3:AM Magazine

By Andrea Fischer.

The first thing one notices about the women is their lipstick, a deep ochre color that is outlined with the sort of precision that would make any cartographer jealous. And then you notice the women’s alert eyes carefully scanning the Libyan audience that surrounds Muammar Qaddafi. And then, finally there is the realization: these women are Qaddafi’s bodyguards.

While we tend to lump Libya in with the They-Wear-Veils-There-Don’t-They countries, Qaddafi’s official policy towards women, at least on the surface, challenges the notions that Westerners often have about Islamic women.

Since Qadaffi took power in 1969, he has called women the revolution’s number one ally. And although it is a good idea to take everything Qadaffi does with a shaker of salt, he has followed up on his statements by opening the world’s first all female military academy and leading Libya in signing the United Nation’s Optional Protocol to the Convention on Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, an international bill of rights for women that has been that has been ratified by all industrialized nations with exception of one - the United States.

Libya though, is not the only country where women have bucked Western assumptions to join military forces; in Eritrea, Nepal and India, the rates of female participation in the military are estimated at 30%, easily surpassing the 10-15% female rate of participation in the U.S. military.

What is driving this influx of women into military forces? And does it represent a significant step toward equality that can be sustained in the civilian sphere?

In Case of Emergency Break Gender Barrier

Ever since the first Neanderthal man called dibs on hunting, causing his female cavemate to think - Grrhphtk yrak? - or roughly translated, “What the fuck?”in Neanderthalese, society has been arguing over whether women should be allowed to fight.

And ever since that time, the arguments against women in the military has magically lessened during times of extreme need. It turns out that what’s good for the goose is good for the gander - provided the goose already has one foot in the pot.

During World War II, after the water in the pot had began boiling awhile, the Soviets became the first nation to allow women pilots to fly combat missions after the male population suffered tremendous losses. Similarly in India, a country whose population has been taken to task for using gender selection technology during pregnancy to selectively abort female fetuses, began in to recruit women officers in 1993 only after men began to leave the military for the booming civilian sector.

Women’s participation though, has not been limited to only state militaries. They have also joined guerilla forces in surprising numbers.

The draw of the guerilla movements, according to Hisila Yami, the top woman Maoist woman leader in Nepal, is that “Women have more to gain…Men are able to go across the border and find jobs in India or Malaysia. The girls run the risk of being trafficked if they go to Katmandu or India.” Fighting for the guerillas also provides the women with a less regimented life than what the women face in their homes. There is also another, darker reason though for the increasing number of women guerillas. In areas in Nepal where there are recruitment pushes that call for one in every family to join the rebels, families are more inclined to send their daughters, presumably on the basis that sons are more valuable than daughters.

The United States too, has its own equivalent of guerilla movements - gangs. And the girls who join gangs often do it for the same reasons that women in India and Nepal have joined guerilla movements; namely to experience things that their status as marginalized girls do not allow them in their daily lives and to rebel against being the stereotyped female.

Part of the reason for the higher number of women in guerilla armies as opposed to state militias, may also be that the bureaucracy that is endemic in state military forces has the effect of immunizing an institution from change. Take, for a domestic example, the DMV. As anyone who has had to beg and plead with an employee for an exception to a rule can tell you, you probably have a better chance of changing the color of the sky than changing any standard procedure at the DMV. The less rigid an institution is, the more likely it will be to accept women into their ranks. Fewer rules mean fewer changes needed to accommodate women, and in the case of a revolution, everything, including women’s roles, is subject to redefinition - at least at the beginning.

Peace brings a lot of good things; ticker tape parades, carte blanche to kiss strangers in Times Square, the death of tie dye shirts - but it is also during times of peace that society becomes uncomfortable again with the idea of women in combat. Without the exigency of war, the military is forced to define itself by confronting the arguments why women should or should not be excluded from the military. And this is not always a comfortable position.

For example, one of the more frequent arguments used for keeping women out of the military is that they are not as physically strong as men. The uneasy implication is that war and winning depends not so much on morality and rightness as on strength. And if the women bring unique strengths not based on physical strength to the armed forces, how does one quantify those strengths?

Ironically though, the military has been perfectly willing to use the perception of women as the weaker sex to their advantage during wartime. During Eritrea’s War of Independence with Ethiopia, male Ethiopian fighters often did not view the women as a threat, allowing the women to gain military advantage in battle. And in the Indian state of Jharkhand women fighters posed as villagers in order to lure officers into a nearby forest. After following the women into the forest, the police officers were hacked to death and the station set on fire.

This “advantage” of course, begs the question: what happens when the very thing that allows you conditional entrance, i.e. the perception of being weaker, is also the same thing that keeps you out? What happens further down the line when the collective male light bulb goes off and women are no longer seen as necessarily being weaker?

