Well they did it even though they said they wouldn't, they lowered the standards again for the Marine Corps PFT. When I served the Marines PFT consisted of five event, push-ups, pull-up (palms out), sit-ups (crunches) squat-thrust and the 3 mile run. For what ever reasons the Corps dumbed down the PFT some time back in the 70's. first the squat-thrust were no more then no more push-ups. Then to make it really easy, chin-up (palms in) were counted as being pull-ups (palms out) Well guess what, if you don't want to do pull-ups you can chose to do push-ups now. Dumbing down the standards in the name of political correctness to accommodate females in the new Obama PC Marine corps. And it was just another Obama administration lie that standards wouldn't be lowered to accommodate liberal social engineering. I wonder what's next of the social engineering agenda, rifle marksmanship ? No I think they will be going after urinals first then dumbing down rifle marksmanship.
Honestly, did you expect any other outcome? From the time they announced that they were "exploring" opening all combat arms jobs to women, there was never any doubt in my mind that the bureaucracy would achieve that by any means necessary. And they did. Between allowing Women to have unlimited recycles for Ranger school to changing the PT standards, the goal was to get the round policy to fit into the square hole of reality.
All in the name of diversity aka PC social engineering. The PFT has been dumbed down numerous times during the past 75 years. When I served in the Corps 69-71 the PFT consisted of five events, push-ups, pull-ups, squat thrust, sit-ups and the 3 mile run. When my father served in the Corps during WW ll the PFT consisted of seven events and there was no 3 mile run but a 300 yard sprint. One of the events was the duck waddle, no (*)(*)(*)(*). I found the U.S. Army's WW ll PFT, lot tougher back then than today. Below are the minimum and max scores of the Army's WW ll PFT 7 pull-ups minimum - 20 pull-ups a perfect score 31 jump squats minimum - 74 a perfect score (Jump squats not to be confused with squat thrust) 27 push-ups minimum - 54 a perfect score. 52 sit-ups in 2 minutes minimum - 79 perfect score. 300 yard sprint 52.5 seconds minimum - 44 seconds perfect score. The Marines dumped the squat-thrust from the PFT I believe during the 1970's for medical reasons, back issues that will come back to haunt one decades later in their lives. Don't know exactly when they dumped the push-ups and why they did ? Maybe someone else knows when and why ? 3 pull-ups is acceptable today ? Hey ararmer1919, how does it feel being able to say you're "Old Corps" ? I bet you never thought you would live long enough to claim that title.
