Marines want fat girls

| July 7, 2016

According to the Washington Post, the Marine Corps is planning on relaxing weight standards for female Marines, you know, so that everyone knows that standards aren’t changing in preparation for allowing women into combat specialties;

Female Marines will be allowed to weigh five to seven pounds more than before for each inch of their height, according to new guidelines published by the service. A 5-foot-6 woman, for example, was previously allowed to weigh up to 155 pounds, but can now be 161. A 5-foot-9 woman was allowed to be up to 169 pounds, but can now be 176.

The changes were among those outlined by the service’s top officer, Gen. Robert B. Neller, in a message released Friday. Neller also called for an overhaul of the service’s combat fitness and physical fitness tests, annual requirements that determine who is allowed to stay in the Marine Corps.

After living on MREs and messhall chow with no Physical Training for six months during Desert Storm, I weighed 165 pounds as a 5’8″ male infantryman and I wasn’t happy with myself. I can’t imagine being over 170 pounds and still being able to do my job. There was a lot of jiggling of stored energy (fat). I don’t understand how the Marines figure that more weight is a good thing especially since they’re not mentioning any changes to the Body Fat Index.

Maj. Gen. James W. Lukeman, the commanding general of Marine Corps Training and Education Command, said in a statement that the new testing plan raises the bar for physical fitness for all Marines.

“Marines today are stronger, faster and fitter than ever and these changes reflect that,” he said.

Yeah, fatter isn’t stronger.

Category: Marine Corps

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Silentium Est Aureum

Yeah, because 30 percent body fat (Navy standard) just isn’t enough.

And I thought 23 for the men was bad.

desert

What the ph-ck is going on? Who in hell is watching the store? What freak of nature is making the rules for the Marine Corp now? Those ignorant a.h.’s have been saying they want women in the Corps but they can’t past the physical agility tests, now they want to allow them to put on more fat? That going to help you IDIOTS?

Hack Stone

“Marines Want Fat Girls”. Extensive research was conducted at the Camp Pendleton Enlisted Club on a Friday night, and the Camp Pendleton Commissary the Saturday morning following payday. Will the Enlisted Club be bringing back Fat Chick Appreciation Night?

Stacy0311

I seem to recall Wednesday nights were “No Pride Night” at the various E Clubs.
And for some unknown reason, trannies liked the Del-Mar E Club.
Being the designated driver was more fun than getting hammered.
And now with Ash Carters latest edict, Del-Mar will probably be over run…..

Martinjmpr

They have those in Fayetteville, NC (AKA Fayette-Nam) too. Except it’s not on Wednesday nights. It’s like Sunday through Saturday. 😉

Why do you think Fayette-Nam’s unofficial motto is “where ugly girls can be choosy?”

Holden Magroin

Does the Sugar Shack in Fayetteville still have the dance floor that resembles a corral?

There was a reason for that.

Holden

Hack Stone

Unless they built a new E Club, I don’t think that Del Mar has a club anymore. Back in 1983-84, it was a pretty hopping place. It was petty cool to sit by the windows facing the ocean as you chugged a frosty draft beer just as the sun started dipping below the horizon. Cut to 1992, and it was like going through screening at the Beirut airport. You had to go through a metal detector to get in. They closed the main side club due to Gang activity, too.

Guard Bum

I served in Infantry in both the Marine Corps and Army and find the Army obsession with weight perplexing. In tje Corps we lifted weights to build body mass and ran long distance to build stamina and endurance, the Army was looking for skinny sprinters.

People confuse weight with fat but in todays environment having muscle mass is important and I think the Marine Corps is not going down some “fat” loving rabbit trail.

Hondo

Bingo. Muscle is considerably denser than fat. A person who’s 5’8″ and 170 lbs could be fat and out of shape – or could be lean as hell because they’re a gym rat and are virtually all muscle and bone. You can’t tell which by just looking at height/weight numbers.

A legitimate body fat standard would be better than height/weight. However, measuring that accurately w/o special equipment isn’t easy.

Silentium Est Aureum

Yeah, the old “rope and choke” wasn’t it. Pinch test maybe, but immersion test was/is about the only really accurate measure of body fat.

Guard Bum

As an interesting aside (at least to me), Gen Neller was my Series Commander when he was a 2ndLt in 1977 and I was in boot camp and later on in my career our paths crossed when he was a Major and I was a 1stLt. I can’t claim to know him well but be is definitely not an ass kisser and he seems to be a steadying influence during a time of strife with the civilian leadership at DoD.

The difficulty is indeed in measuring body fat. I am now a 56 year old Fire Fighter and still take a PFT for my job (along with a piss test, uniform inspections…can’t seem to get away from it!)and I still have a 19.5 ” neck with just one chin. Even with multiple injuries and after several surgeries I still lift weights and work out…but skinny I am not.

