A cadet quitting West Point less than six months before graduation says he could no longer be part of a culture that promotes prayers and religious activities and disrespects nonreligious cadets.
Blake Page announced his decision to quit the U.S. Military Academy this week in a much-discussed online post that echoed the sentiments of soldiers and airmen at other military installations. The 24-year-old told The Associated Press that a determination this semester that he could not become an officer because of clinical depression played a role in his public protest against what he calls the unconstitutional prevalence of religion in the military.
"I've been trying since I found that out: What can I do? What can I possibly do to initiate the change that I want to see and so many other people want to see?" Page said. "I realized that this is one way I can make that change happen."
Page criticized a culture where cadets stand silently for prayers, where nonreligious cadets were jokingly called "heathens" by instructors at basic training and where one officer told him he'd never be a leader until he filled the hole in his heart. In announcing his resignation this week on The Huffington Post, he denounced "criminals" in the military who violate the oaths they swore to defend the Constitution.
"I don't want to be a part of West Point knowing that the leadership here is OK with just shrugging off and shirking off respect and good order and discipline and obeying the law and defending the Constitution and doing their job," he told the AP.
West Point officials on Wednesday disputed those assertions. Spokeswoman Theresa Brinkerhoff said prayer is voluntary at events where invocations and benedictions are conducted and noted the academy has a Secular Student Alliance club, where Page served as president.
Maj. Nicholas Utzig, the faculty adviser to the secular club, said he doesn't doubt some of the moments Page described, but he doesn't believe there is systematic discrimination against nonreligious cadets.
"I think it represents his own personal experience and perhaps it might not be as universal as he suggests," said Utzig, who teaches English literature.
One of Page's secularist classmates went further, calling his characterization of West Point unfair.
"I think it's true that the majority of West Point cadets are of a very conservative, Christian orientation," said senior cadet Andrew Houchin. "I don't think that's unique to West Point. But more broadly, I've never had that even be a problem with those of us who are secular."
There have been complaints over the years that the wall between church and state is not always observed in the military. The Air Force Academy in Colorado in particular has been scrutinized for years over allegations from non-Christian students that they faced intolerance. A retired four-star general was asked last year to conduct an independent review of the overall religious climate at the academy.
There also has been a growing willingness in recent years by some service members to publicly identify themselves as atheists, agnostics or humanists and to seek the same recognition granted to Christians, Jews and other believers. Earlier this year, there was an event at Fort Bragg that was the first known event in U.S. military history to cater to nonbelievers.
Page said he hears about the plight of other nonreligious cadets in part through his involvement with the West Point affiliate of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. The founder and president of that advocacy group said Page's action is a milestone in the fight against "fanatical religiosity" in the military.
"This is an extraordinary act of courage that I do compare directly to what Rosa Parks did," said Mikey Weinstein.
Page, who is from Stockbridge, Ga., and who was accepted into West Point after serving in the Army, said he was notified Tuesday of his honorable discharge. He faces no military commitment and will not have to reimburse the cost of his education.
West Point confirmed that it approved his resignation and that Page had been meeting the academic standards and was not undergoing any disciplinary actions. Page said he had been medically disqualified this semester from receiving a commission in the Army as a second lieutenant — like his classmates will receive in May — because of clinical depression and anxiety. He said his condition has gotten worse since his father killed himself last year.
It's not unusual for cadets to drop out of West Point, an institution known for its rigorous academic and physical demands. But the window for dropping out without the potential for a penalty is in the first two years. Dropouts are rare after that point.
Page expects to leave for his grandparents' home in Wright County, Minn., in the coming days. He plans to remain an activist on the role of religion in the military.
"I'd really love to be able to do this for the rest of my life," he said.
source
NHF Westpoint trying to dispute his claims by bringing up his father's death. He's not lying. As a spouse of someone in the military, I have been discriminated against. I know my husband gets it worse at work. He recently had a briefing about Jedism, they always recite prayers, etc.
Blake Page announced his decision to quit the U.S. Military Academy this week in a much-discussed online post that echoed the sentiments of soldiers and airmen at other military installations. The 24-year-old told The Associated Press that a determination this semester that he could not become an officer because of clinical depression played a role in his public protest against what he calls the unconstitutional prevalence of religion in the military.
"I've been trying since I found that out: What can I do? What can I possibly do to initiate the change that I want to see and so many other people want to see?" Page said. "I realized that this is one way I can make that change happen."
Page criticized a culture where cadets stand silently for prayers, where nonreligious cadets were jokingly called "heathens" by instructors at basic training and where one officer told him he'd never be a leader until he filled the hole in his heart. In announcing his resignation this week on The Huffington Post, he denounced "criminals" in the military who violate the oaths they swore to defend the Constitution.
"I don't want to be a part of West Point knowing that the leadership here is OK with just shrugging off and shirking off respect and good order and discipline and obeying the law and defending the Constitution and doing their job," he told the AP.
