“But there’s always a price to be paid. That’s the thing nobody ever tells you as a young officer at Quantico. It’s easy for the instructors there to tell lieutenants to, ‘always do the right thing.’ What they don’t tell you is that if that right thing bucks the system, have to be willing to pay that freight all the way to the end of the line—and that end of the line is the end of your career. They don’t tell you that when you speak out, the institution you love with turn on your and attack you. People you think are your friends will slink off into the shadows and abandon you. It will come at the expense of your family, your future, your sanity, and your financial well-being. On the hard, controversial issues, most big institutions don’t want you to do the right thing. They want you to shut the fuck up and row.”
—Joe Plenzler, quoted in Lt. Col. Kate Germano’s Fight Like a Girl: The Truth Behind How Female Marines are Trained.
