Boredalt wrote:
Since someone is going to get trampled on, then you have to side with the 93%.
"Leave No Man Behind" speaks volumes about why this is a fundamentally flawed and non-viable adaptive strategy.
It's flawed for several reasons. First is the implied assumption: that people can't overcome their limitations and get along, so therefore losses must be cut. This assumption is clearly incorrect because it's been done in the past. Other militaries throughout history and in many countries in the present day have gay soldiers and they work fine. They aren't undermined by their gay soldiers. The military has said, "it's a choice between fairness and functionality" regarding black soldiers and many other issues and were proven wrong when civilians forced change on them.
It's also flawed because acquiescing to the preferences of the majority is ultimately self-defeating. Institutions doom themselves to stagnation and decline when they refuse the challenge to adapt and simply stick head in sand. If every calculation is made with the lowest common denominator in mind, that inevitably reduces the range of potential values, which means increasing groupthink and narrowness of appeal. I don't refer (as many do) in this context to the issue of recruitment, but of the long-term wisdom of allowing the military to continue to be dominated by rednecks in uniform with a certain political slant. It bodes ill for the political stability of the country to have a certain mindset give the thumbs-up or thumbs-down on internal policy based on their own biases.
Finally, every functional institution and society has protections for the unpopular minority. Even the military. An institution is most functional when it affords its protection to all its members, not just the tyrannical majority, and that's why "Leave No Man Behind" is not only a humanist vision but a piece of military genius that affords tremendous effectiveness in the real world. Smaller minds might say, leave that man behind, it's only one...but history shows very consistently that espirit de corps is maintained by one for all and all for one. So to say, we should exclude these people, because we're disinclined to protect them, is really just a refusal to make the military a better institution towards its own ends.
I agree with just about everything you typed here, although I could nitpick at applying a battlefield philosophy that binds soldiers in arms to non-battlefield general situations, however, my problem is that I think everyone should be afforded the same considerations. How do you accommodate both sides of this issue without telling one side to "Get over it", and by extension saying, "I care more about how they feel about this than you?"