West Point officials on Wednesday disputed those assertions. Spokeswoman Theresa Brinkerhoff said prayer is voluntary at events where invocations and benedictions are conducted and noted the academy has a Secular Student Alliance club, where Page served as president.
Maj. Nicholas Utzig, the faculty adviser to the secular club, said he doesn't doubt some of the moments Page described, but he doesn't believe there is systematic discrimination against nonreligious cadets.
"I think it represents his own personal experience and perhaps it might not be as universal as he suggests," said Utzig, who teaches English literature.
One of Page's secularist classmates went further, calling his characterization of West Point unfair.
"I think it's true that the majority of West Point cadets are of a very conservative, Christian orientation," said senior cadet Andrew Houchin. "I don't think that's unique to West Point. But more broadly, I've never had that even be a problem with those of us who are secular."
There have been complaints over the years that the wall between church and state is not always observed in the military. The Air Force Academy in Colorado in particular has been scrutinized for years over allegations from non-Christian students that they faced intolerance. A retired four-star general was asked last year to conduct an independent review of the overall religious climate at the academy.
There also has been a growing willingness in recent years by some service members to publicly identify themselves as atheists, agnostics or humanists and to seek the same recognition granted to Christians, Jews and other believers. Earlier this year, there was an event at Fort Bragg that was the first known event in U.S. military history to cater to nonbelievers.
Page said he hears about the plight of other nonreligious cadets in part through his involvement with the West Point affiliate of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. The founder and president of that advocacy group said Page's action is a milestone in the fight against "fanatical religiosity" in the military.
"This is an extraordinary act of courage that I do compare directly to what Rosa Parks did," said Mikey Weinstein.
Page, who is from Stockbridge, Ga., and who was accepted into West Point after serving in the Army, said he was notified Tuesday of his honorable discharge. He faces no military commitment and will not have to reimburse the cost of his education.
West Point confirmed that it approved his resignation and that Page had been meeting the academic standards and was not undergoing any disciplinary actions. Page said he had been medically disqualified this semester from receiving a commission in the Army as a second lieutenant — like his classmates will receive in May — because of clinical depression and anxiety. He said his condition has gotten worse since his father killed himself last year.
It's not unusual for cadets to drop out of West Point, an institution known for its rigorous academic and physical demands. But the window for dropping out without the potential for a penalty is in the first two years. Dropouts are rare after that point.
Page expects to leave for his grandparents' home in Wright County, Minn., in the coming days. He plans to remain an activist on the role of religion in the military.
"I'd really love to be able to do this for the rest of my life," he said.
source
NHF Westpoint trying to dispute his claims by bringing up his father's death. He's not lying. As a spouse of someone in the military, I have been discriminated against. I know my husband gets it worse at work. He recently had a briefing about Jedism, they always recite prayers, etc.
I think the Rosa Parks comparison may also be hurting his cause since people already tend to think of historical civil rights battles as being about people who were standing up to blatantly discriminatory laws so when their isn't a law that someone is fighting or the discrimination is confined (or seems to be confined) to a small area like Westpoint they're more likely to think that the person is overreacting.
Yeah, I personally would lol if someone called me a "heathen" (as long as they were actually doing it jokingly, like the article said - otherwise I would rme).
I know a lot of military men that were/are atheist, agnostic, Wiccan - and the flack and discrimination they recieved is appalling. You wanna be religious? Fine. But there is a reason there is a separation between Church and State and West Point defines it.
Edited at 2012-12-06 08:50 pm (UTC)
It's so annoying when an article has all the points you'd love people to discuss, written well, but then has two lines which would be so easy to derail into something entirely different in discussion.
i mean i swear ive noticed a drop in the number of comments by PoC (or those I can remember is a PoC)
Edited at 2012-12-06 09:51 pm (UTC)
The problem in associating a discussion about a badly made comparison to the civil rights movement to derailing is a poor choice of words given the demographics of this community. It might seem unimportant to you given the relative content of the piece in question but for a lot of PoC, it matters because their experiences are routinely trivialised, dismissed and considered unimportant, so you (likely unwittingly) have contributed to that dismissive attitude white people have.
Secondly, you simply can't control a discussion on the internet and force people to talk about certain things. That's just the nature of the beast. If it has problematic elements they DESERVE discussion as much as the next thing, but assuming that nobody here can both criticise the piece as a whole AND point out the issue with the comparison at the same time can be read as fairly insulting, especially, again, to the intelligence of the community.
tl;dr It's not derailment to discuss things that matter to a person and it's not for you to decide or declare what is or isn't important to them. It might be two lines to you but the context of those lines and the throwaway use of them is a commentary in of itself as to how white people consistently co-opt and minimise the experiences of oppressed minorities to highlight their own agendas.
This is the religion of being a Jedi? What would a briefing about it be like?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jediis
But it was about how making jokes about it isn't cool and they need to respect jediism or something. But it mainly turned into a discussion about why they don't do briefings on other religions or lack of but did one on this.
I'm sure being in a religious environment like that must've been shitty but I'm thinking it also exacerbated his mental health issues, issues that were almost certainly super affected by his father's death.