The further decline of personal accountability...

[Gatordev]

I don't care how many hours you work in a day, everybody has 30 minutes to do something good for themselves 2-3 times a week. I don't advocate every sailor competing in an ultra-marathon, but a 15 week (or whatever it is) notice for the semi-annual PRT? Give me a break. People should be able to pass the PRT with less than 48 hours notice.

Your argument keeps going all over the place. Personal accountability? Check. Take 30 minutes to PT on your own to meet the minimums (whatever they maybe)? Check. But guess what, that's not what the CNO's instruction says, which is the point that Brett and I (and BI) are making.

 

[eas7888]

Coming from the Army side, I always thought our PT test was kind of misguided. I did three deployments to Iraq, and never once would the ability to run 2 miles have been useful. Being able to hump 50+ lbs for a few hours on the other hand? Invaluable. The Army apparently realized that the PT standards were out of whack too, and they've just recently decided to revamp the PT test. It went from a 2 mile run, situps, and pushups, to 1.5 mile run, pushups, rowers (essentially situps), suicides, and long jump(???). While I agree that physical fitness is important for the military services, in the 21st century I don't believe it's as crucial as it once was.

Also coming from the Army side, I agree that the Army PFT was a little out dated. However, I have to disagree with you on your other contention. In the military of the 21st century, I would argue that physical fitness is even more critical. Combat loads have never been heavier, and they seem to only be adding weight every deployment I go on. More body armor, more weapons, more ammo, more radios, extra equipment. . .all of that weight has to be carried by someone, and I'd rather have a physically fit person carrying the weight than a fat body who's going to pass out after 20 minutes in full gear, God forbid we talk about having to wear MOPP gear, that'll knock out even some of the more physically fit people.

Physical fitness has been important, and will continue to be so in the future. The only problem I see now, is that there are too many standards of fitness. There ought to be one standard, regardless of gender or age. You either meet the standard, or you don't.

Just my $.02

 

[fattestfoot]

As far as the body armor, 120+ lb rucks and whatnot, I would argue that a lot of it needs to be eliminated. For some good insight into that, read this thread at SOCNET: http://www.socnet.com/showthread.php?t=100619

It basically boils down to not using the military's assets correctly (e.g. resupply). Instead of relying on resupply to get your comfort items to you, people hump them (and SOCNET even argues that people carrying more than the basic load of 270 rounds is overkill, but that's kind of a personal argument I suppose).

Really though, that mostly comes on the infantry side anyways. Since a good portion of the Army isn't going on foot patrols, that's why I'd argue that physical fitness is becoming less important (not unimportant, however). While it's great that a fobbit can run 2 miles, more than likely they'll be driving them instead. Since I'm not there yet, I can't speak to the physical fitness capabilities or requirements for the Navy or Air Force, but I would imagine it's even less important in their environments.

 

[wlawr005]

Your argument keeps going all over the place. Personal accountability? Check. Take 30 minutes to PT on your own to meet the minimums (whatever they maybe)? Check. But guess what, that's not what the CNO's instruction says, which is the point that Brett and I (and BI) are making.

You're right, the 6110 says:

All personnel are required to meet standards set forth in
this instruction. Members who are unable to meet PFA standards
will be subject to administrative action. COs shall recognize
members who make significant improvements in physical fitness or
consistently score excellent or better through comments on​

Fitness Reports, Evaluations, and other incentive awards.

So my initial argument was why stick with the P/WS? Instead of wasting space in the write up, just put the actual score on the eval. That blaring number on your FitRep would be your incentive to do better than 12:45...

 

[porw0004]

I don't see the referenced article as a decline in personal accountability. To me, the main focus was that regulations weren't followed and a few people died.

I see these as facts:
#1: Fatties don't belong in the military.
#2: If morbidly obese fatty runs, morbidly obese fatty dies.

It's been a few days since I read the article, but what I got was that fatties were allowed to run without first passing, or flat out failing, the Navy's (arguably misguided) method of evaluating cardiovascular health. That's not personal accountability, that's the PRT officer allowing regulations to fall by the wayside.

Though yes, the fatties in question probably had no business serving in the military and something should've been done sooner to rectify that. By "something" I don't mean promoting them to command billets. I'm sure everyone here has seen that at least once or twice.

 

[A4sForever]

...I see ... as facts:
#1: Fatties don't belong in the military....

Really ??? A 'fact' ???

If that's a 'fact' ....

Then I'd like to introduce you to a couple of our topside E-men from 40+ years ago ... I suppose you could call them 'fatties' ... and they were the BEST, the epitome of 'hard-chargers' on the job. They humped it ALL THE TIME (which is part of the reason they were final-checkers and QA guys), they knew the A/C & the job C-O-L-D, and they could have thrown a Mk 82 over the side had the need arisen ... and it did on some ships.

They could certainly throw YOU over the side.

Plus, they were the source of countless, hilarious, later much recalled 'Liberty Stories' while on the beach ...

And THAT's a 'fact', Jack ...

 

[Pugs]

Plus, they were the source of countless, hilarious, later much recalled 'Liberty Stories' while on the beach ...

