Cover boys
CommentsIn recent weeks supporters of an end to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” have pointed to the military magazines of England and Israel, which have featured openly gay soldiers on their covers. England’s official magazine Soldier featured a gay servicemen next to the word “Pride” on its front. Israel’s army magazine earlier this year showed two soldiers hugging on its cover.
The idea is supposed to be, “Look at these other countries, how easy the transition has been to including open gays in the military.”
I take a different message away from it: that once the military accepts open gays, the next step will be for it to celebrate them. We should be able to have fair employment policies without the United States government putting its imprimatur on homosexuality as something to brag about.
I support ending DADT for non-combat positions because I think such a step will help the military in its mission to fight and win wars. But I don’t have any illusions that that step won’t also lead to the gay community asking for more and more and more. I don’t want Navy ship captains to be performing same-sex marriages between sailors. I don’t want the government to offer servicemembers partner benefits available only to those the person in question is having gay sex with, and not others who might be equally worthy of benefits. But we’ve seen in the non-discrimination and gay marriage debates that the gay community will say, “Oh, we’re only looking for this little thing,” and pretty soon they’ll use that as a wedge to foist different policies on an unwilling public.
Unlike many other democratic nations, the armed forces of Israel allow service without any distinction based on sexual orientation. Since 1993, homosexuals have been allowed to openly serve in the military, including special units. WIKI
More than 55 years ago, President Harry Truman desegregated the military. His courageous act received a hostile reaction from some Americans. Many of the same arguments made against President Truman’s decision can be heard again today as a way of keeping openly gay Americans from serving this nation. Since World War II,110,000 Americans have been discharged from the military for being gay or lesbian. Tens of thousands of others have served in secrecy, with distinction. Some have given their lives in defense of freedom. The Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy tramples the principles they died protecting. It rips at the fabric of liberty that so many thousands have died defending. The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy must be transformed into Don’t Discriminate, Don’t Surrender! Log Cabin Republicans Chicago
well, David, the last little thing is your use of Imprimatur: (from Latin, “let it be printed”) is an official declaration from the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church that a literary or similar work is free from error in matters of Roman Catholic doctrine, and hence acceptable reading for faithful Roman Catholics.
Keep on truckin’ DB.
Gays will be in allowed to serve openly in the military when enlisted women are forced to shower with men.
oh my g-d Roger, lookie what I found
29 countries that allow gays to serve in their military units.
2.1 Argentina
2.2 Australia
2.3 Austria
2.4 Belgium
2.5 Bermuda
2.6 Canada
2.7 Czech Republic
2.8 Denmark
2.9 Estonia
2.10 Finland
2.11 France
2.12 Germany
2.13 Ireland
2.14 Israel
2.15 Italy
2.16 Lithuania
2.17 Luxembourg
2.18 The Netherlands
2.19 New Zealand
2.20 Norway
2.21 Philippines
2.22 Romania
2.23 Slovenia
2.24 South Africa
2.25 Spain
2.26 Sweden
2.27 Switzerland
2.28 United Kingdom
2.29 Uruguay
wiki
So, Rusty, would you thus tell women in the military that they too should shower in front of the men? And that if they feel the men are looking at them with too much, er, interest, that they should just grin and bear it? And that if it bothers them, that maybe it’s because they’re as sexually interested in the men as the men are in them but aren’t secure enough to admit it to themselves? (Which I’m sure was going to be one of your smart retorts).
Yes, some countries are doing it, but Roger raises a point about a problem nevertheless.
1) How effective are any of the military’s listed? None could sustain a major deployment..and it isn’t just logistics. They have fully embraced a Government Worker, bureaucrat ethos, not a warrior ethos critical to success on the battlefield. Some have even unionized.
2) The official policy may allow gays in a nation’s military, but how many gays come out of the closet and admit it? Not many. Especially in combat units. Nobody wants to be the victim of a Blanket Party.
