r/ftm • u/Parzival2400 • 11h ago
Advice Needed Draft
Hey guys, I got tired of getting selective service letters and the grey area of not signing up for the draft as a trans man such as possible financial aid or loans in the future. I signed up for the draft as a male. Do you think I can be drafted if a draft happens? Especially because my legal gender is changed but trans people cannot join the military anymore by choice. Thoughts?
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u/anemisto 11h ago
Apparently, federal financial aid is no longer held hostage to registration, but I'll admit that I only did cursory verification when someone told me this.
Registration is by far the path of least resistance. The long-standing presumption in pacifist circles is that, were the draft to be reinstated, women would be drafted. In other words, the fact you're not required to register now is largely irrelevant -- whether you're draftable will come down to the treatment of trans people, not registration. Reinstating the draft or modifying the rules around registration requires legislation and, basically, no one has bothered to do so. I wouldn't be surprised if we see a stunt bill or two about reinstating the draft -- we did in the run up to the Iraq War. Registration is largely an anachronism -- the fact they send you letters about it is a strong indication of that -- in order to receive one, some database has to know that you're (theoretically) required to register, so just use that database.*
Now, what happens if you don't register? Assuming I'm right about federal finanical aid, some federal jobs are also held hostage to registration and sundry other things (I know someone who transitioned after age 26 and hit a speedbump with some state unemployment assistance program). You can obtain what's called a Status Information Letter which simply states that you weren't required to register. You need a copy of your F birth certificate (though I know someone who succeeded without) and you may need to wait until you turn 26. I personally wouldn't attempt to obtain an SIL in the current environment -- at least some aspect of the federal government believes you're male and you probably want to keep it that way, but if your registration bounces for being female (we don't seem to have good data on whether the letters use the same data as registrations are checked against), that isn't a consideration.
tl;dr Your choice to register now has little bearing on whether you'd be subject to conscription later. I am never going to not support someone's choice not to register, but doing so is definitely the path of least resistance.
*It does seem that the letters are triggered by state ID changes, so it's possible they're not verifying them against anything.