Gay People And Their Right To Militarize

[Seil]

Aparently there's a "Don't ask, don't tell" policy when it comes to gay people in the military? What's going on? I didn't know we had one of those.

The don't ask, don't tell policy, signed in 1993 by former president Bill Clinton, was implemented as a compromise with legislature which opposed a complete repeal of the prior ban on gays in the military. The death of Seaman Allen Schindler in 1992 brought the issue of gay servicemembers to the forefront. Established under the premise of privacy, discretion and protection, the policy bans gay, lesbian, bisexual or transgender people from serving in the military and prevents military officials from asking probing questions or pursuing investigations of soldiers suspected of being homosexuals. Any servicemember that openly reveals their homosexuality through words or actions are discharged from service.

More reading.

Anyways, Obama's battling this, and I hope he wins. I mean, I don't really go for the military, I'm a more peaceful guy than what I envision the military would allow me, but at the same time I can see that this is discrimination.

dis⋅crim⋅i⋅na⋅tion
  /dɪˌskrɪməˈneɪʃən/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [di-skrim-uh-ney-shuhn]
–noun
1. an act or instance of discriminating.
2. treatment or consideration of, or making a distinction in favor of or against, a person or thing based on the group, class, or category to which that person or thing belongs rather than on individual merit: racial and religious intolerance and discrimination.
3. the power of making fine distinctions; discriminating judgment: She chose the colors with great discrimination.
4. Archaic. something that serves to differentiate.

And I always heard that discrimination was mostly a bad thing.

[Kim]

He's fighting it as much as you can when one of the people you put in a position to get rid of it has actively defended it.

By which I mean not at fucking all.

[Karrrrrrrrrrrresche]

Originally Posted by NonCon

He's fighting it as much as you can when one of the people you put in a position to get rid of it has actively defended it.

By which I mean not at fucking all.

Really?

As a participant recounted one of the sessions, Mr. Obama told Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates and Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, that the law was “just wrong.” Mr. Obama told them, the participant said, that he had delayed acting on repeal because the military was stretched in two wars and he did not want another polarizing debate in 2009 to distract from his health care fight.

But in 2010, he told them, this would be a priority. He got no objections.

On Tuesday, in the first Congressional hearing on the issue in 17 years, Mr. Gates and Admiral Mullen will unveil the Pentagon’s initial plans for carrying out a repeal, which requires an act of Congress. Gay rights leaders say they expect Mr. Gates to announce in the interim that the Defense Department will not take action to discharge service members whose sexual orientation is revealed by third parties or jilted partners, one of the most onerous aspects of the law. Pentagon officials had no comment.

Cause it sounds a whole fucking lot like he's trying.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

I'm down for not letting gay people join the military because I'm down with not letting anybody join the military. We'll just do it one group of people at the time.

[Seil]

I'd be interested to hear something from Flare - where is that lady?

[Funka Genocide]

I never understood the way that was supposed to work, it was entirely too vague.

When you join the military, they do in fact ask you if you are a homosexual. It's one of the first things they get out of the way, so isn't that like "asking"?

Although I will say that it's not like there's an ongoing witch hunt or anything once you get past the initial process. I knew a few people in the navy that were homosexual but its not like they went around telling everyone about their sex life. I mean everyone pretty much knows, but in my experience no one cared. I find it strange, like a lot of the younger generation of the military really doesn't give a shit, the bigots usually get quieted by the general atmosphere of "we're all in this shit together."

I don't think sexual preference should have anything to do with being in the military though. They should just update their damn showers in some of their buildings if they're so worried about it. I mean there's a few places where everyone takes communal showers, other than that it's not like people are running around naked, and if you're so insecure that you walk in terror of being eyed by the "gay menace" well I mean... they're all ready in the military. You've been eyed, get over it.

[Hanuman]

If women are allowed in why not homosexuals?
It makes less of a difference.

[bluestarultor]

I have no idea how a person could get this far without knowing about DADT, but the idea was that it at least LET gays into the military. Technically, it's still illegal to be gay and in the armed forces. DADT basically said that nobody could screen for them. If someone is gay and makes an issue of it, they can be booted.

Frankly, it's a bad policy that we shouldn't need anymore, but with eleventy-billion percent of the armed forces being from the South and the Bible Belt, it's hard enough to deal with racism much less homophobia.

Of course, if the military can't re-educate their troops, they are a failure as a total institution.

[Bells]

Well, in the basis of the argument what you have is that people still think of this subject as if there were groups... y'know?

There is the white people, and there is the black people, and there is the straight people and the gay people... if you pay attention to the political (and the midia) when they talk about this, you can actually see they constructing their narrative as if these groups were actually another species within the human race.

Thus the Bullshit.

[bluestarultor]

Originally Posted by Bells

Well, in the basis of the argument what you have is that people still think of this subject as if there were groups... y'know?

There is the white people, and there is the black people, and there is the straight people and the gay people... if you pay attention to the political (and the midia) when they talk about this, you can actually see they constructing their narrative as if these groups were actually another species within the human race.

Thus the Bullshit.

No doubt about that, but it's sadly basic psychology. Humans are social creatures and therefore gravitate into groups of other humans with which they identify. The problem in this case is that they're failing to identify the people around them as being in the same group (the military) and are segmenting them based on their previous biases (race, sex, orientation).