And THAT's a 'fact', Jack ...

Besides, someone had to be Neptune's baby back when we had traditions.

 

[porw0004]

Then I'd like to introduce you to a couple of our topside E-men from 40+ years ago ... I suppose you could call them 'fatties' ... and they were the BEST, the epitome of 'hard-chargers' on the job. They humped it ALL THE TIME (which is part of the reason they were final-checkers and QA guys), they knew the A/C & the job C-O-L-D, and they could have thrown a Mk 82 over the side had the need arisen ... and it did on some ships.

They could certainly throw YOU over the side.

And that is definately a good anecdote for the Navy's PRT/Weight/Image Standards vs. Practical Fitness debate this thread turned into. I just wanted steer back towards the original post regarding personal accountability and to play devil's advocate in terms of whose "personal accountability" is the real issue in the article.

 

[phrogdriver]

I appreciate your sentiment and agree in principle that all of our Sailors ought to be in top physical form, but that ignores the reality of the other demands that are placed on squadrons. Bottom line, there just isn't enough time to devote to fitness when we're expecting that all of the other requirements get done. I don't know how recently you've had go through a set of work-ups and deployment, but to say that it's an aggressive schedule would be putting it lightly. How does a Skipper ask his people to bust their asses for 14+ hours a day, 6-7 days a week, dets to the boat, dets to Fallon, cruise, then do it all over again and OBTW ask them to remember to PT five times a week so they can add part time athlete to their evals. Ain't gonna happen. I suspect that unless you've been a DH or CO, you probably can't appreciate the juggling that goes on so that a squadron can meet its operational commitments. Ensuring that Airman Jones' PFA score goes from SAT to EXCELLENT is about #327 on the list of things a CO cares about. That is the reality we live in.

Brett

Few Marine squadrons do scheduled PT more than maybe once or twice a month. Maybe a shop sneaks out a couple more times when it can, but that's it. Simply put, Marines live in a culture where physical fitness is more valued. More of them go to the gym or run on their own time before/after work or during their lunch hours. It's not really about operational commitments; it's about personal commitment. Most Marines don't want to be the last guy crossing the line on the PFT.

 

[Recovering LSO]

And that is definately a good anecdote for the Navy's PRT/Weight/Image Standards vs. Practical Fitness debate this thread turned into. I just wanted steer back towards the original post regarding personal accountability and to play devil's advocate in terms of whose "personal accountability" is the real issue in the article.

That was the point of the OP or question - is it reasonable for a command to take heat for this? If a guy does wipe his ass and then gets sick and can't work - is the commands fault for not telling him to wipe his ass? Admitted hyperbole, but where does it end?

 

[exhelodrvr]

It's pretty simple - there won't be large scale "personal accountability" unless there are associated professional benefits and costs.

 

[fattestfoot]

If we're directing this conversation towards the command, I have a question: What does the Navy do in the morning? Do you really not PT as a unit in the morning? I can't even imagine being on an Army base at 6:30 and not seeing people running around all over the place. I'm a little surprised to hear phrogdriver state that the Marines rarely do organized PT as well.

If it's really up to the individual to PT on their own, and it's Navy wide, I don't see how the command can be blamed. That said, if there's also little repercussion for the individual failing PT tests, then the entire system is broken.

 

[Swanee]

If we're directing this conversation towards the command, I have a question: What does the Navy do in the morning? Do you really not PT as a unit in the morning? I can't even imagine being on an Army base at 6:30 and not seeing people running around all over the place. I'm a little surprised to hear phrogdriver state that the Marines rarely do organized PT as well.

If it's really up to the individual to PT on their own, and it's Navy wide, I don't see how the command can be blamed. That said, if there's also little repercussion for the individual failing PT tests, then the entire system is broken.

"Well Sir, we can PT this morning or we can work on an airplane so we can have the birds to complete the flight schedule today. Your pick."

 

[fattestfoot]

And for those that aren't in the aviation community? If it really is that way across the board in Naval aviation, it seems to be that the Chiefs would then be shouldering the blame for any failures on the enlisted side.

I'd also point out that Army aviation does morning PT and manages just fine.

 

[BigRed389]

If we're directing this conversation towards the command, I have a question: What does the Navy do in the morning? Do you really not PT as a unit in the morning? I can't even imagine being on an Army base at 6:30 and not seeing people running around all over the place. I'm a little surprised to hear phrogdriver state that the Marines rarely do organized PT as well.

If it's really up to the individual to PT on their own, and it's Navy wide, I don't see how the command can be blamed. That said, if there's also little repercussion for the individual failing PT tests, then the entire system is broken.

Define "unit." It's one thing for a division (<20) to PT together every day.

Coordinating daily command PT with 150+ bodies (avg turnout for CRUDES PT accounting for duty sections) gets ridiculous.
There are only so many gyms/fields, and way too many tenant commands on a typical naval base.

And I would pay to watch the inevitable clusterfuck if every ship on the NOB Norfolk waterfront went for PT runs....thousands of people running up and down the waterfront at once.