I never had a problem making tape but when I went in for a hydrostatic dunk as part of an overall fitness examination for my civilian job it showed I was several percentage points less body fat than the Army tape test which is not what I would have expected.

If we are stuck with women in combat arms, and no matter who is elected I can’t see that horse being let back in the barn, they need to completely change the physical fitness routine for female Soldiers and Marines, Strength training, endurance, and muscle mass is going to change weight standards no matter how much we wish GI Jane looked like Demi Moore.

PFM

They went to the tape test because it is easy to whip a tape measure out anytime, anywhere. Used to do calipers when I first came in the Army in 84, and water displacement is just too difficult to set up in a remote environment. Accuracy has little to do with it. I have also seen the 300 PT “I can run a mile in 4 minutes” sprinters falter badly when they have to carry 100 lbs. in heat and elevation. I always said it is easy when you are wearing a t-shirt and shorts with sneakers – now try it with a full load.

Green Thumb

Glad I am out.

Former EM1/SS

Who doesn’t?

Martinjmpr

They make the rockin’ world go ’round, or at least that’s what I’ve heard.

Manchu11B

I’m as worried about anyone else about the standards being dropped, but I’m not going to jump on that immediately in this case.

I can’t speak as much to the Marines, but I was an Infantryman in the Army and weighed around 215-220 at 5’11 when I was in. I was running low 11 minutes on my 2 miles and was generally one of a handful of ‘PT studs’ in the Company. Yet, after every PT test when I would clear 300 without any trouble, I’d have to stand in line to get taped. It was a colossal joke among everyone involved, and actually cost me an Air Assault school slot at one point due to admin losing track of my tape paperwork right at the deadline and my platoon being in the field where they couldn’t get one done in time.

I say all that to establish that the Army has a very outdated concept of what an acceptable bodyweight is for someone in the Combat Arms world. Maybe a little review of that and the application of some common sense isn’t the worst idea.

Besides, I know one of my major concerns about women being in the Combat Arms roles is the lack of strength necessary to do the job (you know, human physiology and all that inconvenient science about differences in gender), so giving them some extra room on the scale to put on muscle sounds like a good thing.

Also, joke was made above, but we didn’t need a press release to tell us that Marine Grunts like fat chicks, just as much as some of the Army Grunts I served with.

Kilo3/7

I am in fact, a connoisseur…. glad to see that the time honored tradition of rooting around with the barracks hogs is finally getting the recognition it deserves!

Ex-PH2

I’m sure that the Marine Corps means well, but as several have pointed out, there is a distinct difference between the SIZE of muscle mass and adipose tissue.

Unless I’m mistaken, the USMC may have had this group of ladies in mind. I’m sure they weigh more than the idiot insurance scale allows for their heights.

https://bustedcoverage.com/2014/09/18/33-hottest-female-bodybuilders/#!gallery-inline-embed-1711461-1713533-0

Guard Bum

Bless you Ex-PH2 for that link!

Ex-PH2

There’s another one, where the women have nice faces, but they look like men from the chin down. I thought that might scare you guys, so I didn’t include it.

just some feller

To paraphrase Guard Bum:

Bless you Ex-PH2 for NOT sharing THAT link!

flindip

I hope you realize PH2 that most of those fitness models are taking low doses of Anavar and male hormones in order to keep their muscle definition as they cut weight for show contests. Types of hormones that female marines generally don’t have access to. Women don’t put on muscle the same as men.

So, to get a women with decent strength ability(naturally) she is going to put on much higher levels of body fat which is going to kill her endurance. Men, alternatively, because they have higher levels of testosterone will be able to horde more muscle mass while also balancing endurance events.

Mens bodies are better at multitasking athletically then women.

A Proud Infidel®™

So the USMC is sayin’ THIS? *Diving into low crawl*

Martinjmpr

I’ll see your Queen and raise you one Spinal Tap:

CB Senior

This could be a two-fold initiative. Either make them fatter so the Infantry guys do not want to bang them non-stop, or they are going to not issue air mattresses and save money. There will be plenty of soft things to lay on in the field.

Martinjmpr

make them fatter so the Infantry guys do not want to bang them non-stop

Do I really need to explain what is wrong with this assumption? Or can I just assume you don’t know very many infantrymen? 😉

Stacy0311

Hey!
SNCOs need love to. Maybe this is the new Match.com for gunnies

CB Senior

That is why I included the caveat of non-stop. Hopefully some Combat and Training would take place.

Yes I have extensive interactions with the CPL mafia. Have had to push the Un-Fuck button on them more than once.

Grimmy

@Martinjmpr:

I take it you’ve forgotten how a CONUS 4 can become a deployed 10?

A Proud Infisel®™

Ahhh yes, “Deployment Goggles” are even worse than “Tequila Goggles”.

Grimmy

I think I read Martinjmpr 180 off intended.

Good thing I wasn’t a FAC.

Veritas Omnia Vincit

Who doesn’t love a little bit of cushion for pushin?

