Army charges mom for refusing to leave infant

Originally posted by rogerstigers
It's hard to follow the timeline here and there are so many facts that are not included in the article, such as when she got pregnant, where the father is, etc.

It also doesn't say what the child care alternatives are that were offered, does she have any other family, or why plans with her mother "fell through".

It is a little light on info.

My opinion based on the facts that I am seeing is that she didn't have a child so that she wouldn't get deployed. In fact, she seemed perfectly ok to leave the child with family while she deployed. Her family is not well and that caused the problem. So the army leaves her with the choice of leaving the child with strangers? Sorry, but that's a bad solution for the problem.

Not always. There are many churches and other military families that help out military members, especially low-level enlisted.

I mean, she would be leaving a child in it's formative years with strangers that the child may not ever see again. That's very close to abandonment and can be traumatic on the child. The army wants to trade the child's life long mental well being for 12 months of culinary support? That sounds ridiculous.

I think "traumatic" might be a little strong. There are many good people that could take good care of a child for free, and more that would do it if they were compensated for the cost.

What's worse, if the mom is sent to prison, now it is 2 years of the kid in foster care. The military has simply expounded that problem.

Yes, this doesn't make things better, and they do typically try to help as best as possible.

They don't, however, have a lot of sympathy when their efforts are refused from my experience.

Her family plan should have started with birth control. She knew exactly what she was signing on for when she took the oath: regardless of her branch and MOS, she could be called on to deploy overseas. The vast majority of personnel in the military understand that this is not harsh or callous, this is simply the attitude that is required; personal wants and desires must be set aside; the individual must keep themselves to a higher standard. She was obviously "that one" that every platoon has, unable to conform and unable to do her job and support her comrades-in-arms when it mattered, failing her duty and failing her oath. It wouldn't have been hard to take a little responsibility and use birth control and make whoever she's banging wear a condom. That would have indicated a degree of responsibility and awareness of her duty and completely averted this whole mess.

reply to post by Griever0311


Hi Griever
Just wanted to say I really like your highly relevant signature

thx for adding that proverb to this thread
starred for that sig

Originally posted by sadchild01
disgusting , when i thought i saw the last of worse threads about truth on US military , there comes an another thread , USA is getting worse and worse day by day .

usa is becoming worser than ussr . usa is a epitome of evil

[edit on 15-1-2010 by sadchild01]

I think a quick history of the gulags and the millions of dead in the Ukranian holocaust should make you have a think about your relativism

What a mess. How is it that the private sector and other militaries can figure this out?

Old men with old ideas. Punishing people for being fertile.

Maybe the army should pay for abortions. On the tax payer dime of course. Perhaps they should even insist on it.

.......no problems will come because of that.

Other militaries and the private sector can figure out this conundrum. Am I to believe tha the US armby is too dumb to do so?

MA, if there was a draft I would say you have a point. But this woman SIGNED ON with the Army voluntarily. VOLUNTARILY. No one forced her to do it, just as no one forced her to become pregnant.

IMO she showed incredibly bad judgment by not using birth control and then expecting leniency from the military. She's guilty of dereliction of duty, no matter which way you look at it.

Take your emotions out of the equation and the answer is clear.

reply to post by ModernAcademia


Just drop the whole Nazi thing will you, it really does not apply here. For a start they did not accept women into the military. Secondly they supported pregnancy and even single mothers as long they were pumping out babies they didn't care about the circumstances. Rather the opposite of what we are seeing here wouldn't you agree. This about fulfilling a contract that she voluntarily signed, this is no dictatorship or slavery.

-Cauch1

I have never been a fan of women seeing active duty and being
deployed. Just doesn't set right with me. But . . times change.

Women are there . . because they choose to be. Unfortunately,
if one chooses a military life then one is bound by military
requirements.

I don't think young people should be put in harm's way at all.
Let all the old codgers from different countries have at it. Maybe
their maturity would put them at the campfire, sitting across from
their would-be enemies and sipping a spot-of-tea, BS'ing about
the by-gone days. Maybe a little lawn bowling . . to determine
a winner.

I am certainly not unsympathetic. But when you sign on the line that is dotted read the fine print.

I understand everyone's point
It was her decision and for that they kid is who will suffer.

reply to post by ModernAcademia

this was her ticket to rock-solid stability

Rock-solid stability that comes with a price. She wanted the benefits but didn't want the price that comes with them.

You talk about slavery as if slavery isn't about depending on others for your existence. She wanted this job in order to get out of slavery, i.e. so she could afford to have a family in the first place. She was bound to be a slave before she join the military. Her joining took her OUT OF slavery. Yet, she wants these benefits without having to pay for them. THAT is slavery mentality.

I agree with you that we should END THE SLAVE MENTALITY. But this woman is exhibiting very strong slave mentality in expecting to reap what she has not sown.

I am so sick of all these dip#s that VOLUNTARILY enlist and then decide they don't want to do this or serve there. When you sign that line you put yourself at the mercy of the high command. You go where they tell you to go, you do what they tell you to do ... if you don't like it then don't sign that line in the first place. If you sign that line then STFU and do what your told, nobody has forced anyone to sign that line since 1973.

