Today marks the official end of the eighteen-year-old "don't ask, don't tell" policy and, in a sense, the end of a 233-year-old American shame, as formal anti-gay discrimination in our armed forces is older than the nation itself. As someone who worked to end this policy for more than a decade, I will join with countless other advocates of equality in celebrating this day as a watershed in our nation's long march toward justice.
Yet it's critical that we not rest on our laurels. Some of the most troubling instincts that lay behind this odious law remain a threat to the freedoms not only of gay people but of every American. My fear as I celebrate the passing of the military's anti-gay exclusion, along with other gains in gay rights, is that these victories may sap the energy that still has the best shot at fighting not only discrimination, but other base instincts in American life that continue to hold us back from reaching our greatest potential.
What do I mean by this? What are the attitudes and beliefs that propped up the gay ban and threaten to continue their infection of American freedom?
First, let me be clear that I have no intention of dampening a day that is rightly a moment of profound pride for our country. And so let me mention a few reasons why I joined this fight and why this day is so historic.
One of the marks of equal citizenship is the ability not just to enjoy the benefits of one's country but to give back to it. As in any relationship, citizenship means give and take. But one of the most insidious -- and effective -- dimensions of the gay ban was that it deprived the world of witnessing gay people giving back, serving their country, exhibiting the same valor and self-sacrifice as their peers. That's why the right wing fixated on gays in the military -- because if the world could see that gay men and women were proud, effective warriors, and were willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for their country, it would shatter the careful apparatus of myths they'd spent generations creating, the fiction that said gay people were only interested in their own pleasure and not, in equal parts to everyone else, in the noble effort to serve the greater good. It would shatter the myth that gay people are incapable of self-sacrifice and unworthy of first-class citizenship.
The image of two gay soldiers who -- like straight soldiers -- may even form a happy, healthy couple, striding confidently across the grounds of a U.S. military base, causing no harm but no longer needing to hide, is bound to further retire that myth, to help bring the U.S. military and our society at-large, more fully into the twenty-first century. Two hundred and thirty-three years of having to hide who they are in order to serve ends today.
It was also not always appreciated just what needless, harrowing damage this policy caused to LGBT service members and to the military more broadly: the need to hide who you are to those who are supposed to be your brothers and sisters; the constant threat of punishment, harassment and discharge; the daily indignities of serving an institution that deemed you too shameful to serve honestly; and the loss of critical talent that resulted from firing highly competent troops for something totally unrelated to performance. America invented modern meritocracy and made a mockery of it every time it placed prejudice over fairness. The world watches us as a beacon, as the Puritans liked to say, and in recent years, we have often failed to be the model of democracy so many have sought. Today we hope they're looking a little bit closer.
Now, the challenges ahead. For starters, the change in law does not go far enough. It does not ban discrimination, but merely ends the policy of firing those who are found to be gay. It does not include a mechanism to formally redress the grievances of those who suffer from discrimination. Same-sex couples remain second-class patriots, as federal law will continue to deny them numerous benefits and protections given to their heterosexual peers. Reinstatement and back pay issues must still be resolved. The Uniform Code of Military Justice remains unchanged, making all kinds of non-missionary sex, along with adultery, into jailable offenses. And, unconscionably, the change in law does not alter the fact that transgender service members still cannot serve in uniform.
But in addition to the ongoing policy reform that's still needed, there is an underlying cultural issue -- an ailment of the American psyche -- that's propped up this policy and other prejudices for far too long. "Don't ask, don't tell" was sustained by a foundation not only of anti-gay sentiment but of denial, the long, sad American tradition of repressing unacceptable -- or unrespectable -- feelings. After all, this policy was not, like other forms of discrimination, about hording resources or seeking status so much as about restricting knowledge in an effort to control behavior. The policy, at least on its surface, did not exclude people but denied knowledge of their existence, removing them only when they (or, as was often the case, a third party) punctured the shared fiction that they did not exist. It was a policy that said gay people could be good soldiers and could die for their country, but homosexuality was so shameful and threatening that it was, quite literally, unspeakable. It was a policy of collective denial in which a nation, through its laws, expressed a belief that the Enlightenment ideal of genuine freedom through self-knowledge and self-government was a charade, and that what was really needed to maintain stability and cohesion was ignorance, the repression of any knowledge about difference, especially sexual difference.
