Should women register for the draft since they are now allowed to serve in all combat roles?

The Defense Department will lift all gender-based restrictions on military service starting this January. The historic change will clear the way for women to serve alongside men in combat arms units. At this core, the decision means that as of Jan. 2, female service members both current and incoming recruits will be allowed to serve in any military job for which they meet the gender-neutral performance standards and other requirements. The Army has shown strong support for opening all military occupational specialties to women. So far last year, three female soldiers completed the prestigious Army Ranger School and earned the Ranger tab. In November of 2015, the Ranger School’s first fully integrated class got underway at Fort Benning, Georgia.    

A poster at a recruiting center.

For the Navy, the impact will be felt mainly in to the SEAL community, which was historically limited to men. The Navy integrated its fighter pilot career fields in the 1990s and began allowing women to serve on submarines several years ago. For the Air Force, the change will affect six occupational specialties that had been closed to women: special tactics officer and combat rescue officer, and the enlisted fields of special operations weather, combat control, Para rescue and tactical air control party. Those gender restrictions affected roughly 4,000 positions.

Former Petty officer Alex Deonarain said “I believe women should register for the draft just like men.” He explains “a regular military male can have a job of flying a high range aircraft and now women can too, but now that same male has to drop a bomb and kill alot of people… basically woman will have to do the same thing. Just like the daft nobody wanted to go but they had to. And now that women has the same military rights they can’t dismiss that part of it”.

Kaye Chan an Edison student said “ I believe for women to be truly equal to males, we should register for the draft.”

So, the information I gather during my interviews. I came to the conclusion that for females to feel and be treated truly equal to males, they will and should register for the draft.