Picture this: You’re Willis Augustus Lee Jr., a future naval hero, world-class marksman, and certified badass. You’ve just crushed it at the 1920 Olympics, bagging five gold medals, a silver, and a bronze in shooting events. Your trigger finger is practically blessed by the gods of marksmanship. Surely, the Navy—known for its precision and prowess—would be thrilled to have you, right? Not so fast, champ. Turns out, the military doctors aren’t impressed. Why? Bad eyesight.
That’s right. You can outshoot practically anyone on the planet, but if you squint a little while reading an eye chart, the Navy’s medical team suddenly thinks you’re a liability. Never mind the fact that you can hit a bullseye from a mile away with glasses on, or that your vision is perfectly corrected to 20/20. Apparently, the Navy’s motto is “We Want You… Unless You’re Nearsighted.”
Let’s rewind. Young Willis, ambitious and brimming with patriotism, sets his sights on the Navy. But disaster strikes—literally. A childhood accident involving a homemade bomb damages his vision. (Note to kids: Don’t try this at home.) Undeterred, Willis presses on, determined to serve his country. He enters the U.S. Naval Academy, only to face repeated rejections for “defective vision.” Imagine the irony: the man who could probably shoot the wings off a fly at 100 yards is deemed unfit to stand watch because he might not see that fly without his glasses.
But wait—it gets better. While the Navy’s medical bureaucracy hems and haws over whether this Olympian sharpshooter can hack it, Willis is busy winning enough gold to make Scrooge McDuck jealous. Five gold medals, folks. Not just in one event, but in multiple. His trigger finger is so lethal, it probably has its own security clearance. And yet, the military doctors are all like, “Yeah, but how’s his peripheral vision?”
The cherry on top? Willis Lee goes on to command naval forces during World War II, including the legendary Battle of Guadalcanal, where his strategic brilliance turns the tide of the Pacific War. His reward? A Navy Cross and the eternal gratitude of a nation. Turns out, the guy with the “bad eyesight” could see just fine when it came to spotting opportunities and taking down enemies. Meanwhile, one has to wonder how many perfectly sighted individuals the Navy let in who couldn’t shoot a stationary target if their lives depended on it.
So, what’s the takeaway here? It’s simple: you can be the best shooter in the world, but if you fail an eye exam, don’t expect the military to be impressed. Sure, you can win an Olympic medal, save the free world, and become a naval legend, but you’ll always be that guy who needed glasses to read the fine print. Navy logic at its finest.
The moral of the story? Maybe the military should worry less about 20/20 vision and more about actual skill. After all, when the chips are down, who would you trust more: the Olympic marksman with glasses or the guy with perfect eyesight who can’t hit the broad side of a barn? Yeah, thought so.
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I was rejected for military service because my right eye failed the eye exam. My left eye passed at J-100 — that’s how the military scored it — but my right eye failed miserably. I was disappointed, but saw the logic: if I lost or broke my glasses in combat, I would have been virtually helpless.
Today? My left eye is 20/20, thanks to a great ophthalmologist doing my cataract surgery, but my right eye is toast: all I can see are blurs, and the field of vision is perhaps 25º wide.