Meeting The Minimum is Not Good Enough
The recent Disney film, “The Young Woman and the Sea” gives a biographical sketch of Gertrude Ederle’s courageous swim across the 21-mile English Channel. In so doing, she became the first woman to achieve such a feat, which challenged many to rethink the physical and athletic capabilities of the weaker sex. Such an accomplishment is one of many milestones for women in the fight for equality, shattering the glass ceiling at greater heights and new frontiers. But the cultural moment we live in has shifted. Equality is overextended to believe it applies in nearly any other imaginable category. More than just merely the thought that a woman can do anything a man can do – is that she can do it better, too (cue the music from Annie Get Your Gun). After all, as recent as 1967, women were forbidden from running the Boston Marathon because it was believed that women were physically incapable to do so. The current sentiment is, that given enough time, women will accomplish everything men can do and more. To suggest to the contrary is to play the antiquated and morally inferior card of sexism.
Part and parcel of this milieu has been the steady stream of media in the overplayed, overproduced and overexaggerated superhero flicks. Take, for example, Natasha Romanoff, AKA, the Black Widow, the Russian groomed and fashioned super spy who holds her own as a member of the Avengers. Romanoff, who is played by Scarlet Johansen, is towered over by her male counterparts as she stands at a meager 5 foot 3 inches tall. Nevertheless, her role, which is emblematic of a host of superhero women such as Wonder Woman, Captain Marvel and She-Hulk, to name a few, routinely makes mince meet of hardened, combat experienced, male killers. It’s hard to not see how such portrayals and projections of fantasy reflect the desires of the culture at large. Not only do people want women to be superheroes, but they believe that they can be. This mood has made its way into the DEI hires and progressive desegregation of male and female roles in a variety of places. Among these are the notable institutions that are traditionally associated with men, such as the military, law-enforcement and now also, for the whole world to see with the attempted assassination on Donald Trump, the Secret Service.
The assumption that DEI tragically introduces is one of meeting minimum thresholds, not excellence. If a woman can do the same thing a man can, nothing forbids her from that pursuit, right? Unfortunately, some glass ceilings are only as high as reality. There are some things that only men can do that women cannot and vice versa. When those things are examined, they reveal something that shouldn’t just merely texture this conversation but steer it. Take the most obvious difference between the sexes: women can get pregnant, and men cannot. This singular fact doesn’t suggest an inequality between men and women, but a biologically inherited role. What the man cannot do informs him what he should do – which is to be the protector and provider of the woman. Such a basic fact is what society is based upon. Not just some, but all societies for all time. We can agree with Jordan Peterson’s observation on the matter, men are expendable in a way women are not. If we send women off to fight our battles, who is to bear and rear the children? The entire conversation about what a woman is capable of pivots on the “cans” – but it must be informed, first, by the “shoulds” What should women being doing? Given the attempt on Donald Trump’s life, the DEI hires of the Secret Service are facing a long over-due scrutiny.
The role of being a Secret Service and guarding the President is one that demands an excellence in physical capabilities, foremost among them, are the roles of fighting and protecting. This motif, which is picked up in Josh Hawley’s recent book on manhood, tells us something about man’s God given role embedded in his design. Guarding the president comes with the presupposition that the person be willing to lay down their life in protecting the president and able to inflict violence upon an attacker. My argument is simple, it is not merely men who are best suited to guard the president, but it should be the best of men. Let me tip my accolades as to why I know that is the case. I served in the infantry with 1st Battalion, 7th Marine Regiment, “Animal” Company on two deployments to Iraq in 2007-2009. During my time in the Marine Corps, I also picked up two secondary MOS’s as a Combat Marksmanship Coach and Combat Marksmanship Trainer which were put to specific use during my final six months on active duty while I worked at the Marksmanship Training Unit at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, California. In addition to my experience with firearms, I’ve been in and around the combat sports since I was four years old, when my dad put me in wrestling. I continued with the sport all the way through high school and then returned to it in college, where I competed under two-time Olympian Jim Gruenwald. I have also trained in BJJ, boxing (my boxing gym in my hometown is also where Victor Ortiz got his start) and have dabbled in MMA – enough so that I’m writing my dissertation on the topic. I give that as a preface to say this, as someone who is adjacently aware of the physical and combative demands of protecting, fighting, and so forth, women should not be protecting a former or sitting president. Period.
To suggest that men have been created by God and are better suited to fulfill certain functions is to tell the identity politics of the day “the emperor has no clothes.” This is a fact grounded in the reality of how God has created His world. And this can be said while simultaneously admiring the willingness of the female Secret Service agents to take on the risk of sacrificing themselves for another person. I don’t believe they have any less value than any other person on the planet. They are image bearers of the Almighty and are worthy of dignity and respect. However, they should never have been put into the role they hold to begin with. I have two basic reasons why that is: 1. The physical differences between men and women and 2. The necessity of being able to prevail in a fight.