3) Regulations will not stop Vigilante retribution against open homosexuals. Blanket parties will only end when people view sex as devoid of any meaning, no different than a burp or a fart. Just a physical release. No moral consequences. Nothing to get worked up about. That is when men and women will no longer object to being forced to shower together.
some???? 29 yes that is some number.
logistics are just issues to be worked out. there are many women serving in the forces deployed in both Iran and Afghanistan. HMMM guess they have worked out those logistics.
argue away boys but the end of DADT is not far off. closer than you think. and then
change is such a hard thing to get ahandle on for some.
ciao
some???? 29 yes that is some number.
If you count countries not fully independent, like Bermuda, which you included, there are about 226 countries in the world, which means it’s still at 13 per cent.
But then, I know, some countries count more than others.
logistics are just issues to be worked out. there are many women serving in the forces deployed in both Iran and Afghanistan. HMMM guess they have worked out those logistics.
Are they showering in front of the men? Or do you propose that gays shower separately from straights?
argue away boys but the end of DADT is not far off. closer than you think. and then
change is such a hard thing to get ahandle on for some.
Arguing inevitability does not refute the arguments against something. Mankind makes mistakes in the name of “progress”. Global warming is probably inevitable too. Maybe jihad is too, though I hope not.
I’m not a hard-line opponent of gays in the military. I don’t think they should be barred from serving simply because they are gay. But that does not mean I do not see some problem situations arising. I would really like to see “Don’t ask, don’t tell” replaced with “Don’t ask, don’t boast or advertise”
But keep using inevitability arguments to avoid answering questions if you wish, Rusty.
chew on this a little more RK. . . More than 55 years ago, President Harry Truman desegregated the military. His courageous act received a hostile reaction from some Americans. Many of the same arguments made against President Truman’s decision can be heard again today as a way of keeping openly gay Americans from serving this nation.
and then. . .”So I looked at that survey of Soldiers. And I wondered: What do they know that I don’t? What makes 86 percent of them so sure that females might as well be out there kicking in doors alongside their male comrades? Not too long ago, male servicemembers were among the biggest opponents of women in uniform, much less in combat.
Well, nowadays most of those guys are serving in coed units. So apparently familiarity doesn’t breed contempt — it breeds respect. I learned that the same thing happened when President Truman ended racial segregation in the military. Defenders of the status quo predicted that units would fall apart if whites were forced to fight alongside blacks. But today our military is a more effective fighting force because of integration. ”
It’s true that in coed units, good order and discipline are sometimes undermined by problems such as sexual harassment and inappropriate romantic relationships. But, the source of those problems is poor leadership, not hormone-addled servicemembers.
http://www.military.com/opinion/0,15202,163773,00.html
NEXT>
I learned that the same thing happened when President Truman ended racial segregation in the military. Defenders of the status quo predicted that units would fall apart if whites were forced to fight alongside blacks. But today our military is a more effective fighting force because of integration.
Please note how this completely brushes aside the elephant in the room, which applies to gender integration and homosexuality in the military, but simply doesn’t apply to race.
Again, Rusty, and please answer the question instead of evading it, do you propose that women in the military (or in integrated combat units) shower or bathe in front of the men? Or do you propose that gays shower or bathe separately from straights? The questions are relevant here.
It’s true that in coed units, good order and discipline are sometimes undermined by problems such as sexual harassment and inappropriate romantic relationships. But, the source of those problems is poor leadership, not hormone-addled servicemembers.
No, the source is human nature.
well here’s a nice conservative voice for you. . .
Dale Carpenter http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dale_Carpenter
He blogs for IGF and for the Volokh Conspiracy (www.volokh.com), a conservative/libertarian legal blog. From 1994-2009, he wrote a regular column, “OutRight,” for several gay publications across the country.
here are tidbits from Carpenter http://www.indegayforum.org/news/show/26630.html
IT ALL COMES DOWN TO THE SHOWERS, doesn’t it? Sure, some experts defend the military’s anti-gay policy with abstruse concepts like “unit cohesion.” But those are just words. Behind the words is sexual anxiety about homosexuals. A retired Marine commandant who helped design President Clinton’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy recently said on national television that he would be uncomfortable sharing “body heat” with a gay soldier on a cold battlefield.
