Sharp Within The Army Against Sexual Misconduct

According to the Army Regulation 600-20 “Sexual harassment is a form of gender discrimination that involves unwelcomed sexual advances, request for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature between the same or opposite genders”. The purpose of this essay will be to discuss issues associated with the Army’s Sexual Harassment/Assault Response and Prevention Program (SHARP). Also explain some different approaches to finishing the war against sexual violence in the US. Army.

“Not in my Army” is a motto the Army as dedicated to bring awareness to sexual harassment and assault. It is part of a program that was designed for Soldiers that may have been assaulted sexually or for someone that has witnesses a sexual assault to provide a process to report those incidents. In FY18, the Military Services received 7,623 reports of sexual assault involving Service members as either victims or subjects, approximately a 13 percent increase from reports made in FY17. (DOD, n.d).

Despite all the training the Army has provided the sexual assault and harassment cases have continued to raise throughout the years. I believe this is the case because individuals have a lack of understatement of the policies. As a senior noncommissioned officer I’ve noticed that majority of cases come from lower enlisted personnel (E-4 and below) and the proposed accusers are senior to those individuals. “Perpetrators have a strong sense of entitlement and use power and control to commit acts of sexual violence. Most perpetrators adhere to rigid “traditional” gender roles that focus on the inequality of women”. (Rutgers, 2003). Most of the Soldiers are sexual active and extremely young which makes them vulnerable to older personnel. The new Soldiers coming are not familiarized with the programs the Army has to provide and are scared of repercussion of reporting the incidents.

According to Deschamps (2015), minority of the females in the military were out of proportion and the ratio from men to female was a high risk. And it was the one of the reason the sexual harassment cases were on the raise in the military. I think personally think there should be more females in the some of the positions so some of the lower enlisted and officers are able to talk to and discuss what happen. There is a get deal of individuals who believe if they file a report that it will be laughed at and not take seriously. Or the individual would experience being be look upon as a snitch, ostracized, humiliation or the one who one wanted to be around in the unit.

The current training we receive I believe is failing the younger Soldiers on how to inform them of the appropriate conduct or how to inculcate the ethical culture in the military workplace. The training we receive now lacks credibility causing the personnel to not take sexual assault seriously. The training units receive now is been bestowed as “death by power-point” or some variation of on-line training. This type of training should perform or taught by a civilian professional in smaller groups. It enables the trainer the ability to interact with and get more hands training with the Soldiers. Compared to one Staff Sergeant or Sergeant First Class trying to teach a room with a 1:50+ ratio. All senior non-commissioned officers in leadership roles and all commissioned officers should take bi-annually training on their responsibilities under their policies.

In summary, over the years the raise of sexual assault and sexual harassment have increase. Sexual assault have no place in the Army or in the military in general. In most cases its just personnel too young and too nervous to fill a complaint. Every unit should strongly support their commander’s policies on sexual harassment. Integration senior women into positions could assist in the reform of confidence to younger soldiers. Halting inappropriate sexual acts will not be an easy task to achieve but it can be reduced to make a better unit and rebuilding trust in the chain of command.