The LGBT rights movement has historically taken aim not only at legal inequality but at this heritage of repression in the American psyche that has kept ordinary people from confronting and accepting their own feelings when those feelings are taboo. This, of course, is the full meaning of the word, "homophobia," a word which denotes not just dislike of gay people, but fear of one's own inner workings, a discomfort with desire, sexuality, difference and anything that challenges norms.
This is why "don't ask, don't tell" was so insidious: it mocked the Enlightenment's promise that people were capable of self-mastery through self-knowledge, opting instead for a restricted and impoverished vision of social order that relies on burying our feelings in hopes of keeping their chimerical threats at bay. Indeed, the radical contribution of America's founders was the ideal that, in a democracy, where ordinary people were given extraordinary freedom, those people could exercise the moral autonomy to govern their desires and passions without having to pretend they didn't exist in order to behave.
For years, gay people have been painted as inherently unable to control their desires. Never mind that same-sex desire is not something that should need to be controlled in the first place. The myth of the oversexed gay bogeyman was, in fact, a ruse to disown feelings that are really shared by everyone. Far easier to define others as intrinsically uncontrollable than to confront your own vulnerability to temptation, whatever that may be. And messy, unrespectable feelings dwell in us all. When we refuse to confront that side of ourselves, we're left with a shell of repression, with the kinds of consequences we've seen not only under "don't ask, don't tell" but also in the revelations of the secret and destructive double lives of too many governors, lawmakers, pastors, and -- to be sure -- millions of ordinary people.
The alternative to confronting our true selves is to pretend that our less respectable drives don't exist, or to create a fiction that only other people have them. This means cruelty to our chosen scapegoats and, equally harmful, the abdication of responsibility for our own feelings and acts. The deadly recipe locks inequality -- of all kinds -- into place.
From Thomas Jefferson to Martin Luther King, Jr. and beyond, our nation's most brilliant and passionate advocates for freedom have taught us that discrimination's victims are not only its targets but its perpetrators. As a slaveholder, Jefferson was well-positioned to inveigh against the harm wrought to the master's soul by the unrestrained greed of slavery (which rightly earned him charges of high hypocrisy). One of King's greatest intellectual contributions to our understanding of American freedom was that integration liberated not only African Americans but segregationists and indeed an entire country. It did this by changing a political and economic system that had held itself back by summarily disqualifying some of its best talent, but also by changing people's insides -- by repairing psyches where needless hatred, anger, repression and a false sense of superiority had been allowed to fester.
The passing of "don't ask, don't tell" is a victory for all Americans. But it's not the end of the line. "Don't ask, don't tell" -- the policy and even the mere phrase -- says much about who we are as Americans. What we do in its wake will help shape what it means to be an American in the twenty-first century -- well beyond the rise and fall of this bizarre and convoluted law. As we bury this policy, we must ask if we've learned anything from its many failures. What its history suggests is how far we, as a culture, have yet to go in achieving a vision of democratic freedom marked by genuine moral autonomy, one which does not rely on collective fictions -- about sexuality or about anything else -- to function.
Nathaniel Frank: Will Defenders of DADT Stand By Their Dire Predictions?
"Don't ask, don't tell" consigned to history
Academies don't expect much change from DADT end
As DADT ends, gay officer sheds his alias
After Don't Ask, Don't Tell: The ongoing battle
'Don't ask, don't tell' ends: Soldier tells his father he's gay (video)
Burning Questions on DADT Repeal
Being in the minority doesn't mean you're "wrong" -- nor did it make the supporters of gay marriage, when they were. But there are two points where I do think you're mistaken. First, is your assumption that gay men and women "feel wrong" once married. Most I've known feel triumphant. Second, accusing them of "flaunting their gay ways" misunderstands and minimizes those who have fought so hard to be accorded the same rights under the Constitution as are the rest of us.
Why the gay parades, you ask? For the same reason there were civil rights marches. Repealing DADT - or winning the right to wed one another - have hardly come easily to the gay community. They're not things one achieves while hiding in a closet.
I do know that both concepts (gay marriage and gays serving openly in the military) offend you mightily. And I would fight as hard to defend your right to express that -- as I would the rights of others to protest publicly to achieve those changes.
I long for the day when all of us recognize we don't have to share the same values or lifestyles to earn the title of "good Americans."
We don't give a D*MN about ones ORIENTATION.
THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE AMERICAS ARMED FORCES!!!
