- When you have men and women together in combat, I think men have emotions when you see a woman in harm’s way. I think it’s something that’s natural that’s very much in our culture to be protective. That was my concern, and I think that’s a concern with all the military.
- GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum • Suggesting, to TODAY’s Ann Curry, that women should not serve on the front lines of military combat. He was careful to qualify his statement, saying that he didn’t believe women themselves were incapable of such combat, but that men in the unit would feel protective and be distracted from their mission by female comrades being “injured” or “vulnerable.” Of course, even if his opinion were true, it begs the question; how is that a problem that women should pay for? What he’s claiming sounds less like women being unfit to serve in combat than male soldiers eschewing their duty for some vision of a “damsel-in-distress” story playing out during a firefight. This is classic, culture-war Santorum. source