Physical Differences Between Men and Women
One would think it should go without saying, but the obvious must be belabored on this point. Men and women, though of the same species, have easily distinguishable differences in their biology and anatomy that we become acutely aware of in the sports arena. Men naturally have greater bone density, testosterone, muscle mass, speed, endurance, and strength. While some might be quick to point out the exceptions, like a women’s powerlifter that can out lift the average man, when the categories are kept as equal as possible, men athletically outperform women in nearly every metric of measurement. Consider the following examples:
Serena Williams – Tennis
Serena Williams, a three-time Olympic gold medalist and winner of thirty-nine Grand Slam titles, is arguably the greatest women’s tennis player in the history of the sport. Regarding the differences between men’s and women’s tennis, Serena remarked, “Men are a lot faster, and they serve harder, they hit hard, it’s just a different game.”
Lia Catherine Thomas – Swimming
Lia Catherine Thomas, biologically a male, won the women’s NCAA title for the women’s 200-meter swim in 2022. The advantage that Lia gained in switching from the men’s to women’s division is statistically tremendous, moving from being ranked #554 overall for men to #1 in the country for women. This tells us that there are at least 554 male athletes who are faster than the fastest woman in the country.
Beth Johnson – Wrestling
Beth Johnson was a teammate of mine in high school. An accomplished women’s wrestler from Garden City, Kansas, she won the Fargo National Championships in 2008, was a junior Pan Am Champion, and earned a respectable fourth place at the senior women’s national tournament. With all these hard-earned accolades, Johnson was still never able to make my high school varsity team.
Tori Bowie – Track
Tori Bowie was the 2017 Olympic, World, and U.S. Champion in the 100-meter dash. Her personal best time was an outstanding 10.78 seconds. Though this elite level women’s time is far faster than the average males, when elite male athletes are compared to elite females, the differences are enormous. As of 2018, Bowie’s time has been beaten by over 15,000 men and boys, the vast majority of whom will never be Olympic, World, or U.S. national champions.
Mark Savenok – Wrestling
Mark is a friend and former wrestling teammate of mine from Wheaton College. Though one of the most outstanding wrestlers I have ever met who completed his college career with a respectable record of 113-27, the highest Mark ever placed in college was seventh (he was absolutely capable of being a national champ – but things don’t always turn out the way we want them to). One summer he trained at the Olympic Training Center and had the opportunity to wrestle one of the evenly matched training partners of Helen Maroulis, the women’s freestyle Olympic Gold medalist. Mark threw her around like a rag doll.
The Necessity of Being Able to Fight
What do you think is going to happen if a man intent on killing the president is ever able to close the distance to attack one of the female Secret Service agents? Do we really believe in their smaller stature that they will be able to overcome an attacker? Not a chance. Anyone who thinks that has bought into a fantasy popularized by the plethora of superhero movies. They can’t win in a hand-to-hand fight, so the equalizer for them will be in the number of people protecting the president and their proficiency with firearms. How good is that? Without seeing some actual rounds on targets to objectively measure it – I can only speak to what I saw when the chaos ensued after the first shots rang on the evening of July 13th.
I saw women who:
Were unable to holster their weapons.
If one of my men couldn’t holster their weapon under stress, I would interpret that as a serious skill deficiency that would need to be remedied in training. You don’t want to show up in a stressful situation and find out that you lack the abilities necessary to do the job. That adage was this, “amateurs practice until they can get it right; professionals practice until they can’t get it wrong.” What the world witnessed were amateurs.
Hid behind others.
The photos don’t lie. One Secret Service agent followed an impulse, not to protect the president, but to preserve herself by ducking behind her fellow agents. On the other hand, it is man’s innate wiring and who they are called to be to protect others. Consider the real hero of that day, Corey Comperatore, who shielded his family from the rounds that took his life. He did what every man was made by God to do and be: a warrior-protector.
Appeared disorganized and terrified.
The look I saw on the faces of these women reminded me when I was in Iraq during my second deployment and one of the men in our mobile unit took a shot from a sniper center mass in his back. The Iraqi Army attachment we were working with only had a vague inkling of what they were supposed to do. They were scared, unsure of themselves and disorganized. I saw the same kind of reaction from the female agents that day. They looked inexperienced and untested. We have to wonder, with combat roles being limited to men for so long, how experienced could these female agents really be?
Weren’t big enough to use their body to protect the president.
The meager size of some of these agents begs some serious questions we need to ask: Could she drag a limp, 6’3’’ 250 plus lbs. body? Some will be quick to point out something like, “But I know a woman who is a firefighter who could do this. She can meet all the requirements the men can.” But that would be the exception that proves the rule, wouldn’t it? Who would you rather have protecting you – Person A who can pull a 250 lbs. person to cover in 20 seconds, or Person B who can do the same in 5? The people who protect the president should not be someone who can meet the same minimum requirements as the men – no, we want the best of the best. You cannot have a survivor mentality while protecting others, but one that is set to prevail.
Conclusion
Can we get serious about the differences between men and women? Who is it that occupies the top echelon of elite fighters in our military? Men or women? Who are the greatest combat sports fighters on the planet? Men or women? Who do you want protecting the president? The desire to break the glass ceiling and score diversity points to put women on a presidential detail may be attractive to some – but it could have been deadly to former President Trump. Instead of asking, “can a woman do this?” We should be asking, “what should women do?” Protecting the former or sitting President of the United States is not on the list.
Image Credit: Unsplash