Carpenter continues: We must first recognize that the issue is not, “Shall we let gays serve?” Gays have always served in the military and always will. The issue is, “Shall we let gays who serve be honest about being gay?”
so. . . ” The male-female analogy also misses the gay-straight dynamic in important ways. In the male-female context, the anticipated sexual aggressors (heterosexual males) are in the majority. Their aggression is often approved and even encouraged by their peers. Under those circumstances, the need for formalized separation from the objects of their desire is understandable.
In the gay-straight context, on the contrary, the anticipated sexual aggressors (known gays) are a tiny minority of the whole. Their aggression is disapproved by their peers, and therefore far less likely to occur or be as intimidating when it does.
Because straight men and women are the overwhelming majority in the military, the expected problems associated with mixing them in close quarters would be frequent and widespread. Mixing straights with a tiny number of openly gay personnel, on the other hand, would occasion comparatively few incidents. To say it would impair the military’s effectiveness is silly.
Too, the military separates men and women because it rightly assumes that at least some of the attraction between them will be mutual. We separate straight men and women because they can’t keep their hands off each other.
Yet straight men, some of whom recoil even at homosexual body heat, would be the first to say they’ll be strictly hands-off with gay men. I say let’s take them at their word.
NEXT >
“When you hate, the only one that suffers is you because most of the people you hate don’t know it and the rest don’t care.” medger evers
Rusty, the issue is not even one of “sexual aggression” or the . It’s about the mere discomfort people have with being looked at in a sexual way, especially when naked. Are you, and Carpenter (who I often do respect as an adversary in this debate), saying that if one man walked in on a hundred women showering, the women would not feel just as uncomfortable about it? Or that they would not be justified in feeling uncomfortable about it? (Hey, go a step further, make it about one man walking in on a hundred lesbian women showering and tell me that they would not or should not be uncomfortable about that).
And as it relates to military effectiveness, the question is not whether or not it should make people uncomfortable to be seen naked by someone who may be getting sexually aroused by it, but whether in fact it does, because this is what can affect unit cohesion, which really is important in a military.
Still, I again stress that I do not have that big an issue with gays in the military, at least not in and of itself. I have a far bigger objection to the issue of putting women into combat or drafting them than I do with letting gays serve. But we are getting off tangent with that.
(Suffice it to say, I have heard enough stories from recent veterans that do not paint at all the rose-colored picture Kristin Henderson paints, but talking about them while troops are still engaged over there would be aiding their adversaries. Also, when it comes to anything relating to perceived “equality”, I find you have to ask the question: would we really hear about anything if it was seen to aid arguments against the “equality”. In this journalistic culture, no).
Advocates for gays in the military have a good point that a totally exclusionary policy, or one in which they are discharged if “outed”, makes them vulnerable to blackmail, and that is why discharging them because of exposure from another party should be prohibited. Nor do I see a problem with their telling high rank officers or recruiters about it. The problem is more likely to arise if it is boasted about or advertised to fellow officers of equal or lower rank. And neither you nor Dale are countering that.
BTW, believe it or not, same-sex marriage and women in combat are essentially the only issues that I am hard-line “conservative” on. Please don’t pigeonhole me.
Oh, and, please don’t equate hate with feeling strongly about an issue, even if that issue involves perceived “equality”. I, and I’m sure you as well, don’t believe eight-year-olds should marry, but that does not mean we hate eight-year-olds. And don’t say that I just “compared” gays to eight-year-olds.
Correction: first sentence above should have read “Rusty, the issue is not even one of “sexual aggression” or the possibility of relationships developing.
Okkee Dokee RK. I am not equating hate with feeling strongly about an issue. What is bothersome is that because when folk feel discomfort about something that tends to lead to irrational statements and proclamations.
First. . .Although women are recruited to serve in the military in most countries, only a few countries permit women to fill active combat roles. Countries that allow this include New Zealand, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Norway, Israel, Sweden and Switzerland. Other nations allow female soldiers to serve in certain Combat Arms positions, such as the United Kingdom, which allows women to serve in Artillery roles, while still excluding them from units with a dedicated Infantry role. The United States allows women in most combat flying positions. wiki
So, women are electing to chose to join the military in those countries and some even look to combat roles. THAT is their choice.
