Sunday, September 26, 2010

Sunday Funnies

Skippy and SJS as JOs.

27 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm becoming of the mind that, regardless of the desires of the peace, love, rainbows and happy unicorn world of the aging hippies, turned over to the neo-Hippies, that "we" will always need a hated group.

Something deep in the subconscious of humanity.

Retired Now said...

Navy Diversity Policy always confused me.   Before I retired our 4 Striper Captain used to have periodic training sessions which he would kick off and then turn over to some "expert" from Washington DC who would further confuse us all for 2 more hours.   

We had Equal Opportunity which was understandable.  Then Non discrimination, which absolutely everyone agreed with.  For decades large Navy ashore organizations have repeatedly had these annual refresher training sessions.   Then a few years ago,  we had a 3rd formal, framed single sheet POLICY statement signed by some admiral, hanging on the walls right next to the older POLICY displays of Equal Opportunity and Non Discrimination.    Whenever we walked down the hallways in Navy buildings, we started seeing 3 beautifully framed POLICY one page regulations on the walls.

The only part of the DIVERSITY lectures that I still recall since I'm retired over a year now, was this:   "I don't want to look out at this audience and see a majority of people who look just like me: an old White guy".   Those words still ring in my ears.    True to his word, our O-6 Navy CAPTAIN started hiring alot of "different looking" people back in 2007, 2008, 2009 and then I retired.   It was inevitable that many civil servants had to be hired as so many had gotten to retirement age like me.    Our CAPTAIN went on his hiring spree (which was essential) and true to his promise,  he hired many so called minorities with different backgrounds, non-male, who parents and grand parents came to America from numerous Asian countires.  

Result:  our large Navy organization stopped looking like our Captain, an older White male.   Was this bad ?   It was immediately recognized as "bad" only in a few cases where someone had no qualifications, no potential, and terrible attitudes.   However,   it was too early to tell about the other new hires that were considered minorities.    In fact, it was too early to tell if any of the new hires was unqualified because it takes years to see if the new-bees really plug in, buckle down, stick to it, and fit into our many teams and IPT's.    

Retired Now said...

part 2    

DIVERSITY worked ?    Well, our huge org really did LOOK different at large assemblies for training.    But, if the Navy had never posted this 3rd framed POLICY statement on the hallways, next to the older EQUAL OPPORTUNITY and NON DISCRIMINATION statements,   I think that our particular org would have stopped appearing as a sea of white male faces during get togethers.   It is quite obvious that, as a group, almost without exception, hiring Americans of SE Asian backgrounds is excellent.   IPT leads always want to get them assigned to their teams.      While there are a few totally unqualified and untrainable misfits that fit the female and/or African American "category" of DIVERSITY,   most new hires seem (so far) to be with potential. 

The nagging question, since I'm on Social Security and fully retired,  is " Was this new diversity program necessary ?"     Almost 45 percent of FED GOVT civil servants are retiring from 2009 to 2013.    Wouldn't the new hires have been more "diverse" looking at training assemblies just using the old 2 framed policies hanging on the walls ?    Wouldn't just EQUAL OPPORTUNITY and NON DISCRIMINATION have hired more "variety" of new workers ?     I honestly think that DIVERSITY policy has resulted in maybe 3 to 5 percent of completely unqualified new hires which just happen to be minorities.     However,  our large shore based Navy organizations have unfortunately hired a similar number of completely unqualified non-minorities  ( ie White males) in the past. 

Did we really need DIVERSITY to ensure that when our O-6 CAPT. looked out into the large audiences at our periodic get-togethers, that the good Captain would be able to not see a huge audience that looked (outwardly) just like he looks ?    Only time will tell if this new Navy hiring by percentages race, and gender has resulted in THE BEST AND THE BRIGHTEST workforce.    We need a few more years before that can be answered.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Not sure the hippies, neo or otherwise, ever really desired peace, love, and rainbows.  Tough to be a "hero of the revolution" without a revolution against some evil oppressor.  And that evil oppressor in American since 1960 is always the White Male, whom the Femi-Nazis, the Black Panthers, and the various hispanic and other racial/ethnic power groups have continued to demonize (with the assistance of White-guilt liberal media and academics).  The evil oppressors has been narrowed to the heterosexual White Male, to whom "homophobe" (and "Islamophobe") are added to "racist" and "sexist" as a politically-generated article of faith.

Now that Big Navy is led by those same apologists, whose efforts are that much more nauseating because they wear the uniform of Navy Admirals.  Enough to make you retch. 

Now I will go sit down in my "Dumpy White Guy Ground Combat Section".  ;)

Retired Now said...

Diversity = painful.  for three years now, I have resented our full-bird Capt. telling everyone in our command that he is going to hire new workers so that the enitre command does not look like him,  " an old White man".    

What this CAPTAIN was directly informing us was,  that due to DIVERSITY, he was going to hire new civil servants based upon their outward physical appearances and not which schools, degrees, and previous work experience we had.    We did not feel edified. 

So, if the Navy wants to hire based upon DIVERSITY policy, as our Capt. used to tell us  repeatedly before I retired,  then why do new ADMIRAL leaders still issue 3 signed, framed and prominently displayed contradictory policies ?

Why do we need all three:   EQUAL OPPORTUNITY,  NON-DISCRIMINATION and also now DIVERSITY policies ?    I understood the 1st two, which were greatly thought of.

DIVERSITY, if implemented, trumps the first two, older existing policies which were excellent.

Have you ever tried to even read the US NAVY's DIVERSITY policy ?    Even the Navy cannot really define it.   

If Diversity is now used to hire new workers, then the older EQUAL OPPORTUNITY and NON DISCRIMINATION policies are not being followed, and should therefore, be cancelled.