I was struck by a reply I read elsewhere that mockingly referred to gay rights as a "fringe" issue, wholly unimportant to the electorate. How interesting that Tea-Partyers, who claim to have 67,000 "official" members, describe the GLBT community (which, at bare minimum, comprises over 3 million Americans) as a small and inconsequential minority.
The hypocrisy of opposing an intrusive government, while attempting to legislate the most intimate aspects of our lives, is one of so many things about these "new conservatives" that I find as mind-boggling as it is infuriating.
The repeal of DADT is just one of Obama's many triumphs, so often overlooked by those who speak endlessly on what I consider the myth of his "failed"presidency. This election, however, I think we need to worry less whether candidates can deliver on their promises and focus on what they threaten to take away.
We need to put everything else aside and vote in unprecedented numbers. At stake in 2012 is something even more important than the economy: the right to live our lives in whatever way allows us some small measure of happiness.
Too many brave Americans in the military -- straight and gay -- have risked death to defend our liberty. We owe it to them, and their families, to defend their rights by going to our polling places.
Back then, if your orientation was gay you were either incredibly discrete or you were a national security risk. That was then, this is now. Back then if you were gay, and a communist bloc operative found out about it, you were pressured to reveal state secrets.
For crying in the beer--have you no concept of history?
"Everyone knows that gays have served honorably in the military since at least the time of Julius Caesar. They'll still be serving long after we're all dead and buried. That should not surprise anyone. But most Americans should be shocked to know that while the country's economy is going down the tubes, the military has wasted half a billion dollars over the past decade chasing down gays and running them out of the armed services. () You don't have to be straight to be in the military. You just have to shoot straight."
That "crying in the beer" liberalism comes from Barry Goldwater. You, sir, may have a "concept" of history. Senator Goldwater has a place in it -- and an openness of mind, on this issue at least, that many liberals like myself never realized.
But, otherwise, as I've said in other posts; when I served with people who were known to be gay, no one cared as long as they were doing their job. So, as long as they continue to be dedicated and effective servicemembers, there should be no problems.
DADT failed because it left being gay a punishable (and thus a blackmailable) offense. If that is gone and since gays are not hiding it much any longer, hopefully we can start getting back to all of us just being Americans. Meaning, I hope the gay community doesn't ruin this by demanding recruitment quotas, special protections, filing a bunch of "I didn't get promoted because I'm gay" lawsuits, etc. If you want being gay to be "normal", then live like the rest of us, without the benefit of hiring quotas, anti-discrimination protections, etc.
I am a military wife. My husband is a retired Marine officer (Viet Nam and Gulf I.) My son is a Navy medic serving with the Marine Corps with 3 Afghan and 2 Iraq tours. All of them talk to me about their experiences. (Yes, I am blessed--they are still with me-- and they don't censor their comments.)
As long as being a homosexual in the military exposed the service member to blackmail by Cold War or militant Islamic forces, there was a reason to deny anyone with such an orientation membership in the armed forces. That some enlisted and served admirably is not only to their credit it explains why we have just eliminated DADT.
This is now, that was then. If anyone on whatever is considered "the other side" today tries to co-opt a gay member of the military by trying to "out" them, the response would be "so what?"
This does not mean an historic ban on gay service members is evil. It means it was appropriate at the time.
My son is a Navy Medic with the Marine Corps with 3 Afghan and 2 Iraq tours under his belt. My husband is a Marine with 19 and 6--most of it combat. I am not even going to go there on medals.
I was the (female) technical director of a USO touring company in Viet Nam in 1969. I wound up under a steel hospital table sheltering from incoming mortar fire. Voiding ones bladder from sheer terror is why no other USO companies of over 11 members were allowed in Viet Nam at the time.
That gay service members were considered a national security risk under the circumstances was not a problem for me.
The repeal of DADT is one skirmish in a larger battle. The NC Republican Legislature tried to sneak through a ban on gay marriage. They passed a proposed amendment to the State Constitution banning gay marriage. The ban prohibits employers from giving benefits to gay couples, but the law keeps that part from appearing on the ballot! People who might not vote for the ban on benefits might vote for the ban on gay marriage, so the Republicans are trying to get both parts by what appears to be illegal means.
