The US has gone through many historical changes in culture, namely in the recognition of 'rights'.

Women could once not own homes, or vote.
Minorities could for most of american history not learn to read , or write, or even name themselves, let alone vote or own or accumulate anything of worth.


there are other examples as well, discrimination that has been overcome , but we seem to be regressing quickly,,,,



I am seeing what almost seems like a regression or rebellion of this inclusive fabric that America was evolving into.

I hear the rationalizations for bans on people from 'certain' countries.-not certain people based upon their record, but people from certain countries REGARDLESS of their records,,,


I hear the rationalizations for banning transgenders from the military. Before it became more pc to mutilate your body and pretend to be the same as someone with a natural anatomy and to force(through political pressure) others to do the same, it was recognized as a type of confusion. Yet is it a confusion thats the same in everyone and to the same degree? If so, how have transgender people managed to serve honorably in the past?


We seem to be going back to a time when we attack and exclude groups of people from the 'american dream' merely because of the group to which they belong with no consideration to the character and BEHAVIOR of the actual individual themself. It is a scary time to wonder who will be next as we continue to rationalize and cheer it on,,,,,

Perhaps it is wisdom driving the change?

Personally I really don't care how other people live their lives.

I do understand the logic of
"If its not working - go back to what worked"

sometimes wisdom drives change, sometimes fear/ignorance

change is inevitable , just hoping for the former type rather than the latter

And always will, from now until there is no more US.


You've said that before, it's still not true.
If it were, I wonder if the colonies could have just boded their time until queen anne ruled england then sued her.


That's not really true.
Christian based churches wanted everyone to read...the bible, so they pushed the crap out of teaching everyone to learn to read.
Lots of cities have an "Indian School" road. Maybe just in the SW.
Plenty of (especially christian) groups fought (and won) to force cultural assimilation upon minorities through education.

Not to mention, "for most of american history," there wasn't really an education system like there is now, with a larger number of people spending nearly a fourth of their life in "education" (takes an average 6 years now for 4 year degree. k-12 = 13 years. total 19 years. Average life expectancy approx. 79 years. 79/19 = approximately but less than 1/4).

IMO the way you are presenting the past in the OP is like the current culture and infrastructure existed in the past and everyone just crapped on minorities keeping them from "the good stuff," as though the vast majority of people sat around in their mansions after school voting while reading about and writing how best to suppress and screw over minorities.


Are you under the impression everyone on the planet has their own comprehensive individualized record in a U.S. government database?
Or that all countries have a comprehensive citizen database that lists everything a person has ever done, whether or not the local police have caught them?
Are you under the impression the role of government is to pass laws for and enter treaties with every single individual human being on the planet?

Can't imagine the health care votes in congress based on this.
"We're voting to determine if we'll pay for James B. Adams policy. Tomorrow we'll vote on whether or not we'll subsidize James C. Adams insurance coverage so everyone read about him and his merits tonight (assuming he self identifies as a male). We are now making decisions regarding each individual."


Is it the role or purpose of the military to answer that question, or to be used to answer that question?


I don't think their service is in question.
It's the cost to the overall organization to facilitate a minority's ability to serve honorably.


Personally, I see it more as "many people seem to want to go to a time where government isn't expected to subsidize a person or group's desire to fulfill their idea of the 'american dream,' where the government isn't facilitating any particular person or groups exercising of rights that not everyone sees as and/or agrees are actually rights."

You have a LOT of things wrong here, ciretom. Slaves WERE prohibited from learning to read, and anyone who taught them, was considered a criminal.

Women's property rights DID have to wait a very long time to be equal to men in the US.

Tom4youhere: I think you have missed something with your thought ""If its not working - go back to what worked." Mainly, there's no evidence that something serious was NOT working in the military recently, but much more important, there IS no "what worked" in the past. Everything was covered up and hidden in the past.

In short, it's another case where "the Good Old Days" never actually happened.

As for the main thrust of the thread, rights is, and always has been a very confusing area. It's become extremely confusing in the last few decades. The best way I would describe it is less of a reversal, and more of a wildly confused battle with poor or not leadership on every side. For too long now, some significant people have been using the idea of RIGHTS, to push various agendas and goals that actually have nothing to do with Rights, or at least are made more difficult to deal with under the idea of Rights.

Not to mention, that we have Rights being undone, because someone DID link some behavior to some important Right, and the backfire happened when that non-Right concern had to be addressed negatively, dragging the Right down with it.

Yup, probably.
I don't give much thought to society anymore.
In my opinion its all madness.

Giving it a bit more thought, but not too much I agree that the past had more hidden agendas and covert operations but it seemed (from my childhood view) that life was much simpler not knowing all the details. I'm thinking we are in a period of information overload and it sucks. Too many irons in the fire and that sorta thing.

Everything now has to be torn apart to get to the bottom of it all where in the past, people got the news and it was done. Sure there was speculation and few had all the details but we could just let it go and live life. Granted, things were screwed up but they were more or less screwed up outa sight.

I see a lot of people that get really worked up over things that are not in their control. It builds stress where stress doesn't need to be and causes more problems than its worth. People, in general, exist with a hair-trigger lately. Any little thing can set them off. It wasn't always like that.

It all boils down to greed, ignorance, and fear. Some people have way more than they could ever use, yet they want more, and they don't want anyone else to have any of what they got. Some people think they know everything about everything but they know nothing about anything. Some people are deathly afraid of anything that is new or different.