Now RK, I have no idea if you have ever been in the military. I was just a signature away following my undergraduate work from joining the Air Force. But declined because I had been dealing with ‘coming out’. That was in ‘86. I have many family members who have served, some lifers, others just the the minimum. But it is a choice to enlist. I do know some folk from the ‘draft days’. But the military is a choice.
If folk have a problem with being naked. . .well sounds like a personal issue. It happens to be part of the life in the military. I have friends who have served in the recent Iraqi and Afghanistan tours and have had very positive reports of their gay patriot friends.
Realistically, if there is someone not confident enough to shower naked with other men, what does that really say about their ability to confront the enemy. And many of the folk, both men and women who are currently entering/enlisting in the military, have had exposure to gay and lesbian folk in high school and even college. Some even played sports and showered with them in lockerrooms.
I think that maybe those men truly secure with there sexuality really aren’t going to be bothered. Now, if there are some men (and women) who are bisexual, well, that might be a little bothersome. But the stories of the comraderie (sp) coming from the men and women of our current active military forces shed a positive light on those ‘out’ members. And yes there are many straight folk out there protecting their gay and lesbian friends in the military with their own version of ‘don’t ask-don’t tell’
Carpenter put it. . .Gays have always served in the military and always will.
Since World War II,110,000 Americans have been discharged from the military for being gay or lesbian. Tens of thousands of others have served in secrecy, with distinction. Some have given their lives in defense of freedom. The Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy tramples the principles they died protecting. It rips at the fabric of liberty that so many thousands have died defending. The Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell policy must be transformed into Don’t Discriminate, Don’t Surrender! Log Cabin Republicans Chicago
And please don’t take the Evers quote too seriously. I put it in this thread because of my recent viewing of Ghosts of Mississippi. Another time and place where people weren’t willing to even mix with people of color because of the supposed discomfort that might be caused if we were to mix the races or even consider integration.
I think that maybe those men truly secure with there sexuality really aren’t going to be bothered.
So, would you thus agree that lesbians truly secure with their sexuality really aren’t going to be (or shouldn’t be) bothered by men looking at them lustfully either? Or are you going to contend that if they are bothered, it “proves” that they are really bisexual and don’t want to admit it?
But you don’t understand. The issue is not whether or not people should be uncomfortable about such things. It is not about whether or not some, or many, or even most are NOT uncomfortable. It is about whether or not enough of them WILL be uncomfortable about it that it will affect military cohesion. Laugh if you will, but these things can well make the difference when the battle is close rather than assured. (Similar to the way small things can affect society through time). Lately, we have been dealing with adversaries whose militaries were technically and organizationally so much less sophisticated that those differences were able to mask any weaknesses of ours which could tip the scales in a close situation.
Still, yes, I’ll agree that (unlike the case with women) homosexuals have served in militaries throughout history. I agree that they should not be discharged because they get “found out”. But I feel there is enough area of concern that a policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Boast, Don’t Advertise It” would be best.
And, since you asked, I was ready to enlist years ago, but they rejected me flat because of asthma. Even for a desk job. I’m not bitter about it, really. In a close situation, that could have made a lot of difference. But “equality” overrides that concern for some but not others. Or, as Orwell put it, some are more equal than others.
I agree that it seems to boil down to situations like the infamous showering that gets under people’s skin.
The question I always find puzzling in this debate is aren’t these men and women soldiers? They have been trained to engage in combat and to resist natural responses (fear, flight response to danger), but they are always portrayed in this instance of being completely incapable of getting past their topical aversion.
In the analogy above of a lone man showering with 100 women (even if they are lesbians), even if he does look at them lustfully and that makes the women uncomfortable, it’s still only a look. Acting on the impulse would be improper, but everyone (the man and the women) recognizing that arousal is possible is irrelevant.
Are there not men on the battlefield right now that may look at the women they serve with lustfully? Should we protect those women too? Or only if they are in the barracks?
A gay man in a regiment of all straight men making inappropriate advances, comments, or gestures can be disciplined apporpriately under current military harassment statures. DO those that oppose the DADTDP repeal think that once it is gone all bets are off and now suddenly the “predatory gays” are going to have their way with all the personnel.
