For the presentation on Gender and War we were asked to read several articles before class. All of them were interesting but one struck me closer to home than the others. It is about the reported cases of Sexual Assault in the military and what it said shocked me. Now I'm not the biggest fan of the military to begin with but honestly I didn't know that things were this bad for the women serving our country. The article stated that the "Veterans Administration health care system reports that 28 percent experienced at least one sexual assault during military service." It really appalls me that with almost one third of women in the military have been sexually assaulted.
The thing that bothers me the most however is how little these women are able to do in the situation. Telling someone about the assault could ruin their military career. What a double edged sword that is; her career is ruined because someone else attacked her. That leads me to believe that the number is highly underreported. Imagine going through the psychological effects of a sexual assault knowing that if you tell someone, pressing charges will mean the end of your career. Some people depend on the army for both their income and money for schooling and they shouldn't have to contemplate whether or not to risk it all because some guy thought it acceptable to sexually assault her.
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