The Culture Wars are not over. They are just beginning. The Wrath of the Fundamentalists is determined to limit gay rights if they have to strip constitutional freedoms from every other person in the country as well. They support restrictions on Freedom of Speech and Assembly -- you can't hold a protest rally at any monument in Washington DC anymore! The right against self-incrimination and unreasonable searches and seizures are under constant attack. They have done away with the right to trial by jury in some cases, and have curtailed the right to Habeus Corpus.
Without care, we shall lose the freedoms we already have, not just the ones we are fighting for.
The Constitution, which conservatives claim to love but actually seem to hate says that our govt. cannot support a state religion. This has been interpreted by the courts to mean keeping religion and public govt. institutions separate. End of story. Nobody is preventing people from having a prayer group in a local church, their homes, a rental building, etc... but once again, you all hate the Constitution unless you are talking about the 2nd amendment.
You CHOSE your religion, just as you choose your bigotry. If you can't tell me when you chose your sexual identity or your race, you lose.
When government touches people where they live--their basic beliefs--you better believe government needs to address their voter's concerns or "government" as defined by current representatives either state or federal will go the way of the dodo.
We must absolutely find a way to include everyone--conservative evangelical Christians-- or we will rapidly become the Commonwealth of American Regions.
We do better , when we know better.
For the first time many were exposed to German-Americans from the Midwest, Jews from New York, Italians from New Jersey and Hispanics from Arizona. Airmen knew if they were bombardiers their best protectors had red tails on their planes and black pilots in the cockpits.
Putting it in context explains why Truman desegregated when he did and why it worked. If he had waited, all those men would have retreated into their old ways of life back home and their opinions would have reformed themselves around only what was familiar.
In the 60s and 70s, which I very clearly remember as a military wife, there was not the same worldwide acceptance of homosexuals, even in Europe, there is today. We were in the middle of the Cold War, and there was a clear threat that if some entity from a communist bloc country found out a member of the military was gay that information could be used to compel the service member to turn over sensitive information if they had access.
Today the comeback would be "so what?" Ergo, being gay is no longer a threat to national security. Saying that our parents and grandparents were all repressed closet homophobes is incredibly far from rational.
I do understand the point that susceptability to blackmail (especially following the British spy scandals of the early 1950s) was used to deny security clearances to gay people until well into the 1980s. It was regrettable but justified in the case of closeted individuals--if one has structured one's life around hiding a secret, that will make the person subject to blackmail, no matter how otherwise innocuous the secret being hidden is. It was in the 80' that it was first understood that it was only CLOSETED gays who were a threat in that respect...
That said, even today, most people in the military are not entrusted with such high level clearances--and that was much more the case in the more low tech military of the Cold War era. It was probably smart circa 1970 not to assign a deep-closeted gay man, with a wife & 2 kids, who was leading a secret life as an intelligence analyst, but sexual orientation does not matter at all for a typical infantryman or mechanic.
My point was that the overarching protocol for most of my life--which has been as a military wife--has been the protection of US data, information and technology. Until being gay was no longer seen as affording any kind of leverage for those who do not wish the US well it was a threat, pure and simple.
And, the miitary does NOT pay for moving spouses, it pays to move the service-member's household. I know of plenty of military families where during a long assignment the spouse has gone to live with relatives and the military only paid to move what the servicemember took with them to the new post. Unless that's changed recently, the treatment of married and unmarried couples was the same. There is certainly a difference in treatment, however, with base family housing availability. But the point being if a gay couple living together with one active duty member gets reassigned, everything in the household claimed by the active-duty person would get moved. If they live separately, they'll be treated as a girl/boyfriend.
You outsider/anti-military types should have no say or serious opinion on these things you know nothing about
For the record I am a veteran with an honorable discharge, U.S. Army Aviation 1966-68.
Point is, we all knew were serving with and living with homosexuals, but WE DID NOT CARE!!
It is only the outsiders or a very few of the large number of gays in the military who are trying to make a political bru-ha-ha over this
So what do you mean by non-starter??, I am not trying to start anything, just trying to educate those of you who have no idea
take it or not I could not care less as it is all history, promulgated by Clinton
The ban had everything to do with blackmailable situations nothing to do with morality. Does anyone honestly think that the military cares if a person is committing adultery? The reason it is punishable is because someone who knows about it can use it as leverage to coerce the adulterers (impair operational effectiveness, for instance). The same with owing large debts, because someone can say, "I'll clear your debt if you...".
DADT failed because it left the Servicemember open for punishment if "outted", effectively making being gay a blackmailable situation ("do this or I tell your Commander and you lose your job.").