^True words^

Unfortunately, any concession(s) to rights are purely superficial and only for the cameras, so to speak. Outside of the few satanic families who run the world, ALL of us, Black, white, red, yellow, fluorescent green with purple polka dots, are slaves legally; if your mom signed your birth certificate, you a were made a ward of the state and owned by the IMF. As such, you and I are incapable of legally owning anything, and your birth certificate used to get signed/stamped by the dept. Of Commerce, because soon as youre born, tptb are trading your name on the open market based upon predictions of how much you'll make in a lifetime. You must become a Secured Party Creditor to begin to win your freedom.. This country is based upon and run by England, both countries being founded upon institutional racism and genocide. Blacks were only given the vote within my lifetime, and there's no excuse for that - and while we take two steps forward and one back, its good to remember that its only as bad as it is because the authorities ENGINEER racism here. Always have.

http://www.kappit.com/img/pics/72488107hhgeg_sm.jpg

especially with the likes of Steyer and Soros!

Obama changed the Regulations last year June,as usual,by Fiat,weaseled change in the last moment!
Peruse the Regulations concerning Recruitment!
There is NO Right to serve in the Armed Forces!

Contrary to Leftists' dishonesty, the United States Armed Forces are entities that exist for only two reasons:

1. To afford protection for the citizens of the nation from violent foreign threats;

2. To mete out lethal and deadly force to those enemies.

All other tasks performed by our military, whether non-aggressive or not, are incidental and ancillary to those two charges. Simply put, they are defensive killing organizations.

The U.S. Army, Air Force, Navy, Marine Corps, and, Coast Guard are NOT social constructs or clubs. Neither are they governed by the same code of behaviors as civilians, nor should they be so regulated.

And, they certainly do NOT exist to provide free medical/surgical services to those suffering from psychological disorders.

If you have special medical needs, for whatever reason, then you can't serve. It doesn't mean you're not patriotic, worthy, or just gosh darned nice. It means you can't serve.

Whenever statistics and averages are used, we can count on some well-meaning but confused individual to trot out the exception as though that disproves the offending science and data.

Transsexuals have a 40% suicide rate and no, it's not because of bullying or any nonsense like that. Moreover, gender reassignment therapies do not lower this extraordinary high suicide rate by any meaningful amount. There are plenty of marginalized people who do not commit suicide at those rates. For example, the suicide rate amongst African-Americans is lower than for Euro-Americans and even the suicide rate amongst Native Americans is lower. In fact, other than transsexuals, suicide seems to be a 'white male privilege.'

Let's stop pretending these are normal well-adjusted individuals whose only problem is one solved by gender reassignment therapy. The fact is that they are unfortunate mentally ill people for whom a political redesignation or a change of wording in the DSM does not provide a cure. Why would we saddle our warriors and our war fighting institutions with these problems and concerns, when they should be focused on one thing and one thing only; defeating the enemy!? Yes, there are exceptions. Good for them. Making public policy based on the exception is foolish in the extreme.

http://www.military.com/join-armed-forces/disqualifiers-medical-conditions.html

but, if dead people can vote, why can't they serve in the military too ?

Trump bans transgender from military = outrage. Islam throws LGBTQ people off buildings = religion of peace.

I consider this fallacious logic. IF the issue is mental health, than perhaps screening individuals for their INDIVIDUAL mental health should be the answer, not banning a whole DEMOGRAPHIC. After all, if 40 percent are suicidal that means 60 percent are not,, so why ban them too?

again, fallacious, trump is an individual, islam is a religion that has billions of INDIVIDUALS ,,,Islam 'does' nothing, but certain individuals claiming to be Islamic do.

Reality Check

I know that if I am in combat I don't care what my fellow soldier's personal details are as long as they are well-trained, fully aware of their abilities and willing/able to act. You don't have to be a close personal friend of everyone you serve with but you do have to trust them to have your back and vice-versa. Do what you are ordered to do and be yourself on your own time.

A long time back now, I remember reading an argument by someone who opposed allowing the armed forces to accept non-Caucasians to join. They said that the main concern they had, wasn't based on racial prejudice, it was based entirely on a practical need to retain complete order and discipline in the ranks, and that if non-whites were allowed in, that would be disturbed. Confronted by the logical argument that order and discipline is the opposite of catering to recruit prejudices and mental/emotional defects, the person switched things up, and declared that it wasn't the job or the mission of the military, to lead society to change their ways.

The trouble with that argument was, that what they were deciding to declare instead, was that it WAS the role of the military to enforce OLD social concepts, which is clearly a contradiction to their entire argument.

As Tom4Uhere said, the way the military does work, is reliant on functioning, is that members must ignore EVERYTHING to do with social mores, anxieties, assumptions, prejudices and sensitivities, and learn to work as a team to accomplish their military missions. If a soldier can be distracted and made dysfunctional simply be telling them that the person next to them looks or sounds or otherwise thinks "funny," that person wont be a good fit for the military to begin with.

doesn't really what you consider it,Armed Forces aren't the place for Social Experiments!

these are the Rules for Recruitment,anything else is Baloney!
http://www.military.com/join-armed-forces/disqualifiers-medical-conditions.html

When people think and write about "The Military" they often use combat references. The fact is that around eighty percent of people in "the military" never serve in any kind of combat environment. Most are technicians, administrators, and other "support" type personnel. The U.S. armed forces employs people from all walks of life. That includes racists, rapists, thieves, closet homosexuals, outright bigots, and borderline psychotics. There is no reason not to add transgenders to the list.