Female veterans ask for recognition on Veterans Day

By Thomas Nelson, tnelson@charlescitypress.com

Come Veterans Day, don’t assume a woman isn’t a veteran.

Female veterans often aren’t recognized for their service, on Veterans Day and other days, veterans said.

“I think people just assume that females are not veterans,” said Maria Deike, director of the Floyd County Veterans Affairs. “Moreso, when you’re with a male figure, they will just automatically assume that the male is a veteran and the female is not.”

Prior to working for the Floyd County Veterans Affairs office, Deike was a staff sergeant in the Army and later in the National Guard. She deployed to Iraq during Operation Iraqi Freedom with the same battalion that captured Saddam Hussein.

Some businesses will offer special deals to current and former service members on Veterans Day, such as free meals, but Deike and Floyd County Veterans Affairs Commissioner and veteran April Banks said they have been questioned whether they qualify.

Banks said she had that experience while at a veterans breakfast.

“Because I’m a female they just assumed my husband was a veteran and I wasn’t,” Banks said. “You can’t always just assume, because you don’t know.”

Banks served in the National Guard for six years on active service and two years inactive service. Her service took her from Maryland to New Mexico and eventually to Iowa.

While in the National Guard other soldiers became her family, she said.

“I loved my time in service,” Banks said. “It was a good experience for me. I met a lot of nice people.”

Often around Veterans Day, veterans can be seen with a hat showing their service, or some other apparel listing where or when they served, or the branch of service, but some women don’t acknowledge their status as veterans openly, Deike said.

“It’s more the common courtesy of asking, especially on Veterans Day, ‘Are you a veteran?’ instead of assuming that you’re not,” Deike said. “It kind of stings you when they ask the person in front of you and they ignore you.”

Females may not fit the typical standard that people think of when they think of a veteran, Deike said. “That’s unfortunate.”

“For the female veterans it can be very degrading throughout the year, and specifically on Veterans Day, when they’re right there and not being asked.”

Not acknowledging women as veterans is similar to not acknowledging non-combat roles in the military.

Banks said, “You’re still a veteran, you still go through basic training,” and noted that the percentage of females in the military is increasing.

The amount of women in the military used to be capped at 2 percent, but now that amount is closer to 15 percent, “and growing,” she said.

The Floyd County Veterans Affairs Commission currently has two female members out of five, with Deike as the executive director. Both women members are veterans.

“It’s just public awareness and acknowledgement of it,” Banks said. “People just think of World War II and that 2 percent, and they just don’t realize the military is developing and having more female roles.”

In 2013 the ban on women in combat roles was lifted by then-Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta.

More recently, a woman passed the rigorous United States Marine Corps Infantry Officer Course in September and became the first female infantry officer in the Marine Corps.

There was one  incident that really bothered Deike, she said, when she went with her son to get a meal on Veterans Day and she said she would pay for her son’s meal, and was asked to pay for both meals. The business was offering free meals to veterans.

“The guy just looked at me, and I said, ‘I am a veteran,'” Deike said. “It shouldn’t have to be that way.”