Some military women though, when faced with other’s assumptions of their weakness run the other way with it - all the way to prison on occasion.

Perhaps one of the most infamous examples of this is Lynndie England, the slight tomboy whose complicity with Charles Graner in the Abu Ghraib scandal earned her one of the harshest punishments meted out to those implicated in the scandal.

The smartest thing that Charles Graner did, and smart is relative term here mind you, was to involve Lynndie England in his crimes at the prison. Although Graner was the ringleader, England’s notoriety easily eclipsed Graner’s even though she was not found guilty of any actual physical abuse. Googling both of their names, results in nearly twice as many hits for Lynndie England as there are for Graner. The Rolling Stones song, ‘Dangerous Beauty’, even included a reference to England as “the girl with the leash.”

Often, when a person is initially allowed access to a group they were previously prohibited from joining, there is a tendency to assimilate the group’s behavior. The negative consequences for this can range from the relatively benign women’s power suits of the early eighties to engaging in dangerous behavior to prove that they can “hang with the boys.” This includes women in the military.

According to a study of U.S. military women, women cadets, in general, were less likely to help other women and instead tried to out masculinize each other as well as the men. Even off base, the women were less likely to associate with one another. England too, engaged in behavior disassociated herself from her gender and mimicked a hyper real concept of male behavior. At one point she participated in the act of making the prisoners wear women’s undergarments - the garment meant to humiliate and weaken the “enemy” was the same garment that she as a female wore. England’s attorney would later advise her to grow her short hair out. Femininity it appears, equates to innocence.

In much of the commentary that surrounded the Abu Ghraib scandal there was an undercurrent of thought that pulses through - namely, how could a woman do this?

It seemed implausible to many that a woman could be capable of what transpired at the prison. There was even speculation about whether Lynndie herself had been subjected to physical or sexual abuse as a child; the implication being that the only way that a woman could engage in such behavior is if she had somehow been cornered there.

The idea of women soldiers as protectors of an ideology is hardly an idea that is unique to the U.S. The documentary, Shadows of a Leader, by Rania Ajami offers a rare glimpse into the world of Qaddafi’s female bodyguards.

Qaddafi’s efforts to promote the idea of women in the military, has often had the “F” word – feminism - tossed his way like a hand grenade by Arab critics. He has deftly sidestepped this potentially explosive accusation by charging the women with not just the guarding of his body, but more importantly, the guarding of an ideology.

Throughout Shadows of a Leader, both men and women will repeat this sentiment, that the women are guarding not just a leader, but an ideology. And part of that ideology is women’s military participation will not come at the expense of their femininity. As if to emphasize this notion, Colonel Fathiya Tabishat who is centrally featured in the documentary, is shown purchasing make-up and a purse in a fist-sized store as two bemused shopkeepers watch.

The ideal of beauty has received state sanction as well. In 2002, Qadaffi agreed host the Miss Net World pageant, whose theme was beauty will save the world. During the pageant, finalists strutted down a runway in camouflage pants and t-shirts emblazoned with a picture of Qaddafi.

Make no mistake though, the women with him are not meant for show. His top bodyguard, Aisha, died after taking a bullet for him in 1998. If the positions as bodyguards are meant only for show, someone should tell these women, and quick.

Another tenant of the female soldier ideology is that the domestic life should not be neglected. Not only do you have to bring home the bacon and cook it up, but apparently now you’ve also got to shoot the pig as well.

During one scene in Shadows of a Leader, Colonel Fathiya is cooking dinner with several other women at a friend’s house. They all agree that eating out frequently is seen as evidence that you are not a good wife and mother. Military work is acceptable so long as family and home are not neglected. The two men shown in the film are never shown commenting on what would occur if their job interfered with their family life.

Ideologies can be good, even if not achievable they are least a target to move toward. But, there is a danger in ideologies that are the creation of others. Or as associate professor of history and writer Abby Kleinbaum noted: “As surely as no spider’s web was built for the glorification of flies, the Amazon idea was not designed to enhance women.”

You’ve come a long way, baby

England though, was far from the first woman to have earned dubious military distinction based on her gender. The Nazis, short on men and long on war, decided to enlist women as guards at concentration camps, including Auschwitz. According to survivors, these women proved to be no exception to the cruelty that reigned in the camps. One survivor described how, when a group of fifty women guards were led in and were instructed to hit an inmate, only three questioned why they should do so and only one refused to do it. The same survivor went on to say that the women guards soon got “into the swing of things, which they have been warming up their entire lives for.”

