TRANSGENDER IN THE US MILITARY 4
department should have 100% access to the American population from where it can select,
recruit and retain most qualified all-volunteer forces (Schaefer et al., 2016). Additionally,
their population in the military would be too low to significantly affect the readiness and
expenditure of the military (Schaefer et al., 2016).
Differentiating Sex and Gender
Sex is the anatomical difference between male and female that is determined during
conception. It is also determined by the genitalia that an individual acquires at birth which
makes him/her be named male or female. However, gender has a social concept, the
expectations of an individual based on their sex. It is determined by what individuals believe
about themselves. An individual can change his/her sexual identity based depending on their
sexual orientation as opposed to their sex which is impossible to change.
Military as a hyper-masculine
The military environment is a hyper-masculine environment in which entails
aggressiveness in the protection of ego and dominance. The military cultivates and tends to
reward violent hyper-masculinity. As a result, it increased the cases of rape especially by
recruits on peers. Additionally, a large fraction of soldiers is men. Transgender soldiers face a
significant problem with other soldiers who tend to abuse them (Schaefer et al., 2016). For
instance, Bradley Manning, a transgender soldier faces abuse fellow soldiers which drove
him into hating gay soldiers. Therefore, the military environment is less appealing to
transgender female soldiers because they operate in an environment where they are likely to
be abused by male soldiers as they do not reflect the masculinity and strength that they are
expected to reflect.
