AN OFFICER AND A FEMINISTJames M. DubikI'm a member of a last bastion of male chauvinism. I'm an infantry officer, andthere are no women in the infantry. I'm a Ranger and no women go to RangerSchool. I'm a member of America's special operation forces—and there,althoughwomen are involved in intelligence, planning and clerical work, only men can beoperators, or "shooters." Women can become paratroopers and jump out ofairplanes alongside me yet not many do. All this is as it should be, according towhat I learned while growing up. Not many women I knew in high school andcollege in the 60s and early 70s pushed themselves to their physical ormentallimits or had serious career dreams of their own. If they did, few talked aboutthem. So I concluded they were exceptions to the rule. Then two thingshappened. First, I was assigned to West Point, where I became a philosophyinstructor. Second, my two daughters grew up.I arrived at the Academy with a master's degree from Johns Hopkins University inBaltimore and a graduation certificate from the U S. Army Command andGeneral Staff College at Fort Leavenworth. I was ready to teach, but instead, Iwas the one who got an education.The women cadets, in the classroom and out, did not fit my stereotype of femalebehavior. They took themselves and their futures seriously. They persevered in avery competitive environment. Often they took charge and seized control of asituation. They gave orders; they were punctual and organized. They playedsportshard. They survived, even thrived, under real pressure. During field exercises,women cadets were calm and unemotional even when they were dirty, cold, wet,tired and hungry. They didn't fold or give up. Most important, suchconductseemed natural to them. From my perspective all this was extraordinary; to themit was ordinary. While I had read a good bit of "feminist literature" and,intellectually, accepted many of the arguments against stereotyping, this was thefirst time my real-life experience supported such ideas. And seeing isbelieving.Enter two daughters: Kerith, 12; Katie, 10. Kerith and Katie read a lot, and theywrite, too—poems, stories, paragraphs and answers to "thought questions" inschool. In what they read and in what they write, I can see theiradventurousness, their inquisitiveness and their ambition. They discover cluesand solve mysteries. They take risks, brave dangers, fight villains—andprevail.Their schoolwork reveals their pride in themselves. Their taste for reading isboundless; they're interested in everything. "Why?" is forever on their lips. Theireyes are set on personal goals that they, as individuals, aspire to achieve:Olympic gold, owning their own business, public office.2Both play sports. I've witnessed a wholesome, aggressive, competitive spirit bornin Kerith. She played her first basketball season last year, and when she started,she was too polite to bump anyone, too nice to steal anything, especially if someother girl already had the ball. By the end of the season, however, Kerith wastaking bumps and dishing them out. She plays softball with the intensity of aBaltimore Oriole. She rides and jumps her horse in competitive shows. Now she"can't imagine" not playing a sport, especially one that didn't have a littlerough play and risk.In Katie's face, I've seen Olympic intensity as she passed a runner in the last 50yards of a mile relay. Gasping for air, knees shaking, lungs bursting, she dippedinto her well of courage and "gutted out" a final kick. Her comment after the race:"I kept thinking I was Mary Decker beating the Russians." For the first time sheexperienced the thrill of pushing herself to the limit. She rides and jumps, too.And her basketball team was a tournament champion. The joy and excitementand pride that shone in the eyes of each member of the team was equal to thatin any NCAA winner's locker room. To each sport Katie brings her dedication todoing her best, her drive to excel and her desire to win.Both girls are learning lessons that, when my wife and I were their age,wereencouraged only in boys.Fame, aggressiveness, achievement, self-confidence—these were territories intowhich very few women (the exception, not the rule) dared enter. Kerith and Katie,most of their friends, many of their generation and the generations to come areredefining the social game. Their lives contradict the stereotypes with which Igrew up. Many of the characteristics I thought were "male" are, in fact, "human."Given a chance, anyone can, and will, acquire them. My daughters and the girlsof their generation are lucky. They receive a lot of institutional support notavailable to women of past generations: from women executives, womenathletes, women authors, women politicians, women adventurers, womenOlympians.Old categories, old stereotypes and old territories don't fit the current generationof young women; and they won't fit the next generation, either. As Kerith said, "Ican't even imagine not being allowed to do something or be somethingjustbecause I am a girl." All this does not negate what I knew to be true during myown high school and college years. But what I've learned from both thewomencadets at West Point and from my daughters supports a different conclusionabout today's women and the women of tomorrow from the beliefs Iwas raisedwith. Ultimately we will be compelled to align our social and political institutionswith what is already becoming a fact of American life. Or more precisely,whenever biological difference is used to segregate a person from an area of3human endeavor, we will be required to demonstrate that biological difference isrelevant to the issue at
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