Columbia Post: Combating the military on sexual assault
Freelance columnists, Jan Collins writes an op-ed for the Columbia Post:
Now, the military brass has been saying for years they are trying mightily to stem this plague of rape. Back in May at a Congressional hearing, the secretary of the Air Force and his chief of staff expressed regret about recent assault cases and suggested they were making progress on solving the problem. To which Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, Democrat of New York, tartly replied: “I do not think you should pat yourself on the back.” Sexual assault, she said, “is undermining the credibility of the greatest military force in the world.” Not to mention ruining the lives of thousands of women who were only trying to serve their country, I would add.
Victims of rape in the military have been attempting for decades to get the Pentagon and the military—still predominantly male, of course—to take this problem seriously. The response has been, essentially, pats on the head and loud silence.
In 2013, however, seven of the 26 members of the Senate Armed Services Committee are female, a historic high, and they are making their voices heard. Senator Gillibrand and others have introduced amendments to the annual defense authorization bill, expected to be debated sometime this month, which would change the way sexual assaults are dealt with in the military.