Why promulagate conflicting policies ?     I personnally think DIVERSITY is an un-needed and harmful (relaitvely) new policy.     Our leaders are not clear.  

Skippy-san said...

You laugh, but right after Tailhook, our XO decided we needed sexual harassment training. One of our enterprising JO's was tasked with preparing the slides and the training. His opening slide? " Get off of our backs and onto yours!". Suffice it to say the Ready Room loved it and he got his ass handed to him right then and there.

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Ahh, the constand dilemma of thinking you are funnier than your boss thinks you are.

Retired Now said...

Here's a 4-star ADMIRAL's brand new DIVERSITY policy:


http://www.uscg.mil/seniorleadership/announcements/dps.pdf

Gee, even this 4 star has a rough time even defining DIVERSITY.
This is the newest one I could locate on Google.

xformed said...

I adopted the South during college.  I have recently lost 32 lbs.  Is there a old white guy section, non-dumpy?

sid said...

How about a NotExactlyWhite white guy section?

Of course, the dumpy thing transcends skin color...

There, you will find true Diversity.

cdrsalamander said...

Call the IG.  Raise a sink - or sit back an take it.

Byron said...

I've been in the Cajun section my whole life. We sit back, drink beer and suck heads and pinch tails while the rest of you look silly :)

UltimaRatioRegis said...

Dunno who Charlie is, but he either has some damned thick rose-colored glasses, or he is peddling the deed to the Brooklyn Bridge. 

Steeljaw said...

Skippy & I had the trifecta - white male, naval aviation and grads of an all male Southern military school.  Which is why we were probably slated for the initial gender-normed VAW squadrons *DONT_KNOW*
w/r, SJS

Steeljaw said...

"<span>Yet the fact is that minorities and women are significantly underrepresented in Navy leadership positions. So, in order to make sure the most talented officers have a fair opportunity to advance, CNO asks the flag officers who lead the various Navy communities to be able to identify their most talented minority and women officers...</span><span>"</span>
Which, I suppose, is why we are so busy sending diversity selects off to self-perpetuating select diversity fora.  Talk about self-licking ice cream cones....

Redeye80 said...

"You can be sure that there is still only one way to advance in the Navy, and that is to excel at what you do and demonstrate potential for success in positions of greater responsibility, especially in operational assignments." 

What color is the sky is this guy's world?

Man, did this guy drink the Kool-Aid or what!

Circle the wagon around the flag boys, the boss is on trouble.  What a crock!  Again, someone who has had a total disconnect with the fleet.

anon said...

Charlie has been drinking the Kool-Aid a little bit too long.

anon said...

And to Admiral Papp and other diversity flags, I say "Show me the new approaches and fresh perspectives brought to problem solving by these minorities that we want so much."  Figure out the real reason you want them and say it - we just have to be more colorful.  And Salamander - you need to add "THIS IS AN ALL HANDS EVOLUTION" to you opening tag line.

Skippy-san said...

But it was fun at the time. We had a proper military education. Besides SJS is a graduate of the Joel Porter school of "super performance" (inside joke).

UltimaRatioRegis said...

<span>Ahh, the constant dilemma of thinking you are funnier than your boss thinks you are.</span>

John said...

Will the senior leadership jamming this "diversity" crap into everyone's orfices be equally adamant about the necessity for it in the very few years when caucasians are relegated to minority status by the exceptionally high birth rates among Hispanics?

I want to hear them say yay or nay if that will be the case, or is this strictly aimed at preferential treatment for specific races!

We all know the answer, just they won't admit it.

The cowardice of it all is exceeded only by the wastefulness of everything associated with the diversity drivel, and the demnstrable cluelessness of those who blindly adhere to it or worse, promote it.

Every stinking billet, and body filling them, in the USN "diversity" business should be dropped immediately.  They contribute nothing to readiness, or even equality of opportunity, only gross favoratism unrelated to skill, performance or merit.  Not a bit of "content of character" but exclusively driven by "color of their skin."

Steeljaw said...

Signal follows:

"BRAVO MIKE"

8-)

cdrsalamander said...

Thanks for the tip over to Lex's.  The email that spawned the editorial can be found in one of my DivThu posts from JUL here.

cdrsalamander said...

<span>Thanks for the tip over to Lex's.  The email that spawned the editorial can be found in one of my DivThu posts from JUL here.</span>

Grandpa Bluewater said...

I'm sorry I'm late for the meeting, but my recreational nap ran long. Where is the grumpy old retired dinosaurs from extinct subspecialties who went to state colleges of cows and mines section, haole with big belly seats

Yes, I came with what I need.  I have my bag o'laffs and my raspberry kazoo here to accentuate key remarks. You can start now, young'n.

Race? Not since my Submarine Races license got pulled by CincHouse when I pinned her with a Midn collar device. Let's get this show on the road, I got two grandkids to pick up when school lets out.

Equal opportunity? We all had the same chance for a watery grave every time we took in the last line, you can't get more equal than that. All we cared about was is he qualified and can he pull his weight.

Diversity? We were all different, and all alike, and all different from the rest of the Navy and the human race. Our protege's still are, last time I checked. That right, baby nuke in the corner?
Yep, thought so.

Women? Just like men except for being completely different. Vive la difference. Why do you ask?

By the way, why are you dressed like a Marine who fell into three different shades of blue striping?

Byron said...

Early on in the comments at Lex's place and after Lex said he couldn't believe it was true, I told him, oh, yes, it is, go see Phib, and it's a LOT worse than you think.

Actus rhesus said...

See. They keep telling me that as a female I am valued and diverse and blah blah. Then their most senior leaders do things like endorse less than a week deals for serial sex offenders who assault women in uniform. Tell you what. I'll be happy if you just give me the fitrep I've earned and put actual guilty offenders in jail. That will make this "diversity officer" happy.