and ain't I a woman?: A victory on all fronts?
With the recent announcement from Australian Defence Forces chief Admiral Chris Barry that he believes the exclusion of women from combat positions in the military cannot be justified, women may finally be allowed to serve in a full capacity on the front line. For the first time, women would be able to work alongside men in the navy, army and air force in all positions.
Presently, women soldiers cannot work in any position involving tanks, armed troop carriers or artillery. They cannot serve as infantry (which involves hand-to-hand combat possibilities) or as combat engineers. In the navy, women are excluded from clearance diving and in the air force from ground defence work.
Many people, especially women, will welcome this announcement as long overdue. There is no job from which women should be excluded simply because of their gender.
Anne Summers, in an article in the January 14 Sydney Morning Herald, described the long struggle by a small section of the feminist movement which fought for equal opportunity within the armed forces, and the opposition from the "khaki brigade".
During this fight, the special women's units — WRANS (navy), WRAAC (army) and WRAAF (air force) — were abolished, temporarily reducing the number of women in the forces. At present, up to 13% of the defence forces are women. The latest news seems to indicate a victory for those equal opportunity campaigners.
While definitely not one of those conservatives who believe it is "unfeminine" or unsuitable for women to fight, I do wonder how much of a victory it really is. Ground and combat troops in any armed force are overwhelmingly working-class people; now working-class women will be allowed to stand beside working-class men to kill and maim other working-class women, men and children around the globe.
It is not a question of such a job being okay for men but not for women. Rather, it is a question of whether ordinary people, who are not responsible for declaring wars and do not benefit from them, should be sent off to kill to protect the interests of the tiny, powerful minority who never see the whites of the "enemy's" eyes.
Like the "victory" which allowed women into the police force, this one allows women to join men as agents of a state which enforces and perpetuates the oppression of women, to fight for a government which is trying to overturn many of the advances women have made since the second wave of the women's liberation movement in the 1970s.
That movement for women's rights was intertwined with the movement against the Vietnam War, and with the broader peace and anti-nuclear movement. Many of these activists realised the class nature of war, and that the body bags shown on nightly television mostly contained the corpses of working people. The refusal to fight in or support war was a statement of class solidarity with the so-called enemy.
The fighting forces in national liberation struggles need to include both men and women in order to succeed. The women of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam are an inspiring example of the courage and skill women can bring to the fight for justice.
But women who join Australia's armed forces today will not be fighting for a just cause, or in the interests of the majority of Australians. While no form of discrimination against women is justifiable, campaigning to widen the pool of those who can be exploited to fight against other oppressed people, usually in the Third World, is very low on my list of priorities.
By Margaret Allum