#6 Time Magazine Article from 1972

As I read through this Time article from Nov. 1972, I started to question the pros and the cons of equality in the military/Navy. I have mixed feelings about the armed forces of America. On one hand they provide jobs for people so that individuals can take care of their families and retire at a young age, the military provides opportunities to travel all over the world and meet folks of all types of backgrounds. Obviously the armed forces protect us from our “enemies.” In order to better understand our enemies we should look at our actions, and how what we’ve done, affected others. On the other hand, the military forces are trained and ordered to kill others. Many times, those so-called “others” are people of color, various hues/shades of brown. Does anyone really know why we are at war? If it is a personal beef between our president and theirs, it should be dealt with in the front yard through fist fight or even a tea and crumpet session.

This article highlighted Chief of Naval Operations Elmo Zumwalt and his attempt to change certain aspects of the United States Navy. Not much is actually different today, some 36 years later, but he set out to revamp some of the practices. “Charging "calculated racism," 120 black members of the crew—joined by twelve whites—staged a sitdown at sea.” This sitdown came after repeated requests to inform Captain J.D. Ward, of the Kitty Hawk, what was going on with the crew members on the ship. Captain Ward refused all requests which trickled down into a violent out break.

Radarman Third Class Lonnie Brown, talked about the menial jobs that the black seamen were continuously relegated to as well as the unequal punishment for equal offenses. The article also spoke on the grading system that is used to track each sailor’s quality of work, which was also scored unequally. Kind of sounds like the way in which the Navy is ran reflects the rest of society, second class citizens in a first class world.