figured out how much money this will cost, because you can’t just change the names you will to republish all tech,FM’S and Navy publish books for training and you know they will make some kind of all hands training NKO course and other shit and all that will not be free. You think you can say know we shouldn’t do this because of cost and maybe spend on bullets.
This shit head SENAV needs to go away..
There you go making sense. Don’t you know that when this administration is involved there is no room for logic? Come on man!
?
No room for intelligence or common sense either, apparently.
Most of the rates already had other names.
But I’m guessing Ray wouldn’t approve.
I was wondering how long it would take Mr. Mabus to come up with this and it has happened. My recommendation would be to change anything with “man” in it to person since it is supposed to me gender neutral and we certainly could not have Yeowoman, so instead we would get Yeoperson. Now all they have to do is re-engineer all the alpha males into not wanting to protest the female of the species in combat environments, Yearight.
Yeoho……nah, too simple.
Perfect! aka “Petty Officer in charge of supplies”
Hmm. Isn’t ‘Petty’ a rather demeaning term these days?
Belay my last….”Awesome, Super-Duper, Person in charge of supplies”.
These are hysterical! So much creativity ?
Yeomama
Squid Pro Quo
~dying~
I guess you can’t consider elite units as “crack troops” anymore either.
Okay! All you crack troops with only a two hole…fall in on the right. All of you countersunk crack troops…fall in on the left!
Yo-dude.
“I think you ought to have a military that reflects the country it protects, and if we get too separate from that country, in a democracy, that’s a bad thing,” Mr. Mabus said in a telephone interview. “You set standards, you don’t lower and change those standards for anybody, and then gender and who you love become irrelevant.”
One would be hard pressed to find more idiotic statements from someone in his position. If the country ought to have a military that reflects the country, where are the folks in their 60s, 70s, 80s, and 90s? Where are the babies, toddlers, and 4-16 year olds, among other large segments of the population that comprise the country? Is the military going to recruit these people? Clearly, there are a significant number of commies in the greater civilian population. Shouldn’t they be openly represented as well? How about Ivy League grads? “PVT Fitzroy Collingsworth Blueblood reporting as ordered, sir!” Sure they should. In fact, without a draft, these folks should be recruited heavily to get their numbers up. But that’s a problem, isn’t it? This is a volunteer military and there is a large pool of people from a certain segment of the US population who traditionally volunteer for military service. Changing names won’t change that.
The second idiotic statement Mabass uttered is self evident. I’m not sure what the hell he was trying to say.
Cleaning up this mess is going to require a world-class helping of blood and treasure.
None of this, none at all, is meant to improve the fighting capability of the armed forces of the United States. Quite the contrary, it is meant to sap strength and debilitate the able, like any other poison.
Billy Mitchell foretold the fall of the Battleship as the ship of decision, in an undeniable and blatantly obvious way, long before Pearl Harbor. The Battleship Admirals would have left us unable to fight the resultant war.
Here we go again.