Military Weight Standards
I can’t believe that the U.S. Military is allowing members to put on this amount of weight without giving them the boot. I know that we are hurting for military members but, don’t worry, if we run out, all of us old gray-haired Jarheads will more than happily pick up arms and add a few extra air holes to some fuckers forehead with our wireless paper hole punches. Now that some of you are scratching your heads and thought maybe I was having a stroke as I wrote that. For those of you that couldn’t figure that out, I was stating that we will gladly provide headshots to any of the bad guys with our AR-15-style rifles.
Now back to weight standards. I was introduced to military weight standards the first week in boot camp. I was so thin at 6 foot and 145 pounds that I was what they called “doublerats” which stands for double rations, meaning I was supposed to eat twice as much food as everyone else. Well, not everyone eats the same, because if you were a “fat body” or overweight, you ate half of what everyone else got to eat.
Every time I went to the chow hall, all of us double rat recruits got to go first in line and we had to shout out “double rats” to the recruits serving the food and they would put two scoops of everything on your tray and you had to clean the tray (which was never a problem). When we were in the field we were given two MREs as well. In the field, the fat body recruits had to turn in their sweets to the drill instructors, and they usually gave it to us double rats.
But that wasn’t it, our senior drill instructor GySgt Hernandez, who was a bodybuilder, called everyone to the quarterdeck and told us that he was being removed from the drill field due to weight standards. Now this guy was a huge cut bodybuilder, like a damn tower and he got removed because he didn’t make weight.
For those that are not in the know, the first way the Marine does this is by height/weight standards. There is a chart that you must fall in between. So if you are a male and 72″ tall, you must be at least 140 pounds and no more than 197 pounds according to the 2016 chart.
So as a bodybuilder, GySgt Hernandez weighed more than what was allowed. This meant that he had to be taped, which is how the Corps figured out BMI or Body Mass Index. The idea here is that they would be able to better help those that, like GySgt Hernandez by getting a more accurate idea of how much fat someone has. But it wasn’t perfect and it still wasn’t helping serious bodybuilders. GySgt Hernandez was out and SSgt Atondo was in. Still today, I have no clue what ever happened to him. I do hope the Corps didn’t force him out. Now there was a waiver process, but from what I understand it too wasn’t perfect and still screwed over bodybuilders.
So, if you are so seriously overweight, how can you meet the requirements for mission readiness? This poses the question of if they can do the job, then why does it matter? The best answer for that is, let’s say they are assigned to a ship, they will have a difficult time going through the hatches and up/down the ladders, causing a problem. What if they are in combat and they get hit and they need to be carried off the field? Who in the world is going to be able to carry them? They also make a bigger target, and trying to locate and stop the bleeding from a wound could also be a problem. Trust me here, we are not picking on those who have weight issues.
Then that poses the question of, if they are overweight, are they damaging Government property? If you are out too long in the sun and get a really bad sunburn, the military can actually charge you with damaging Government property, because when you sign up for the military and you raise your hand and take the oath, your body is considered Government equipment. It may sound harsh, but it makes sense if you think about it.
