<p>Hulk- 3rd hand information is usually pretty lame information and you are the recipient of 3rd or 4th hand information. VMI doesn’t “look down” on females anymore than West Point “looks down” on females. Perhaps some individuals at either place have different opinions- but institutionally you are dead wrong. Further, you don’t really have a clue about the Rat line or the 4th class system at either USMA or VMI. For example, while VMI still practices an adversative 4th class system compared to USMA, absolutely it is also true that VMI’s rat line is less physical today than it was 35 years ago- but my observation is that it is far more controlled and purposeful today than it was then. So has the deemphasis on fairly relentless degradation and physical abuse as practiced back in the “old corps” produced a lower quality of grad and officer? Not from what I can tell- in fact the contrary. So your theory basically doesn’t hold a heck of a lot of water from my perspective. Finally- whatever your opinions on women at VMI - USMA or anywhere else- they are there because it is the law, because it is their right to be there and because the Army benefits from their being there. The arguments of 1995 at VMI died a long time ago and only a true outsider even raises them anymore. Further- I don’t know what cadets you are talking to - but I know plenty of cadets and grads who are attending their first choice of college and would kick you down a steep hill for presuming to spew that they would all go to USMA if they had the chance. So- speak for yourself not for others (like me for example who you apparently presume to speak for); and perhaps you might speak from personal experience not from thoughts picked up over a beer. To be blunt-it seems to me that you don’t know what you are talking about.</p>