Canada's top general asked about getting equipment fitted especially for women

[daftandbarmy]

Something of a non-sequitor, I was wearing a step counter for a while on ship and was averaging between 20-25k steps each day and doing about 40 flights of stairs.  My stride is just under a meter so you can do the math, although most of the extra weight I was carrying was the 10 yards of additional fabric built into all NCDs so that they don't fit anyone properly.

I always thought people got around the boot issues with a med chits from doctors/physio.

Funny story though, when I was in ADM(Mat) years ago I was asked to be involved in a survey for the new sea boots.  I went up to a room, saw a bunch of boots on the table, and was asked to rate them on appearance.  ???

I asked a few questions about their funcitonality and was told it didn't matter for the survey, but did weight the ones with zippers and mesh sides heavily for completely unrelated reasons.  They wanted to know what I thought about the leather grain, colour, etc, so it was kind of bizarre.  (The new boots suck for wet weather, but fantastic to have kicking around for pulling on quickly during bong bongs).

Anyway, unless the requirements types put in something about that to make the dress committee happy, that would have come from the project.

That's a great example of Navy fitness, BZ! I know a few guys who are retired Navy types and they all have knee and lower limb issues from, apparently, stomping around on solid steel decks for most of their careers. I wonder how a boot can address that issue, if at all?

 

[Underway]

It seems simple really to solve the "boot issue".  And this woman who asked about kit really gave me the idea (I'm sure its not new).  Women get a allowance to buy bra's.  SOF get a clothing allowance as well.  Why doesn't the army just give everyone a boot stipend with a list of approved boots.  Like they did with Tac vests once upon a time.

Every time I work with the army in the field, 3/4's of the people have bought a pile of their own kit anyways.  Tac vests, boots, flashlights, sunglasses, underwear, kneepads, gloves, knives, multitools, camping gear, compasses, bino's, helmet padding, etc, etc...  I feel like I'm in a MEC commercial.

 

[dapaterson]

SOF do not receive a clothing allowance.  There are SOF allowances that are more or less the equivalent of SDA or LDA or AIRCRA.

There is Civilian Dress Assistance Allowance, but it's not SOF specific.

 

[daftandbarmy]

It seems simple really to solve the "boot issue".  And this woman who asked about kit really gave me the idea (I'm sure its not new).  Women get a allowance to buy bra's.  SOF get a clothing allowance as well.  Why doesn't the army just give everyone a boot stipend with a list of approved boots.  Like they did with Tac vests once upon a time.

Every time I work with the army in the field, 3/4's of the people have bought a pile of their own kit anyways.  Tac vests, boots, flashlights, sunglasses, underwear, kneepads, gloves, knives, multitools, camping gear, compasses, bino's, helmet padding, etc, etc...  I feel like I'm in a MEC commercial.

The British Army solved that problem by paying everyone very poorly

 

[dimsum]

It seems simple really to solve the "boot issue".  And this woman who asked about kit really gave me the idea (I'm sure its not new).  Women get a allowance to buy bra's.  SOF get a clothing allowance as well.  Why doesn't the army just give everyone a boot stipend with a list of approved boots.  Like they did with Tac vests once upon a time.

Every time I work with the army in the field, 3/4's of the people have bought a pile of their own kit anyways.  Tac vests, boots, flashlights, sunglasses, underwear, kneepads, gloves, knives, multitools, camping gear, compasses, bino's, helmet padding, etc, etc...  I feel like I'm in a MEC commercial.

Maybe all of this is a cunning plan to boost MEC's profits  >

More likely that the Canadian boot company companies will realize that most of us either scour surplus stores for Mk 3s or buy other brands, and may actually have to improve their quality.  I have never quite figured out why all RCAF members, including office-bound types, are required to have safety-toed boots.  If possibility of things landing on your toes is the reasoning, then issue special safety-toed boots to those trades (Loadie, Tfc Tech, Supply).

 

[armyvern]

Seems a thread on the requirement for women's kit has turned into the 10 thousandth Army Boot Thread where boot allowances etc have already been discussed, debated, answered many times before.  Suggest those posts get cut over to one of those available threads.

The need to actually consider real women when coming up with kit is not limited short or compact ones nor just to the add-on kit.

Back in the day the tunic I was issued actually WAS a woman's tunic. Cut, styled and sized for women. 

Somewhere along the way some man (who no doubt assumed he was doing us wee-women a favor and acting in our best interests) decided that we women had to have pockets and all the extra material they entail added onto the chests of our female CAF tunics ... so we would look like the men (word up: we are NOT).

