Far East Cynic

Spread the word……..

I came across this little tidbit a couple of days ago. I sent it over to Phibian because I knew he could capture in writing, the proper level of outrage that this particular type of thinking by our once great Navy deserves.

Go read the particulars over at Phibs’s place-here. I’ll wait for you to read it and come back.

If you are not outraged when you read that swill-then you have either never served in the military, or have missed the boat on what is fair and reasonable. If you are outraged-join the club. You should be.

This has particular meaning for me because I sat on two selection boards in my naval career-and this kind of thing corrupts the process. The last board I sat on had no minority markings on records-which is at it should be. “Best qualified” should mean exactly that. Regardless of skin color.

That the US Navy puts it in writing-and in effect creates a program of affirmative action is plainly disgusting. The services are supposed to be better than this.

This type of mis-direction by senior naval leadership has to be stopped. And it will be stopped if it sees the light of day, and the current bunch PPT wizards at our 3 and 4 star levels are made to understand that the armed forces are not a laboratory for someone else’s social agenda. The only way they will be made to understand is if they know that they cannot hide behind the veil of “better business practice”.

So spread the word. Write your Congressman. Write the Chief of Naval personnel. Write the CNO. Blog about it, talk to your friends about it. This is the kind of thing that people should be fired for. Its racism pure and simple. That’s right RACISM.  The Navy started down this path in 1993 by not sticking to its best instincts.

It happened with women-there were quotas in effect then-instead of what was planned which was to bring women in the force at entry levels and make them pay their dues and earn respect.  The more senior women whined-they were going to miss their golden opportunity.  So the Navy turned tail and reversed its common sense decision.

It is continuing to happen today. Good people of all skin tones will get screwed by a system that creates preferred customers.

Don’t let it stand. Demand that someone be fired. I have two nominations, here and here.

This is so wrong on so many levels. Speak out.

  1. Concur 100% with Nom #1.

    …. also, I have received some interesting emails from the Fleet along the lines of “Thank you …. but I would never say anything because, well, because – my career would be over.”

    Land of the free baby – land of the free.

  2. With #2 its personal. That man is without a doubt “The worst detailer ever-bar none”. Heard that from a prospective CVN CO. If the preferred customers are getting jerked around-how do you think the also rans got treated?

    Not very well-I know that from personal experience.

  3. I discuss this issue, especially IRT women, at length in Bathtub Admirals. The business of pasting women into leadership positions at the O-5 level that they simply were not trained or experienced enough for was a disaster that was still cascading when I walked in 2001.

    Sorry to hear it’s still cascading.

    Jeff

  4. Gee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Who would have thunk it?
    I wonder if any of this was in place back in the mid to late 1980’s when I was trying to make AMHC? In 1988, a buddy of mine was called to DC to be a recorder for the CPO Selection Board. That year the board selected 36 AMHCs. We ran into each other at the Club at Lemoore one night. He filled me in on what happened. I was number 37!!!!!!!!!!!!! At the time I was assigned to AIMD SeaOpDet and was running the Airframes Division Night Shift. I also cut the BCMs and upped the RFI rate in the Aviation Hydraulic/Pmeumatic Shop. Naval Air guys will know what those mean. All I did was my job. That being the Leading Petty Officer. But this was also the time when getting a degree and volunteering for everything under the sun started to come into play. After being retired for 15 years now, I still wonder.
    Because in the interim, I have seen board results with CPO Selectees that I would have not let baby-sit my kids.

  5. As a minority officer that is being forced out at a terminal paygrade well below what I think it should be after 20 years, let me add my 2 cents. When I first joined the Navy, I was told by a crusty warrant that this is how things will break down in the wardroom:
    #1 – white males
    #2 – white females
    #3 – black males
    #4 – asian male
    #5 – all others.

    Think of it this way, of the many dual military couples that you may have run across, or the couples where both were in the military at one point, you will probably find that the majority of white male/female couples had served together, and in some cases, the white male was the superior to the female (at least from the many cases that I have personally seen).

    So what does this all mean, I am not sure, but I think it just comes down to whom the senior rater feels comfortable with. People tend to stick to their own “tribe” whether we want to admit it or not. I don’t think I missed any promotion opportunities because of my color, but I will put it to the forum that I may have missed one or two due to my chromosome make up.

  6. Maurice,

    I never noticed that kind of pecking order in the wardroom. Maybe I lead a sheltered life but I never noticed any type of racial type things within ranking of people on FITREPS. I’ve seen people get marked well or ill-but not because of race. That said I’ve seen guys get done dirt-but the dirt was done because of stupidity of the rater-not by racial discrimination.

    Like I said though-it could be that I was just sheltered.

    As for the issues with women-well that’s a whole different ball game and I would agree with you about chromosones.

    Still-its great to be a guy! 🙂

  7. Skippy-san,
    I have seen minority guys who have dated white women on the ship get slammed, but the not the white guys who go after the “LBFM’s” or any other color. Sometimes FITREP breakouts do have something to do with your personal dating scene, but from what I have found out that it has a lot to do with perception. True there was not an out and out “Jim Crowism” in the wardrooms I was in, but you could at times see when certain members got an extra break when a minority who did the same thing may not have gotten one.

    I think that overall, the navy needs to acknowledge the fact that “tribes” tend to stick together. Look back over your career. I am not sure what the racial component was of the wardrooms you were in, but I bet it went something like this. If minorites were present, they did to the wardroom bonding things and went out together. But, I submit to you that as the evening wore on, the minorited tended to break off by themselves. Maybe they went to the places where the music they liked was played. Even in Asia, there are definately places where the preferred foreign customers by the locals varies with race, where in one spot they prefer whites, and in others they prefer blacks, koreans, etc.

  8. Re: your last statement, that is true, but its driven in my opinion by local prejudices on the Asian side and a desire to cater to a certain clientele. (E.G. the type of music played). Japanese girls tended to be different-some wanted nothing to do with African Americans, others only wanted to date African Americans. Fortunately the supply allowed plenty for all.

    Most of the wardrooms I was in were predominately white and only one was mixed gender, so my sample size is small to be sure.