If the soldiers of our country are so unable to control themselves with the sheer knowledge of knowing that one of their comrades is gay, then perhaps they should not be soldiers at all. Right now, they guess at whose gay in the bunk next to them; the repeal of DADTDP simply lets soldiers say that they are gay and not get thrown out of the military and nothing more.
Oh, and lastly let’s look at the “Don’t Boast, Don’t Advertise” shtick. Would that apply to heterosexuals as well? Seeing as even Galdware uses sexuality to sell tupperware I guess you count that as normal, but a person simply saying “I have a boy/girlfriend of the same sex” is “boasting.” Most every piece of advertising, television, movie, and music reference heterosexual relationships (usually dripping with sexual connotations and innuendo) and that seems okay by your standards; you don’t see that as heterosexual “boasting.”
From my perspective, I don’t see getting flooded every day with heterosexual context as boasting, just a consequence of it being the majority experience. However, I expect the same right to casually reference my (homosexual) relationships without being told I’m “flaunting” it. Some public displays are inappropriate and superfluous regardless of attendees, i.e. raunchy gay pride parades say and represent as little about the gay community as Mardi Gras does of the straight community.
What this all boils down to is the confusion between the ideal and the real.
The ideal, I guess you feel, HFW, is a world in which nobody lets these things get to them.
The real, though, is that many do, and we can’t say ahead of time just who and how much.
And in a close situation little things like this can tip scales.
Really, I think the last statement there is at the core of the difference between the two sides here on most of these issues. Many refuse to believe that small things can accumulate to take down the big things.
DB: ‘The idea is supposed to be, “Look at these other countries, how easy the transition has been to including open gays in the military.” ‘
Certainly that’s the idea of drawing attention to the covers, and to the experience of other militaries more generally.
DB: “I take a different message away from it: that once the military accepts open gays, the next step will be for it to celebrate them.”
Certainly, that’s a significant part of the idea of putting them on the covers in the first place: to celebrate their presence in the military and the breaking down of the unproductive taboo that formerly kept them out. And in turn, in significant part that’s to attract more qualified gay people into the military, by reassuring them that the military is serious about the welcome.
DB: “We should be able to have fair employment policies without the United States government putting its imprimatur on homosexuality as something to brag about.”
You have a problem with celebrating the breaking down of unproductive taboos?
DB: “I support ending DADT for non-combat positions because I think such a step will help the military in its mission to fight and win wars. But I don’t have any illusions that that step won’t also lead to the gay community asking for more and more and more.”
Of course. The first thing we’re going to insist on is dropping the baseless restriction to non-combat positions. (I hope you weren’t expecting credit for reasonableness in being prepared to meet the gay lobby halfway. Wisdom is not always halfway between opposing views, and it’s especially not likely to be halfway between the experience of the many countries that have tried the experiment and armchair speculation in a country that has not.)
DB: “I don’t want Navy ship captains to be performing same-sex marriages between sailors.”
Well if Navy ship captains were marrying opposite-sex couples we would naturally insist that they marry same-sex ones as well, but in fact not only are they not authorized to celebrate marriages, they’re explicitly prohibited:
http://0-frwebgate.access.gpo.gov.library.colby.edu/cgi-bin/get-cfr.cgi?TITLE=32&PART=700&SECTION=716&YEAR=1998&TYPE=TEXT
DB: “I don’t want the government to offer servicemembers partner benefits available only to those the person in question is having gay sex with, and not others who might be equally worthy of benefits.”
Why on earth would we ask for that? Gay servicepeople don’t want the military in their bedrooms checking whether they’re having sex anymore than straight ones. We want the same deal as straight service people actually get, not the deal that a bunch of sex-obsessed God-botherers would like to imagine straight servicepeople get.
I am left to wonder why this issue is even a big deal. With DADT, gays are allowed to serve their country.
But why must anyone be openly gay while serving their country? Why must someone be openly Goth, or openly redneck, or openly any number of a myriad categories while serving their country?
For any military to work effectively, everyone must be on the same page. I think DADT should be expanded to include musical preference, style of dress, or anything else that makes a person an individual. The military is not a place to show off what a non-conformist you are. It is a place where everyone has to be acting in unison, with one mind, or people die. If you REALLY MUST serve your country AND be Out-n-Proud, the DMV might be a better fit.
