Military training dehumanizes women to teach soldiers to kill.

Evidence

There’s no ambiguity about the general disdain for all that’s female in a military where words like “pussy,” “bitch,” “dyke,” and “girl” are common insults. During the war in Vietnam, Hynes notes, the military appears to have “deliberately infused” training with “misogynist language and imagery and phallic allusions to weapons … to build battlefield aggression and improve the rate of weapon use.” In many ways, little has changed. As Hynes points out, “when sexist epithets and misogynist chants are used in drill exercises, and when women are singled out and harassed by drill sergeants, it gives license to male recruits to do likewise, and it seasons the recruits and sets the culture for future military sexual harassment and assault.” — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 587 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

“Visualize the banana tree as the enemy, the rebels who killed your parents, your family, and those who are responsible for everything that has happened to you,” the corporal screamed. “Is that how you stab someone who had killed your family?” he asked. “This is how I would do it.” He took out his bayonet and started shouting and stabbing the banana tree. “I first stab him in the stomach, then the neck, then his heart, and I will cut it out, show it to him, and then pluck his eyes out. Remember, he probably killed your parents worse. Continue.” He wiped his knife with banana leaves. When he said this, we all got angry and drove our knives in and out of the banana trees until they fell to the ground. — Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ishmael Beah, A Long Way Gone- Memoirs of a Boy…, 445 (#exemplifies, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Misogynist training language is deliberately used to build battlefield aggression — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 587; Instructors induced fury in child soldiers by linking bayonet practice to murdered families — Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ishmael Beah, A Long Way Gone- Memoirs of a Boy…, 445

Related

• Misogynist training language is deliberately used to build battlefield aggression (similarity 0.90)
• Training soldiers to kill requires dehumanization that extends to women and ethnic others (similarity 0.85)
• Instructors induced fury in child soldiers by linking bayonet practice to murdered families (similarity 0.83)
• Sexually objectifying base entertainment links to epidemic of military sexual assault (similarity 0.82)

Broader Connections

• Misogynist training language is deliberately used to build battlefield aggression #corroborates (0.75) — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 587
• Instructors induced fury in child soldiers by linking bayonet practice to murdered families #exemplifies (0.60) — Farrar, Straus and Giroux Ishmael Beah, A Long Way Gone- Memoirs of a Boy…, 445