Opinion

The Meaning of Meaningless Rules

By DOUGLAS LUMMIS

I recently read in a book about women and the militarythat the U.S. Marine Corps requires women Marines to pluck their eyebrows into a "regulation arch."

"Why?" asked the student who was reading the book with me.

Why, indeed?

Of course, the Marine Corps has long been very anxious about regulating the hair on the heads and faces of its men. When I was in the Marines you couldn't have hair longer than about an inch, you had to get a haircut about every two weeks, and any hair coming over the collar of your shirt was a violation of regulations. Beards were not permitted. Mustaches were not permitted — except, for some reason, those of a few senior noncommissioned officers. For violating any of these regulations you could be severely punished.

I suppose that because women don't grow beards, the Marine Corps had no choice but to go after their eyebrows.

But again — why?

It is said that laws and regulations are of two types — those based on natural law and those that are arbitrary. Those based on natural law (or, if you don't believe in natural law, those based on cultural values) include laws against murder, assault, rape, theft and other acts that directly harm people. Our belief that these things are wrong comes before our knowledge that they are prohibited by law.

A good example of law that is arbitrary is traffic law. It is not required by natural law or any cultural value that you should stop when the light is red, or drive on the left. Pink would do just as well for a stoplight, and driving on the right is a perfectly satisfactory traffic system. But once the law is made there is a strong ethical reason to obey it: Violating it will bring great trouble to others, and perhaps endanger their lives.

It seems, however, that there is a third type of regulation. The eyebrow rule is a good example. The presence or absence of facial hair has no ethical meaning. Nor is it something like traffic law, that has got to be decided one way or another for reasons of public order and safety. Obeying such a rule contributes nothing to the public good and disobeying it harms no one.

What, then, is the purpose of such a rule? In the case of the military the answer is clear. A military organization seeks to establish absolute authority over its soldiers, even in personal matters. It is not enough that soldiers obey orders when they seem reasonable. Soldiers must obey orders whether they are reasonable or not.

Military organizations train their troops by giving them orders that are purposeless, absurd, contradictory, even impossible. From this a soldier learns "If it's an order, you obey it — and that's all." This prepares soldiers to do the absurd, contradictory and impossible things required in wars.

But why junior and senior high schools have similar regulations is a question I cannot answer.

Shukan ST: Dec. 4, 1998

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