The Department of Defense recently announced that it would be opening up all combat roles to women next month. It’s a big step, and it’s long overdue. But it’s not enough.

This year and the next, six of the seniors on the Talon’s editorial staff will be turning 18 years old — and accordingly, they’ll all be signing up for the Selective Service, which enables the U.S. government to draft young adults to serve in the military. But under current law, eight editorial staff seniors will not be. The reason behind this doesn’t have to do with their age, background or citizenship status — it is because they are women.

Yes, the Selective Service only includes males between the ages of 18 and 25, and excludes all women. It’s a distinction that even the Supreme Court upheld back in 1981, and a distinction that the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals is currently considering. It’s a distinction that is blatantly unfair, to both men and to women, because though American women can’t be drafted, they can vote for candidates who are willing to send brothers, husbands and sons to war — but not sisters, wives and daughters.

That is not gender equality. That is gender discrimination, against both men and women, and it is particularly pernicious in its origin.

In the early 1970s, many states ratified the proposed Equal Rights Amendment, which stated unequivocally, “Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” But, if you look through the U.S. Constitution, you won’t find that text anywhere — partly because anti-feminists, led by conservative activist Phyllis Schlafly (a woman), began a “Stop ERA” campaign that forced many states to rescind their ratifications and compelled the rest to not ratify the ERA at all. And a central tenet of the “Stop ERA” movement was the idea (apparently horrifying to many) that an Equal Rights Amendment would lead to the drafting of women.

Today, that idea is not nearly so horrifying, nor should it be. But many do, in good faith, question the concepts of women being drafted and women in combat. Many point to a study released this year by the Marine Corps, which indicated that all-male units outperformed coed units. However, Rand Corp., a think tank, released another study Dec. 3 that was sponsored by the Marine Corps — and this study concluded that coed units would perform just as strongly, provided that the men in the unit viewed women as equals.

Standards should not be lowered for women to enter combat units. They don’t need to be — many women are capable of meeting and exceeding those standards, like the first women to graduate from the Army Rangers program in August 2015.

Simply put, we cannot be selective regarding women’s rights. We cannot pick and choose which laws and social conventions are the most convenient to men or to women — be it equal pay without the women also paying for dates, maternity leave without paternity leave or voting without being eligible for the draft. We must ensure that women are equal in every aspect of life, as women are equal as American citizens and equal in their measure of patriotism toward the United States — and ending the exemption of women from the draft would be a strong signal that we truly believe that.