I’ve been thinking about this point on and off since early February, when I attended a SF convention called Potlatch and a panel called Women Ruin War, The Gendering of MilSF.
A man in the audience asked if there were any female combat veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan who are writing genre fiction.
He kept asking this question again and again.
By repeating his query, he implied that no female writer could write with authority about war, combat or the military without having served.
I found this attitude incredibly frustrating.