Date: April 4, 2023
Host: Jim Schneider
Guest: Elaine Donnelly
MP3 | Order
Tensions around the world continue to escalate. Alliances are being formed between America’s enemies while they strengthen their militaries. As for the U.S. military, look at these headlines from various news sites over the past several weeks:
–The Biden administration is now ordering the military to allow male soldiers to shower with females.
–Army revamping “Be all you can be” campaign.
–Republicans demand answers from West Point over pronoun play acting training session.
–Pentagon researchers urge more access to sex change hormones for military kids.
–Secretary of State Blinken defends funding drag shows.
–Biden aims to shrink the Navy while the Secretary of the Navy focuses on climate change.
After reading these you have to ask the question: Are we pursuing military readiness or military “wokeness”?
Appearing on Crosstalk to discuss this issue was Elaine Donnelly. Elaine is president of the Center for Military Readiness, an independent, nonpartisan public policy organization that reports on and analyzes military/social issues. Since its founding in 1993, CMR has advocated for high, uncompromised standards in all forms of military training and sound priorities in the making of military/social policies.
What does “woke” mean? Elaine defined it as another name for progressivism/liberalism taken to extremes with coercion, even if it hurts the institution. That means “wokeness” is affecting and shaping gender policy, environmental policy and in the case of the subject discussed here, the military.
One area where we see “wokeness” at work is in the area of Critical Race Theory (CRT). This involves a number of books written that divide people into various racial groups. White people are suspected or assumed to be racist or white supremacists. Then you have another group who aren’t white but are assumed to be under-served or that have been harmed in some way by the racism of other people. So Elaine noted that when you go into a military school and you teach this kind of ideology, how can you expect the same people who accuse each other of racism, or assume the other is a victim of racism, to go out and fight a war together? This is inherently divisive.
Transgender policy and its attendant pronoun usage, the promotion of drag queen events and President Biden’s executive order further advancing racial equity in support for under-served communities through the federal government; it’s all part of today’s military “wokeness”. Get the details when you review this edition of Crosstalk.
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