One man's View

smitethepatriarchy:

prokopetz:

It always gets me when MRAs bring up the draft as an example of discrimination against men. Yes, it’s true that no woman in America has ever been subject to conscription in times of war; however, being that the most recent draft was in 1973, most likely neither have you. If you get to drag up stuff that happened before you were born, so does everybody else - and I’m pretty sure the ladies are going to win that particular game of misery poker.

BAM.

BAM nothing. This so wildly ignorant and inaccurate it’s almost like parody. The entire argument is misrepresented, and you are clearly know nothing of repercussions it has on males today.

It’s not about what happened then, it’s about what is going on now. A minor clarification on the point however. There draft hasn’t been actively used since then, it’s still here and with us to this day.

The Selective Service System is “The Draft”. It is alive and well. It’s currently sits idle absorbing the names of all men in the U.S. between the ages of 18 and 25 inclusive. It can be activated by congress if they see fit. It’s in the MSSA, most recently amended in 2003.

It’s a real thing that hangs over the head of every man in the U.S. But that’s not the entirety of the point.

Legal prosecution for not signing up is rare, there have been about two people charged for not signing up since 1980, and only because they were making a huge public stink about not signing up. So hey, no big deal right? Just don’t register and keep your mouth shut, all clear yeah? Not at all.

Because now we have incentive laws, created to increase the ratio of men complying with the law. What do they do? They make men second class citizens without full rights and privileges until they comply.

Any male in the U.S. who has not registered cannot get federal student loans, scholarships, or grants. They will not be qualified for student work programs or federal employment. No stretching of truth, no ambiguity. Look what it says on the letter you get as proof of registration.

I didn’t get to states yet, but there it is in black and white from the U.S. government, your rights to these things are dependent on registering for the draft. There are laws linking your driver’s license to registering for the SSS(remember that IS the draft) in 44 states and territories. Most you cannot renew your license at 18 without registering, some automatically register you when you renew at 18, and very very few of them have a law requiring a check box to register be included on the form to renew.

But the License thing isn’t the only part. Many states have followed suit and you are barred student loans, grants, scholarships, everything mentioned at the federal level, except now at the state level as well. Hell a couple of states will flat out bar you from even attending a state funded school if you aren’t registered.

You want to go deeper? Ok. What happens if you somehow make it to your 26th birthday without ever registering? Do you now get access? Nope. Not even a little.In fact you are now permanently locked out of all of it, the rest of your life. Which can be a fun thing for immigrants seeking citizenship. If they are over 26, they then have to prove they weren’t trying to become citizens before their 26th birthday. Otherwise permanently barred from citizenship.

The real fun one, actually the saddest in my opinion. Sad because many won’t know, and the only people talking about it usually are MRAs. How this affects transmen. Even though they will likely never qualify to actually go into service as men, once they change their gender to male legally, they are bound by the same laws. They can lose loans, scholarships, be kicked out of schools, even have their license revoked. If they are over 26 they have a hard fight ahead of them, they have to prove they weren’t required to sign up for the SSS.

TL;DR If you are a male in the U.S. and you do not sacrifice ownership of your life to the government, you will be a second class citizen with fewer rights than the men who did, and women who don’t have to. It is real discrimination against men. It is not some far flung thing in the past. It is happening today.