I volunteer for the firing squad. Where to I sign up?

reply to post by ModernAcademia


I agree.

At the risk of sounding callous, I must agree also with those who posted that she enlisted and signed on the dotted line, so she must follow the terms of the contract. Since she enlisted from high-school, I'm quite sure that there was some kind of incentive to pay for college etc. A great deal of money was spent on her training and education by the military (even as a cook, you have other training). It wasn't her commanding officer's decision that she get pregnant, and he/she is simply following directives - as she should. If she wants to leave the military, she should be compelled to reimburse the military for their losses.

You don't join the military for your own gain, you do it for the benefit of the country. You serve your nation. If you have any personal growth from it, that's a bonus.

It's a shame that the kid is the one who will suffer most, but it was the mother that is responsible. Sure the commander/s should be more sympathetic to individual cases, but there was a lot of noise made by previous generations to have women treated with the same as the men - especially in the subject of deployment. This kind of thing puts back the cause by decades.

As a parent I do understand her plight, but at the same time I must question how she is treating her commitment to her country. It's a volunteer army, not a draft. She volunteered and was aware of the rules at the time she enlisted.

reply to post by ModernAcademia

What the hell is she supposed to know?
She was fresh out of high school, do you know how stupid people are fresh out of high school in America?

This seems like a case where everybody is wrong! She was supposed to not get pregnant out of wedlock while actively serving in the military. That would have been the first smart move.......but, I can definitely side with her on the current issue. No way I leave my baby with someone too overwhelmed to take care of it, or take a chance on foster care. The military needs to discharge her. A single mother makes a bad soldier!

In the future, there should be some penalty for becoming a single mother while serving. There should be an equal penalty for fathering a child out of wedlock while serving. The military needs to be proactive and fix this issue before it comes down to ship out time and you forgot to get a babysitter for the year!!

reply to post by blueorder

thread derailer
off topic
from the propaganda of the hearst press , yes on the gulag issue i will partially agree that hundreds of thousands died, but the 'holodomer' its a fake anyways and i am not interested in the right wing that Rummel and others in west tried to show to it in the black book of communism .
refer Canadian journalist Douglas Tottle, author of Fraud, Famine and Fascism: The Ukrainian Genocide Myth from Hitler to Harvard
www.amazon.com...=cm_cr_dp_all_helpful?ie=UTF8&coliid=&showViewpoints=1&col id=&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending
back on topic , keep those comments for other threads related to holodomer
threads
------
Whats happening reminds me starkingly of USSR ,modernacademia , an ultra paranoid govt spying on its citizens , arresting and jailing its soldiers for being weak ,not obeying orders,massive military build up etc etc.

[edit on 15-1-2010 by sadchild01]

reply to post by ModernAcademia



Have I got this right she was issued orders for a war zone and now refuses to go?

If that is correct then we are talking about wartime desertion action.

Firing Squad is an acceptable punishment for Deserters in wartime in fact all through time from the War between the States to Viet Nam we have dealt with deserter this way! Seems like one runs off then they all want to go and then no frontlines.....

Solution? Just need 7 volunteers, a stake in the ground, a blind fold, one smoke if she requests it and of course 7 rifles with one shot in each. Oh yes volunteering is how this soldier arrived in her current situation.

Shoot mother -> child in care.... There are many loving couples on lists for adoption!

Otherwise allow every soldier either male or female who no longer wishes to be in a war zone just stand up, run up the ramp to the plane seat and fly back home with an in flight move of say "Black Hawk Down"!

The best story I have heard yet was a con person wanting all the GI benes the service has to offer and never once thought he would get orders for Iraq. When war zone orders were issued he realize that he lost the order lottery and then he file a lawsuit aganist the army under humans rights act. It seem it would be inhumane to send this solder to the war zone which may threaten his life thus violating his human right to live...

Need any voluteers on the firing squad?

Sorry, for me it is late 0321 and I am on very high dosage of pain pills and now the sleeping tablets as my Viet Nam era wounds have come back to haunt me as an older man now, body heals open wound then but today the joints and broken bits now healed become very painful and stiff when older. Chairs are a chore now and cannot believe the running I did in Jump School. So because of the drugs I may have the wrong end of the stick on this story. If that is the case then please set me straight and disregard my posting. I was waiting for an email from my family in the States who been in an accident and I thought I would loose some time by seeing what headline are up with ATS when this headline jumped out at me.

I hate deserters. When I was medivac back to the States to recover before returning I had the pleasure going in Victoria BC only to be shamed by our deserters begging all of the American tourest for their dinner and rent money (and drug money). Now I was in uniform so you can imagine that exchange of wisdom back and forth. I was so embarrassed as I had my parents with me as they live just on the otherside of Victoria which is only a boat ride across. Also I was embarrassed as the Canadians had these people preying on the tourest which supports their tourist business to deal with and the mess they make in such a pretty city which prides themselves as being more English than the English!

