The United States hasn’t had a military draft since 1973, but this fact doesn’t mean jack squat to eighteen-year-old Elizabeth Kyle-LaBell, a recent New Jersey high school grad who for some reason is enraged that she’s not able to register on the Selective Service’s website.
Never you mind the other facts — that women have long been able to join all branches of the military or since 2013 have been able to participate in combat — because, no. Kyle-LaBell wants the right to sign up for a nonexistent draft.
Want to know why?
Because she says its discrimination. That’s why.
“I hadn’t even entered my age yet when the website directed me to a page saying I couldn’t register,” Kyle-LaBell tells Yahoo Parenting. “I feel that if a woman wants to register for the draft, she should be able to.”
She claims it violates women’s civil rights, but because she’s not legally an adult yet, she couldn’t take legal action. So she had her mother do it for her.
And now a class-action lawsuit exists. Filed against the Selective Service system.
More from Yahoo Parenting:
“With both males and females available for such roles today, the two sexes are now similarly situated for draft registration purposes, and there is no legitimate reason for the government to discriminate against the female class, so equal protection applies,” the complaint, which identifies Kyle-LaBell by her initials, E.K.L., states.
“Further, with both males and females available for such combat roles, there is no reasonable basis for infringing the associational interests of the female class by preventing them from registering.”
The suit aims to overturn a 1981 Supreme Court decision that upheld the men-only draft registration rule. “The court decided that the draft is there to create a pool of people who can be in combat, and since women were barred from combat, it wasn’t discrimination to bar them from the draft,” Roy Den Hollander, Kyle-LaBell’s attorney, tells Yahoo Parenting. “Now women are allowed to be in combat, but they still can’t register.”
What does Selective Service System have to say about this? They’re … like .. umm … yeah? Sure. Sounds good.
“We’re not opposed to women registering,” said Pat Schuback, public affairs specialist for the Selective Service System. “We just follow the law.”
Is this all much ado about nothing? What do you think?