Army Officer Suspended over Tweet About Friend’s Bra Size

Rick Dickson. Screenshot via YouTube.
Screenshot via YouTube
Kristina Wong

An Army officer is facing suspension and an inquiry by his command for a tweet that left-wing veterans and service members claimed perpetuated a culture of sexual harassment and assault in the military.

Army Capt. Rick Dickson, a public affairs officer for 3rd Special Forces Group, had posted on his personal Twitter account last weekend, while not at work, a photo of himself and one of his best friends, a female Army veteran, in his car driving to his daughter’s cheerleading event.

After some Twitter users speculated about his friend’s bra size, Dickson wrote in a follow-up Tweet, “Obviously all the likes were because of me. G’s btw.”

After some accused him of demeaning women in the military and one of his own best friends, Dickson apologized to anyone offended and he and his friend explained in a video that she was behind the mention of her bra size.

“The size was incorrect, so I gave the right size. It did not bother me to send it back at ’em,” she said in the video.

However, since the tweets prompted outrage by mostly progressive veterans and members of a small group of mostly progressive officers and enlisted on Twitter, Dickson’s commanders initiated an “inquiry” — which is below a full-scale investigation — into Dickson, and suspended him pending the results of the inquiry.

The wife of Alex Vindman, the retired Army lieutenant colonel who testified during the impeachment hearing against former President Donald Trump, had also weighed in, tweeting:

Some of those left-wing veterans and service members pleaded for senior military leaders to weigh into the matter, as they did after Fox News host Tucker Carlson’s monologue about the United States military focused on accommodating pregnant women while China was busy building ships.

Most senior leaders did not explicitly comment on Dickson’s tweet, but the senior enlisted leader of the Army, Sergeant Major Michael Grinston, tweeted that the issue was being handled by Dickson’s command.

The episode is only the latest incident of left-wing veterans and service members calling for the punishment of a fellow service member whose they dislike or whose tweets they dislike, and only the latest incident of many incidents where they have attacked Dickson.

Many criticized Dickson in March after he pointed out that contrary to popular belief on the left, Fox News does not air 24/7 at all military bases and called for him to be fired.

Some progressives also went after Dickson in 2019 when he criticized American flag burning.

Dickson tweeted: “#BREAKING: You can dislike POTUS w/out desecrating Old Glory, the flag that symbolizes the freedoms you exercise.”

Dickson’s friend, who got roped into the outrage over his tweet, emphasized she herself was not offended by Dickson and called for people to stop bullying him.

She wrote:

My freakin tits are famous ‍♀️ Thanks a lot

I do not need a man to protect me so stop bullying and ruining someone’s career who I’ve carried body bags with for this country. I responded with MY words. I have the right to respond to derogatory and absolutely crude remarks in any way I see fit to go along my day. My response and reaction is mine alone. To everyone saying he should have said something about else, I am a 35 year old woman standing up for myself and making fun of men back, who clearly don’t know how to treat women or what breast sizes are. I told him what I wanted to say. Use another instance to fuel your media agenda.

According to another friend, local news reporters were waiting outside her gym in California and she had to be escorted to her home by police.

The controversy over Dickson’s tweet comes as conservatives serving in the U.S. military say they are facing persecution for going against woke ideology.

In recent months, service members have fallen under investigation and punishment after posting something online — even on their personal social media pages — for posting something that leftists in the military disagree with.

Army Chaplain Maj. Andrew Calvert received a letter of reprimand after he criticized on Facebook the Pentagon’s new policy allowing transgender recruits and service members to serve in their preferred gender.

His post received widespread attention after a left-wing veteran highlighted it on Twitter and tagged the chaplain’s chain of command and the Army secretary.

Air Force Lt. Col. Matthew Lohmeier was recently fired and put under investigation for political speech after saying that Marxism and critical race theory are spreading within the military. At least two dozen Republican lawmakers have called for his reinstatement to his job, and the top Republican on the House Armed Services Committee is now vowing to look into the issue of political bias in the military.

Follow Breitbart News’s Kristina Wong on Twitter or on Facebook. 

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