DK: “But why must anyone be openly gay while serving their country?”
What do think “openly gay” means that you would ask such a question? The main thing it means is feeling free to mention or otherwise be public about one’s same sex spouse or partner or boyfriend or girlfriend or one-night stand(s) whenever it would be natural and appropriate to mention an opposite-sex one. That’s going to be pretty much never on-duty, but moderately often off-duty - relationships are a staple topic of conversation. Do you have a problem with gay people mentioning their relationships off-duty when the subject comes up? If so, why should we care? If not, what exactly is it that you have a problem with?
what Gay FOLK are really gonna do. . .let’s see, intitute a change in the uniform. current style and color just not suitable. and the menu, puhlease, those gay folk will be turning the kitchens upside down. Reveille will be replaced with fun disco music and/or melissa ethridge.
There will be an increase in butt slapping, issues of the Advocate will be in foot lockers, and the bathrooms will have distinctive cologne by high end folk replacing old spice and mennen speed stick.
Lesbians will be driving high end trucks and even muscle cars onto and around military bases.
But really, gay and lesbian folk who have chosen to enlist and serve their country are going to continue serving and some of them are fighting DADT.
Lt. Col. Victor Fehrenbach, The winner of nine air medals for distinguished service in flight, including one for heroism the night U.S. forces captured Baghdad International Airport in 2003, Fehrenbach is in the process of getting kicked out of the military a year after an acquaintance told his bosses he was gay. . .
“I will fight this in uniform and I’ll fight it without,” Fehrenbach said. “I swore an oath to defend and support the Constitution, I’m going to speak out and fight this until the law is repealed because it is not constitutional.”
He said “don’t ask, don’t tell” denies American service members their constitutional right to privacy, due process and equal protection, and forces them to lie about who they are when honesty is part of the code they serve under. msnbc
Fehrenbach is in the process of getting kicked out of the military a year after an acquaintance told his bosses he was gay
That I’m against. Exposure from third parties should not result in discharge.
Otherwise, Daiichi Kuronama above puts it best: “The military is not a place to show off what a non-conformist you are”. If anyone is doing that, for whatever reason, and it becomes too much of a problem for unit cohesion, the law should not be tying the military’s hands.
The arguments so far against “don’t tell, don’t boast” just amount to arguments that it wouldn’t be fair because heteros can still boast about it. Sorry, but the military’s purpose isn’t to be fair about all aspects of life, it’s to win wars. It should not be hamstrung by laws which encourage blackmail (note my fifth paragraph in my August 11 20:03 post) or by laws that cause the weakening of unit cohesion.
there RK. here is your answer
“I will fight this in uniform and I’ll fight it without,” Fehrenbach said. “I swore an oath to defend and support the Constitution, I’m going to speak out and fight this until the law is repealed because it is not constitutional.”
He said “don’t ask, don’t tell” denies American service members their constitutional right to privacy, due process and equal protection, and forces them to lie about who they are when honesty is part of the code they serve under.
Rusty, I just got through saying that gays should NOT be discharged through the act of a third party, as Fehrenbach was, and I’m not for them “lying” about it either. You’re just repeating your platitudes and not addressing what I actually said.
However, my comment of 19:16: “The arguments so far against ‘don’t tell, don’t boast’…” should read “The arguments so far against ‘don’t ask, don’t boast’….”. My error there, sorry if that caused confusion, though I had made this clear in previous posts.
Do we all at least agree that the “don’t ask” part should be retained? Or do some here think that should go too?
BTW, I think that a heterosexual in the military who badgers others (even of equal rank) with questions about whether or not they are gay is as much a threat to unit cohesion as one who boasts excessively about his being gay (probably even more so), and should be treated accordingly.
Here are some fun cover boys. . .some of them are even gay
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOROaABCBgQ
Even Hollywood had it’s own DADT. . .
Some of the brightest have even played ‘gay’ men. and won awards
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBuDMEpUc8k
Cool. Here’s the women.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vEc4YWICeXk
RK: “I would really like to see “Don’t ask, don’t tell” replaced with “Don’t ask, don’t boast or advertise”.”
