...to Know Mulan Could Teach the Marines a Thing or Two

Not the Italian Mama

 

 

 

Remember when shoulder pads dominated women's clothing back in 1980s? My entire business wardrobe in the years after college included shoulder pads in every suit, blouse, and dress that I wore to my first job in a midtown Manhattan advertising agency. And I was surrounded by colleagues dressed in the same "power suits." The decade that saw the largest increase in women's participation in the workforce heralded a new, retro style that echoed the style of the 1940s and was ubiquitous. Women's haircuts got shorter and more angular, and women's clothing concealed feminine curves behind straight, boxy lines that mimicked the silhouettes of men.  Androgyny was in, and the female form was out.

As in the '40s, the 1980s saw record numbers of women in the workforce trying to compete and do business with businessmen. The fashion trends reflected the desire of women to blend into the men's world, to gain an equal footing on foreign terrain, and to break past the secretarial pool into the corner office.

Now that we have 26 women CEOs in the Fortune 500, have had several women serve as Secretary of State, and for the first time have 100 women in Congress, the paradigm has changed. Women are more openly embracing their femininity and beginning to define their roles in the workforce on their own terms. Libby Sartain, director of HR at Yahoo!, Inc. explains  

 

“So much of what it takes to be a leader has been historically defined by men. And while I was determined to be a leader, the last thing in the world I was going to do was to try to be like a man so that I could be taken seriously.”

Like women trying to break into the testosterone-infused corporate world, women in the military are seeking higher paying roles and greater opportunity for advancement in a very male-dominated arena. While women have been officially allowed in combat roles for about two years now, the Army and the Marine Corps still have a large number of specialties from which women are barred. But the military has always been on the leading edge of social change because it recruits from all walks of life and, as an arm of the government, sets standards that reflect the political ideals espoused by its civilian leaders. As a result, the US Marine Corps is spending the next year analyzing the current training standards to answer the question if women are fit for combat roles in the Marines. Along the way, the brass hopes to discover if the current training standards are appropriate for men or women. Joint Chiefs Chairman General Martin Dempsey has said that perhaps the current standards need to be updated for current combat situations.

“If we do decide that a particular standard is so high that a woman couldn’t make it, the burden is now on the service to come back and explain to the secretary why is it that high? Does it really have to be that high?”

The Italian Mama recommends that, as the Marines consider this question, they take a night off, pop up some popcorn and settle in to watch Mulan. Their night at the movies would reveal to them another way they could shift a paradigm and update their standards to include characteristics that women naturally excel in. In Disney's recreation of the ancient Chinese legend of Mulan, our heroine succeeds not because she acts like the men she is training with but precisely because she acts like a woman. Her success in training and in the final showdown results from her agility, quick thinking, and innovative problem solving that employs her female charms rather than disguises them. With new standards in the military, a woman soldier could succeed not so much by trying to act like the guys but by acting like a good soldier, which can and should include criteria that are generally associated with women.

But what can women bring to the battlefield? Hmmm, let's see. Studies show that women executives battling for a business edge exceed their male counterparts in risk taking and demonstrate more creative problem-solving skills because they are not bound by conventions created by men. We can extrapolate that women on the battlefield would act similarly. Social scientists and anyone who knows women can agree that most women surpass their male counterparts in communication skills, agility, multitasking, cleanliness, empathy, and consensus building. Surely these are skills that would serve Marines well in any of the various roles required of them. In these areas, men should be working hard to emulate women. If the Marines were to update their training standards to include such characteristics, more women would qualify for combat roles, and the military would benefit from the enormous contributions women can make to fraught combat situations. A role model for all of society, the Marines could redefine how to be successful in all aspects of society which might finally recognize that women bring unique skills to the executive suite, the drafting table, the writer's studio, the research lab, and the director's chair as well as the battlefield.

...to Think the Best of You

We've all been there: you're standing patiently on the deli counter line thinking about the three hundred other errands you need to run when an exuberant and oblivious college student, full of his youth and new-found independence leans in, presumably to look at the Swiss cheese selections, and places his order right there in front of you. You simmer, and steam, and think of a thousand things except the right thing to say.

