Penetration and dominance define the idealized military masculinity groomed on bases
Evidence
The prevalence of these various forms of abuse suggests how central penetration—with all its complex connotations of dominance—is to the military, and thus part of the unseen world of life on base. On bases throughout the world, penetration and dominance are central to an ideal form of military masculinity, one that’s prized and actively groomed among troops. — David Vine, Base Nation_ How U.S. Military Bases…, 582
Categorization
Category: Causal Relationships
- DEEPTHINKING: A dense, uncomfortable analysis tying sexual abuse to the structural ideal of military masculinity itself — worth sitting with.
Related
- Military bases foster the specific conditions that enable rape across human societies (similarity 0.85)
- Military environments structurally enable sexual assault regardless of recruits’ innate nature (similarity 0.83)
- Military prostitution trains soldiers in a militarized masculinity marked by violence and superiority. (similarity 0.81)
- Camptown sexual exploitation normalized in training drives later military sexual violence (similarity 0.80)
- Military leaders feared sex because relationships could compete with their monopoly on troops’ loyalty (similarity 0.79)
- Sexually objectifying base entertainment links to epidemic of military sexual assault (similarity 0.79)
- Soldiers’ sexual exploitation of local women is socially constructed, not natural male behavior. (similarity 0.79)
- Environmental conditions, not innate nature, make rape likely in the military. (similarity 0.79)
- Military tolerance of prostitution is limited by its threat to troop loyalty (similarity 0.79)
- In absolute numbers, more men than women are sexually victimized in the military. (similarity 0.78)