2/17 Air Cav

That’s what I was thinking. If the added weight is in the right places, this is good news.

Ex-PH2

You scum!

SFC D

And who wants to snuggle with a skinny girl when it’s cold?

Hondo

The WaPo article was written by someone who is either literacy or mathematically “challenged”.

If female Marines were actually authorized to weigh “five to seven pounds more than before for each inch of their height“, they’d be authorized to be morbidly obese. Literally.

Under the old standards, a 5′ 6″ female Marine was authorized to weigh 155lbs. 5′ 6” is 66 inches. If the USMC was actually authorizing an additional 5 to 7 lbs per inch of their height, that would mean that a 5′ 6″ female Marine would now be authorized to weigh at least 155 + (66 x 5) = 485 lbs. Um, I don’t think so.

It doesn’t surprise me that the WaPo screwed up the math. My experience is that many journalists are substantially worse at basic math and science than most 6th graders.

nousdefions

Cut them some slack. They spend their school days studying “hard” science, global warming…..

IDC SARC

“Marines Want Fat Girls”

Well, who doesn’t? Unfortunately, this is Fort Bragg, where the fat chicks can be choosy.

Dennis - not chevy

I spent 20 years always within 5 pounds of my maximum allowable weight. My last boss was a pencil-necked douche canoe who couldn’t lift his own petard. I was always getting counseled about my weight even though I never had any problems with fitness; my boss was on a mandated remedial physical fitness program.
Here it is 20 years later; the more things change, the more they stay the same.

AZtoVA

Full article in Marine Times indicates the change is to allow for muscle mass as women ‘beef up’ for combat arms and PT requirements for all MOS’s kick in. I believe the ladies will be doing pull-ups as well since the flex-arm hang is going away. Also there is a note that those that get 285 or higher are exempt from height/weight testing altogether.

Flagwaver

My best friend is a weight lifter and has a higher PT score than two-thirds of her unit. However, she’s also over weight because she is so muscular. She had an officer threaten her with a “fat discharge” with the paperwork all written out. Her command had to fight it because the officer didn’t even look at her BFI or PT score, only her weight.

Personally, if any service member can qualify in the top 10% of PT scores, that proves they can do their job.

Hack Stone

You may want to rethink that last part of your statement. My MOS was radio repair, and we had a few knuckleheads that a high PFT was their only redeeming quality. Couldn’t fix a radio, couldn’t dress themselves, and seemed to award themselves meritorious time off whenever it suited them.

Mick

Hack: I absolutely concur with you.

I knew several Marines during my Marine Corps career, both officer and enlisted and on both the ground and Air Wing sides, who could max the USMC PFT every single time they ran it, yet they couldn’t have thought (or fought) their way out of a piss-soaked paper bag if their lives had depended on it. They may have been “PT Studs”, but they were weak-minded and weak leaders, and overall poor performers as Marines. Yet somehow they always managed to be retained/promoted, mostly because their Reporting Seniors and Reviewing Officers would use the tired old Marine Corps excuse of “but he runs a 300 PFT” to justify overlooking the significant shortcomings of those Marines.

It goes without saying that maintaining a high level of physical fitness must be required of every Marine, and it is always important regardless of MOS, but it is never enough on its own. As you correctly observe in your comment, it is only one attribute out of many that define a successful Marine.

radar

Yup. Knew a few complete idiots when I was an active duty Marine who were promoted far beyond their level of competence because they had 280+ PFTs and looked great in a uniform.

Green Thumb

Or is a drunk, thief and wife beater.

But, hey, he’s got a 300 so he is a good dude.

Sparks

I guess BAM is going to take on a whole new meaning.

Kevin

Grunt say fat wookies nice

HMC Ret

‘Fat Girls, Fat Girls, whatcha gonna do, watcha gonna do when the Grunts come for you?’

Nucsnipe

So will they be changing the Marine anthem from “Halls of Montezuma ” to “I like big butts” by Sir Mixalot?

MrFace

I was thinking more like Bremelo by Sir Mix-a-lot.

Hondo

FWIW: I’m pretty sure the song’s title is “Baby Got Back”. (smile)

Possibly NSFW in uber-prudish work environments.

jarhead

This will probably piss off a few with an axe to grind, but I’m too damned old to care these days. So who’s in charge these days? Not the old Corps that knew pride in every uniform. Nope, it’s gotta be those who want to see attractive white blonde women with kiddies hangin’ on, but pimp daddy nowhere to be found. This is another Stevie Wonder coulda seen this coming.

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ubik

We will lose the next war.
Thanks, Obama!

flindip

Also, how much muscle mass does DOD believe women are going to put on? 20lbs of lean muscle? Hilarious. If a women busts her ass without using growth hormone, steroids etc: She may put on, at most(with great genetics)2-5lbs of lean muscle in a year: the rest is going to be fat.

Its hard enough for men to put on real significant muscle mass. Its doubly harder for a female.