       "Maybe he's in a hurry because he has an exam 

        tomorrow." "Maybe he was here before me, and 

        I didn't see him."  "I don't want to sound like a 

        tetchy old lady." "Oh, it's too late to do anything 

        now, the order is placed."  

You drive home trying to shake the scene from your head, but it's stuck. You know there was something you could have said that would have politely yet firmly expressed your anger, illuminated his oblivion, and gotten him to back down: you were there first; too bad about his exam, he should have been studying all along; and, right now, I am a tetchy old lady! And then you beat yourself up the whole way home for not finding the right words when you needed them.

Then it hits you: "Oh, goodness! Silly me! I must have forgotten to take off my invisibility cloak this morning! Ought to remember that the next time I come to the grocery store."

Or the sad encounter during which you learn from your much younger boss that you were passed over for promotion because your cover letter was not compelling enough for him to turn it over and look at your resume. As the humiliating scene unfolds, you think to yourself, "Watch what you say because he is your boss." "Well, it is a cover letter. It should make the employer want to know more about you." "Maybe that cover letter really wasn't my best."

Feeling uncomfortable about the conversation the whole way home, you stew and mull, and then it hits you. "Don't talk to me about compelling cover letters! Honey, I was teaching cover letters while you were in training wheels!"

All kinds of social conventions and insecurities filter our natural responses. Be polite. Respect authority figures. Everyone makes mistakes. Maybe I was wrong. The Italian Mama has been thinking about another one: the inclination some people have to think the best of other people, to believe that everyone does their job competently, has the community's best interest in mind, tells the truth, and acts honorably. These beliefs inhibit our gut reactions, which we ignore at our peril. On the other hand, if you go around believing that everyone is incompetent, egotistical, and self-absorbed, it's easy to let those zingers fly.

          But do you want to harbor such an unflattering view 
          of your fellow journeymen? The Italian Mama thinks 
          not. Carrying around all of that negativity might just 
          mire you in the muck.

Armed with this new awareness of the reasons for holding my tongue, the Italian Mama is old enough to judiciously weigh the cost/benefits of hurling a zinger. Choosing to remain silent may deny the fleeting satisfaction of calling out the ignorant but may be the result of a more sunny view of humanity. And that's nothing to beat yourself up about.

...to Remember Boom Boxes (Part II)

Since they were toddlers capable of making lots of noise and inserting themselves into the lives of all people within an 100 yard radius, my kids learned from the Italian Mama that behaving properly in public means disturbing as few people as possible, as little as possible. On my seemingly interminable New York City commutes to my first job out of college, disturbing as many people as possible, preferably to an intolerable degree, was a goal achieved by many young men who appeared to be otherwise disenfranchised. Surrounded by people dressed for the office or lugging backpacks for school, the Boom Box Brigade sported baggy jeans, unlaced hiking boots, and bomber jackets over t-shirts. They were not riding the 4 train to Wall Street. I couldn't help but feel that the loud music, the lumbering gait (under the weight of that damned boom box!), and the disheveled clothing was a demonstration of power from the powerless, a literal shout out "I matter if only because I am assaulting your eardrums and eyeballs right now!"

Contrast these loud, imposing, and hard-to-ignore young people with today's young music lovers. Their iPods or iPhones tucked discreetly in their pockets, they silently enjoy their music and glide through society disturbing only those they might bump into as they silently text their friends. The Italian Mama believes that today's plugged in youth may feel more empowered in more constructive ways than their counterparts from 30 years ago. They don't need to aurally and visually assault everyone in their vicinity in order to feel validated. Their ability to shape public discourse and even overthrow governments on social media and other Internet forums enables them to say, "Hey, I matter!" in much more effective ways than boom boxes once did for their generation. The Twitter Revolutions in Iran, Egypt, and Ukraine demonstrate the immense power young people and others hold in their hands when they log on to tweet, post, like and unlike.

The Italian Mama is old enough to remember the fruitless sounds emanating from boom boxes and thanks the Internet for giving young people a way to be heard that matters.