Don't be condescending, I wanted to tell them. That's the dilemma, the division, the emotional contradiction around which these All-American macho movies build their tension. But in the gestalt of the film, these are the feelings to be overcome. Everything human is standing on its head. War is peace.
Abuse is the emblem of respect.
It is a moment that is at once both the Master Chief's defeat and his victory, where the painful tension of the film is resolved once and for all. O'Neil has won Master Chief's respect fair and square by beating him at his own game. By acknowledging her triumph and giving it to her as her reward, he wins her respect as well. He is tough, even brutal, but in the end he is fair, and by extension we are being told that the military establishment is, in the end, fair as well. The military woman becomes the military man, thus making the grade, even as men in the military must make the grade by beating down, shaming, and banishing the woman within.