In modern day Sri Lanka as well, women fighters have shown themselves to be just as merciless in combat as the men. Squads of mostly women Tigers killed civilians and used woman suicide bombers to blind the Sri Lankan president as well as kill ten people outside the prime minister’s house.

And most recently, Italy’s secret service has reported that Al Qaeda has launched an online women’s magazine, Al Khansa whose topics seem to be pulled straight from the Onion, including articles on dietary advice for suicide bombers and how to “dominate the passions” prior to self detonation.

In the 1960s and 70’s tobacco companies used the rallying phrase “You’ve come a long way, baby” to sell smoking as a sign of gender equality. In the intervening 30 or 40 so odd years, we have come to the not-so-startling realization that lung cancer should not be a marker of equality. But, a similar type of thinking persists when the sole barometer of women’s advancement is mirroring of men’s accomplishments. This type of reactionary feminism can be just as dangerous as other forms of sexism as reactionary behavior is inherently weaker. If I shoot you with a gun, I may do several things. I may admire the ability of my gun. I may admire my ability to shoot. But, I would not likely admire your startlingly ability to propel yourself backwards.

Reactionary feminism’s greatest fault though, is that its narrow focus prevents the other side of the equation from being addressed: men and the roles they are traditionally expected to assume. The focus on getting women into male dominated occupations without the reverse being true as well, seems to imply that the roles men have traditionally filled are more valuable than those occupied by women.

And one of the most difficult areas to change gender role expectations is in that holy grail of politics; the family. You can bring it into battle, but you can’t ever look directly at it. To do so is to risk political death.

In Eritrea where women were a significant force in the thirty-year struggle for independence from Ethiopia, women were expected to be treated the same as men and this was reflected in their slogan of “Equality through Equal Participation”. Women were allowed to take on combat roles and even led battles. This departure from the general Eritrean population where gender roles were strictly enforced offered the women a unique opportunity to redefine themselves. Yet, when they returned to civilian life they found that domestic expectations had remained the same. Women who had fought in the war were seen as “tainted” and were less likely to find a marriage partner. Those who did marry found that the old traditional roles had waited for them.

The traditional roles are also enforced by the unstable economic conditions that are typically present after a guerrilla fought war. As Benjamin Friedman posits in his book, The Moral Consequences of Economic Growth, nations liberalize and increase rights during times of economic growth and times of hardship coincide with a retreat from progressive goals. Faced with a stagnate or declining economy and the “taint” from war, these women often find that the great leap forward turned out to be one off a pier.

In Libya, the way in which advances made by the women bodyguards have not yet successfully penetrated the domestic sphere can be seen when Ms. Ajami is given guidance on how to fire an RPG by a school girl in a head scarf who laughingly and with much charm, asks her instructor, “who do you want me to shoot?” while aiming the (hopefully) unloaded RPG at Ms. Ajami. Ms. Ajami is a good sport and takes a quick lesson in handling the weapon that on her shoulder resembles a fallen minaret. Later on though, when Ms. Ajami is given guidance on putting on the traditional Libyan headscarf, it is then she that she is told, “Now, you’re a true Libyan.”

There are also other hints that trickle down theory of equality, has been less than successful. At one point during the film, Colonel Fathiya is shown making the argument to Naval commanders that women could successfully be integrated into the navy. The seriousness with which her argument is taken can be evidenced by the yawns and not so discreet watch glances that occur while she is speaking. When she walks outside it is hard not to notice that the shoulders on her uniform are to large, almost as if the consideration to the uniform of a female colonel had almost been an afterthought.

While Qadaffi’s hairpin turns of reasoning and logic are capable of inspiring both excitement and nausea (occasionally at the same time) his policies do appear to have made some progress.

Three girls at the military school are asked what they want to be when they grow up. They reply that they want to go into medicine, engineering and programming. These girls and the imperfect conditions in which they find themselves are the equivalent of the proverbial 99 foot man - they make it easier to believe that the 100 foot man exists. And yet, when I think of these girls, and other girls everywhere who harbor dreams of leading a full, rich life, I also find myself thinking of an anecdote about Qadaffi.

When Qadaffi came to power, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser sent his confidant, the famous journalist Mohamed Heikal to assess the situation. Upon his return, he told Nasser it was a catastrophe. “Why,” Nasser reportedly asked, “is he against us?” “No, much worse,” Heikel replied, “he’s for us.”

Women should be able to join the military. There should be no ovary based draft exemption. But the ideology that guides their lives should be one of their own choosing. Anything less isn’t worth fighting for.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Andrea Fischer lives and writes in Pacifica, California. Her writing has appeared in A Woman’s World, Again, the San Francisco Chronicle and Kitchen Sink Magazine.

First published in 3:AM Magazine: Monday, November 17th, 2008.