Got my email - sent flowers, better go to bed before I fall on this keyboard.

Please someone set me straight on this story is she a deserter or not and if not why.

Thank you as he stumbles off his soapbox.

You see it simple if you look at this correctly, someone, who in the lottery of orders, received their non war zone orders, who, is now going to have to take the place of someone who did not like her lottery ticket winnings. That always really seems unfair to me. This especially bad if the subsitute soldier ends up as a KIA!

If we don't shoot deserters then what do we do when nobody wants to accepts their orders for a war arena? How do we justify to the families of past cowards being shot for desertion? If you look through history there are a few of these shootings. Some people join quick for those education benes VA Hospital plan, home loans and it looks very good on a CV for future job prospects but never expect orders for a war zone which of course was not in their game plan.

Please someone correct me if I am wrong.

Originally posted by rogerstigers
It's hard to follow the timeline here and there are so many facts that are not included in the article, such as when she got pregnant, where the father is, etc.

My opinion based on the facts that I am seeing is that she didn't have a child so that she wouldn't get deployed. In fact, she seemed perfectly ok to leave the child with family while she deployed. Her family is not well and that caused the problem. So the army leaves her with the choice of leaving the child with strangers? Sorry, but that's a bad solution for the problem.

I mean, she would be leaving a child in it's formative years with strangers that the child may not ever see again. That's very close to abandonment and can be traumatic on the child. The army wants to trade the child's life long mental well being for 12 months of culinary support? That sounds rediculous.

What's worse, if the mom is sent to prison, now it is 2 years of the kid in foster care. The military has simply expounded that problem.

Yes, and then the child won't know his own mother when she gets out. That will be traumatic on the child as well.

"The command set up alternative child care options for her," he said. "Some organizations came forward, including a well-known veterans group, and offered to take care of the child. Command passed that on to Spc. Hutchinson, and she said no."

How many mothers could leave their baby with strangers for years at a time?? Had she done so, she'd be distracted, wondering and worrying about her baby.

www.abovetopsecret.com...

This is the thread from when this story first came out.

Originally posted by marg6043
She should have waited to finish her military commitment before becoming pregnant and wanting to be a full time mommy.

Sorry but it was her choice to have a child not the military choice.

How do you know she chose to get pregnant?? She might've had contraception failure and just been opposed to abortion.

Originally posted by KrazyJethro

Originally posted by rogerstigers
It's hard to follow the timeline here and there are so many facts that are not included in the article, such as when she got pregnant, where the father is, etc.

It also doesn't say what the child care alternatives are that were offered, does she have any other family, or why plans with her mother "fell through".

It is a little light on info.

My opinion based on the facts that I am seeing is that she didn't have a child so that she wouldn't get deployed. In fact, she seemed perfectly ok to leave the child with family while she deployed. Her family is not well and that caused the problem. So the army leaves her with the choice of leaving the child with strangers? Sorry, but that's a bad solution for the problem.

Not always. There are many churches and other military families that help out military members, especially low-level enlisted.

I mean, she would be leaving a child in it's formative years with strangers that the child may not ever see again. That's very close to abandonment and can be traumatic on the child. The army wants to trade the child's life long mental well being for 12 months of culinary support? That sounds ridiculous.

I think "traumatic" might be a little strong. There are many good people that could take good care of a child for free, and more that would do it if they were compensated for the cost.

What's worse, if the mom is sent to prison, now it is 2 years of the kid in foster care. The military has simply expounded that problem.

Yes, this doesn't make things better, and they do typically try to help as best as possible.

They don't, however, have a lot of sympathy when their efforts are refused from my experience.

news.aol.com...

Spc. Alexis Hutchinson, 21, said she had no choice but to refuse deployment orders because the only family she had to care for her 10-month-old son -- her mother -- was overwhelmed by the task, already caring for three other relatives with health problems.
Her civilian attorney, Rai Sue Sussman, said Monday that one of Hutchinson's superiors told her she would have to deploy anyway and place the child in foster care.
"For her it was like, 'I couldn't abandon my child,'" Sussman said. "She was really afraid of what would happen, that if she showed up they would send her to Afghanistan anyway and put her son with child protective services."

There was a family crisis which prevented her mother from taking the task as planned.

Why would any mother want to leave her child(ren) with strangers that she never even met for years?

Originally posted by Griever0311
Her family plan should have started with birth control. She knew exactly what she was signing on for when she took the oath: regardless of her branch and MOS, she could be called on to deploy overseas. The vast majority of personnel in the military understand that this is not harsh or callous, this is simply the attitude that is required; personal wants and desires must be set aside; the individual must keep themselves to a higher standard. She was obviously "that one" that every platoon has, unable to conform and unable to do her job and support her comrades-in-arms when it mattered, failing her duty and failing her oath. It wouldn't have been hard to take a little responsibility and use birth control and make whoever she's banging wear a condom. That would have indicated a degree of responsibility and awareness of her duty and completely averted this whole mess.

You are assuming she didn't. What if the birth control failed?? Condoms break. Not everyone wants to abort their babies.