Journal: Eikon
Volume: EIKON 01:2 (Fall 2019)
Article: Statement Against Female Conscription
Author: Anonymous

Eikon 1:2 (Fall 2019) p. 88

Statement Against Female Conscription

In 2016 the US Congress appointed a National Commission on Military, National, and Public Service to investigate the question of expanding Selective Service registration to all Americans, which would subject women to potential military conscription, and to report back to the President and Congress in March 2020. The following statement was submitted to this commission in protest of female conscription; it also formed the basis for a resolution adopted by the Southern Baptist Convention in Birmingham, AL in June of 2019.

The Council on Biblical Manhood and Womanhood stands unequivocally against conscripting America’s daughters into military service. Requiring women to register with the Selective Service alongside men to make them eligible for military conscription would be to treat men and women interchangeably and to deny male and female differences clearly revealed in nature and Christian Scripture.

Eikon 1:2 (Fall 2019) p. 89

The Testimony Of Nature

The natural order, considered by plain reason, supports what the vast majority of civilized societies — ancient and modern — have recognized: men are better suited than women for warfare; thus, women are at a disadvantage against men in warfare. The inherent, distinct, physiological compositions of male and female point to differently-suited purposes that have implications in the realm of fighting. The average man is stronger and has a larger frame than the average woman, making him better equipped for aggression; the female body is naturally equipped to nurture the next generation, suiting the average woman better for care and not combat. Only a non-scientific assessment of male and female physiology overlooks these plain and natural differences.

Nature and plain reason also warn that a government that conscripts its female citizens in their reproductive prime is a government that fails to seek what is best for its future and the future of its citizens. A woman aged 18–25, the current range for military conscription, is in the midst of her prime reproductive years. Therefore, to conscript a generation of women — wives, mothers, and daughters — is to demographically doom the next. Drafting women into the military, where many could be involuntarily assigned combat roles, would set the nation up for demographic disaster as birth rates would be inevitably and drastically affected.

Moreover, not only could a woman, unbeknownst to her, be with child when conscripted, she could also become pregnant during her time of service, which would put her and her unborn baby in the path of great harm — not to mention the necessary leave during pregnancy and postpartum that would require additional resources to train her replacem...