We now have combat pants that are straight cut at the hips (ie: men's cut) with zero allowance for any real curves.

We have combat shirts and rain jackets with no allowances for curves and/or hips, so females like me who nature has cursed with hips, butt, boobs  instead of the normal inverted triangle measurements of the male have to wear shirts huge on the top/long on the sleeves so they actually accommodate our butts  and/or hips.  Or walk around with the zippers on the bottom sides of the ran jacket undone to accommodate our ass but not be swimming up top.

We get to always have a belt on so that we can bunch up that extra and unneeded 6 7 or 8 inches of material at our waists so that we could accommodate our ass or hips. THAT'S some comfortable all day I tell you.

And, on the DEU front because of the pockets, some of us women now get to decide every parade whether we line our medals up with the pocket top like they should be only to have the medals then jut out from our chests and hang at an awkward angle so guys can say, "your medals are on crooked." or put the medals on so that they hang straight (my personal option) and still look unprofessional because the pocket now looks crooked sewn onto my tunic because the medals are hung on an angle not in line with the pocket top.

I have no issues with the DEU pants ... because it's the ONE piece of kit that still actually has a female version (altough I hate the pleats - they serve only to add extra material ensuring all women wearing them also look fatter than they actually are).  Women who are less naturally curves have the option of ordering male DEU pants and there's nothing wrong with that either..

And I saw a message recently that allGOs And CWO in SA are now going to wear the forge cap (a nan's head-dress) regardless of sex. 

Want to attract women? Remember that we ARE women and acknowledge the fact that it's OK for our tunic to look different from the man's because we aren't shaped like men! Get rid of the upper pockets. Get rid of the fattening pleats in the pants,  but keep the female adjustable cut and for crying out loud keep the seamed pleat down the back of our DEU pants so that us women who are not fat, yet have curves measurements to fit into our clothing!

 

[daftandbarmy]

Seems a thread on the requirement for women's kit has turned into the 10 thousandth Army Boot Thread where boot allowances etc have already been discussed, debated, answered many times before.  Suggest those posts get cut over to one of those available threads.

The need to actually consider real women when coming up with kit is not limited short or compact ones nor just to the add-on kit.

Back in the day the tunic I was issued actually WAS a woman's tunic. Cut, styled and sized for women. 

Somewhere along the way some man (who no doubt assumed he was doing us wee-women a favor and acting in our best interests) decided that we women had to have pockets and all the extra material they entail added onto the chests of our female CAF tunics ... so we would look like the men (word up: we are NOT).

We now have combat pants that are straight cut at the hips (ie: men's cut) with zero allowance for any real curves.

We have combat shirts and rain jackets with no allowances for curves and/or hips, so females like me who nature has cursed with hips, butt, boobs  instead of the normal inverted triangle measurements of the male have to wear shirts huge on the top/long on the sleeves so they actually accommodate our butts  and/or hips.  Or walk around with the zippers on the bottom sides of the ran jacket undone to accommodate our *** but not be swimming up top.

We get to always have a belt on so that we can bunch up that extra and unneeded 6 7 or 8 inches of material at our waists so that we could accommodate our *** or hips. THAT'S some comfortable all day I tell you.

And, on the DEU front because of the pockets, some of us women now get to decide every parade whether we line our medals up with the pocket top like they should be only to have the medals then jut out from our chests and hang at an awkward angle so guys can say, "your medals are on crooked." or put the medals on so that they hang straight (my personal option) and still look unprofessional because the pocket now looks crooked sewn onto my tunic because the medals are hung on an angle not in line with the pocket top.

I have no issues with the DEU pants ... because it's the ONE piece of kit that still actually has a female version (altough I hate the pleats - they serve only to add extra material ensuring all women wearing them also look fatter than they actually are).  Women who are less naturally curves have the option of ordering male DEU pants and there's nothing wrong with that either..

And I saw a message recently that allGOs And CWO in SA are now going to wear the forge cap (a nan's head-dress) regardless of sex. 

Want to attract women? Remember that we ARE women and acknowledge the fact that it's OK for our tunic to look different from the man's because we aren't shaped like men! Get rid of the upper pockets. Get rid of the fattening pleats in the pants,  but keep the female adjustable cut and for crying out loud keep the seamed pleat down the back of our DEU pants so that us women who are not fat, yet have curves measurements to fit into our clothing!

A good example of the way that uniforms were fitted differently in the 'good old days'.

Danjanou should recognize a couple of the 'Old Contemptibles' in this 1974 photo