With physical, emotional, physiological issues, how can equality really be fully manifested in the services?

Equality isn't a function of physical sameness. It's an equality of opportunity. On average females and men have very different strength levels, for example. But amongst men, there is also a wide variation of strength levels as well. But all men are given the opportunity to demonstrate whether they have the abilities to meet the standard. Many fail, but they were given the opportunity to try. Yet female soldiers until recently were not given the opportunity to demonstrate that they could meet the standard. They were excluded as a blanket policy. So women who do possess the capability to meet the standards are denied even the chance, while any man can get the chance to tryjust because he's a man.

That's the heart of this issue. It's not about lowering standards, it's about giving every soldier the opportunity to show that they meet the standards. As far as LGBT issues go, in 10-20 years, as the older servicemembers move on and today's young people become the senior leaders, they will wonder what all the fuss was about. Multiple surveys have shown that a large majority of young people today do not share the prejudices of their parents generation, and support LGBT rights. They have grown up side by side with openly gay friends, and each year more and more young people will enter the service with that experience.

After WWII, the Army surveyed white soldiers about their feelings on integrated units. A large majority were opposed. 80% said they did not want to have to be forced to live with or eat in the same mess halls as blacks. They said the Army should retain separate service clubs for blacks and whites. The senior generals opposed it as well. Today, those seem like ridiculous concerns to anyone but avowed racists and bigots. But those concerns were very real to those soldiers at the time. They didn't consider themselves anything but normal Americans, and thought society was losing its bearing.

I have no doubt that within a couple of decades, soldiers will look back and wonder what all the fuss was about, and those who so vehemently opposed LGBT integration today will look as out of place as those who opposed racial integration in the 40s and 50s.

Senior don't think I'm playing the race card. There's a point I'm going to try and make. In the Civil War blacks were seen as less than White men and their fighting abilities were thought to be of a lesser standard. Now the movie Glory sought to show it wasn't true by using a unit 54th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, led by a white man who went on to distinguish themselves in many battles. Moving forward to WWI and II, and more of the same, if you're not a White male, your abilities were doubted so you got to do jobs like porters, truck drivers (Red Ball Express), and after a LOT of doubts the Tuskegee Airmen proved anything is possible. The intent of this IS NOT to say "white man bad", or anything like that. It's to show that folks doubted the abilities of someone UNTIL they're placed in a particular position and THEN they find out those are some of the baddest mofo's out there. Women are in the same boat. Relegated to nurses, S1, factory workers in support of the war effort, yet there are some women pilots with more flight hours than their male counterparts. They don't get the "glory" being they flew the planes to their male counterparts so they could go forward and fight. Now with the GWOT(or whatever it's called today), women are no longer relegated to the "rear". There is no front lines anymore, no more standing Armies with "Honor Codes" to keep them in line. It's a complete free-for-all. I know of a few MP's that were in savage firefights, but since they're not grunts, their accomplishments are taken down and downplayed being a woman squad leader was in charge or the gunner was a woman. It's time to stop finding reasons why someone CAN'T and give them the tools so they CAN. Give them the tools, don't lower standards and should they fall, pick em the hell up, dust them off and say you got this. A video last year made the rounds on FB about a woman finishing a road march(I think it was for EFMB). The part that was shown was her falling at the end, but not across the line, and she had folks yelling at her to get up and go. It's not widely known that she BEAT a lot of her male counterparts in that march. Women CAN do it just like she did, just like the Rangers, just like the Blacks when they were doubted....the same way the most decorated unit in the Army is a Japanese American Unit who's families were in camps. Give the ladies the tools, the training, and the belief we have their back in anything they do and they will succeed.

Just like Starship Troopers, communal barracks and showers. We are all the same. Nothing bad could possibly happen, right.