What on earth do you imagine that would accomplish? Anyone would think you thought that DADT was close to a good policy on the merits and just needed a bit of tweaking. And to the extent that’s true, it’s a sign of how unmoored the discussion has become from where it started. Nobody involved in the passing of DADT thought it was a sensible policy - Clinton thought it was the least bad deal he could get and the conservatives who got the last word on the text of the law were literally having a joke at his expense. Certainly no one thought it was about showers. It was all about gay sex.
Shorter DADT: Having same-sex sex is prejudicial to good order and military discipline. It is vital that all personnel having same-sex sex or likely to have same-sex sex be thrown out. We make a non-binding recommendation that the Secretary of Defence consider not Asking and giving warnings against Telling. But if (ha, ha) that turns out not to be the best way to expel personnel likely to have gay sex, we encourage him to do whatever it takes.
No, seriously, that’s what the law amounts to: http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/rainbow/html/dontasklaw.html .
RK: “Again, Rusty, and please answer the question instead of evading it, do you propose that women in the military (or in integrated combat units) shower or bathe in front of the men? Or do you propose that gays shower or bathe separately from straights? The questions are relevant here.”
Fair question, so I’ll give my answer as well: I would maintain shower segregation for the sexes, because what I take to justify that in the first place is more the power imbalance than the gender contrast. But I wouldn’t institute shower segregation for each sex individually because gays and straights are already showering together in the military and it doesn’t seem to have been a problem. The gay guys are undoubtedly very discretely ogling the good-looking guys, gay or straight, and any straight guy with enough brain cells to be in the military must realize there’s a possibility he’s being ogled. He’s certainly being sized up, if only by other straight guys. If he wasn’t up for that, he shouldn’t have joined the military.
RK: “It is about whether or not enough of them WILL be uncomfortable about it that it will affect military cohesion.”
No, it’s about whether enough of them will be uncomfortable that you can’t throw their sorry homophobic asses out and replace them by all the extra gay guys who will want to join.
You folks are missing the whole point. We don’t keep the sexes separate because they would be uncomfortable. We keep them separate because they might get too comfortable. If the sexes were not separated the Barracks could quickly turn into a non-stop bacchanalia.
jim b over at BTB. . .
Air Force Lt. Col Victor Fehrenbach has made the rounds on radio and television ever since he came forward with the news that the Air Force was trying to discharge him under “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” He even scored a meeting at the White House during the much-derided LGBT Cocktail Party to mark the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Rebellion in June. What hasn’t been told was how Lt. Col Fehrenbach got caught in the DADT crosshairs to begin with:
Fehrenbach confronted a crisis in a very different setting. A Boise police detective sat across a conference table questioning him about an alleged crime.
Fehrenbach, stationed at Mountain Home Air Force Base, was in a Catch-22. To clear himself of the claim he’d raped a man, Fehrenbach could tell police his side of the story. But admitting he’d had consensual sex could get him kicked out of the Air Force he loved after 18 years.
Fehrenbach asked Detective Mark Vucinich whether his employer had a right to see his statement. Yes, replied Vucinich.
Fehrenbach then told the detective he had sex with Cameron Shaner on May 12, 2008. He’d met Shaner, 30, on a gay Web site and invited him to his southeast Boise home.
Police and Air Foce investigations found no evidence that Lt. Col. Fehrenbach committed any crime. But Shaner, a discharged Army Veteran with a 100 percent service-connected disability for post-traumatic stress disorder and skeletal injuries, pressed the Air Force to begin discharge proceedings against Fehrenbach — all because of a false allegation:
Because of the criminal allegation, Victor confirmed the fact he was gay,” said Emily Hecht, a lawyer for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Fund. “That’s all the Air Force needed. Had his accuser been a woman, he’d have gone back to work with no further issue.”
The unique circumstances behind Fehrenbach’s case has caught the attention of Defense Secretary Bill Gates and Air Force Secretary Michael Donley, who has the final call on whether Fehrenbach will be dismissed. He is currently still on active duty at Mountain Home Air Force Base near Boise, Idaho.
Where is David??? He’s not bailing out AGAIN is he???
david seems busy with this. . .
http://www.stljewishlight.com/topstories/15319555876295.php
more cover boys. . .http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDS3py71hvE