Two weeks after her 18th birthday, a girl watches her twin brother fill out a military draft registration card. She wonders why she too is not participating in this coming-of-age ritual alongside her brother. Why is she exempted from this civic responsiblity just because of her gender?

After outgoing Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced that the Pentagon would lift the ban on women in combat, the question has been raised as to whether women should be required to sign up for the draft like young men currently do.

Immediately after the end of Panetta’s speech, the U.S.  Selective Service posted a notice on its website stating, “Attention: Even though the secretary of defense has decided to allow women in combat jobs, the law has not been changed to include this. Consequently, only men are currently required to register by law with Selective Service during ages 18 thru 25. Women still do not register.”

Now that women are gaining the same military rights as men, they should be prepared to take on the same responsibilities. Men have been required to register for the draft within a month of turning 18 years old since the U.S. Selective Services was established in 1940, a year before the start of World War I, according to www.military.com. 

When this legislation was written, women were still viewed as “housewives” who were incapable of doing the same jobs as men. Today, we live in a society where this view is held by a small minority, and women are filling positions that have traditionally been held by men, such as police officers, firefighters, doctors and lawyers.

In 1980, President Jimmy Carter asked Congress to expand the draft to include women. When Congress refused, a legal battle ensued. In the 1981 U.S. Supreme Court Case Rostker v. Goldberg, men argued that the draft was discriminatory and therefore unconstitutional because women are not required to register. The Supreme Court rejected the lawsuit on the grounds that women were not able to fight in combat roles.

Now that women are allowed in combat roles, this argument is no longer valid. The law that is in place now is inherently discriminatory as it requires something of men that it does not of women.

If women’s rights advocates are going to continue to crusade for equality between men and women (as they should), they must also accept that women have to take on the same responsibilities as men. If men are going to put their lives on the line in the defense of their country, then women should have to also.

We are all Americans, regardless of gender, and we should all be expected to participate in the same civic duties.