Posted on 07/07/2008 8:16:52 PM PDT by markomalley
Congress should repeal the "don't ask, don't tell" law because the presence of gays in the military is unlikely to undermine the ability to fight and win, according to a new study released by a California-based research center.
The study was conducted by four retired military officers, including the three-star Air Force lieutenant general who in early 1993 was tasked with implementing President Clinton's policy that the military stop questioning recruits on their sexual orientation.
"Evidence shows that allowing gays and lesbians to serve openly is unlikely to pose any significant risk to morale, good order, discipline or cohesion," the officers states.
To support its contention, the panel points to the British and Israeli militaries, where it says gay people serve openly without hurting the effectiveness of combat operations.
Undermining unit cohesion was a determining factor when Congress passed the 1993 law, intended to keep the military from asking recruits their sexual orientation. In turn, service members can't say they are gay or bisexual, engage in homosexual activity or marry a member of the same sex.
Supporters of the ban contend there is still no empirical evidence that allowing gays to serve openly won't hurt combat effectiveness.
"The issue is trust and confidence" among members of a unit, said Lt. Col. Robert Maginnis, who retired in 1993 after working on the issue for the Army. When some people with a different sexual orientation are "in a close combat environment, it results in a lack of trust," he said.
The study was sponsored by the Michael D. Palm Center at the University of California at Santa Barbara, which said it picked the panel members to portray a bipartisan representation of the different service branches.
According to its Web site, the Palm Center "is committed to keeping researchers, journalists and the general public informed of the latest developments in the 'don't ask, don't tell' policy debate." Palm himself was "a staunch supporter of civil rights in the gay community," the site says.
Two of the officers on the panel have endorsed Democratic candidates since leaving the military - Army Lt. Gen. Robert Gard, who supports Barack Obama, and Marine Corps Gen. Hugh Aitken, who backed Clinton in 1996.
Air Force Lt. Gen. Robert Minter Alexander, a Republican, was assigned in 1993 to a high-level panel established by the Defense Department to examine the issue of gays in the military. At one point, he signed an order that prohibited the military from asking a recruit's sexual orientation.
Alexander said at the time he was simply trying to carry out the president's orders and not take a position. But he now believes the law should be repealed because it assumes the existence of gays in the military is disruptive to units even though cultural attitudes are changing.
Further, the Defense Department and not Congress should be in charge of regulating sexual misconduct within the military, he said.
"Who else can better judge whether it's a threat to good order and discipline?" Alexander asked.
Navy Vice Adm. Jack Shanahan said he had no opinion on the issue when he joined the panel, having never confronted it in his 35-year military career. A self-described Republican who opposes the Bush administration's handling of the Iraq war, Shanahan said he was struck by the loss of personal integrity required by individuals to carry out "don't ask, don't tell."
"Everyone was living a big lie - the homosexuals were trying to hide their sexual orientation and the commanders were looking the other way because they didn't want to disrupt operations by trying to enforce the law," he said.
Attitudes are changing because of public schools and the media, working hard to undermine moral standards.
WMAL was discussing this, and wondered why, since before 1993 the policy was if you were gay you could not serve, people didn’t get out of Vietnam by saying they were gay.
But the fact is, back during Vietnam it was still considered immoral to practice gay sex, and even people who wanted to get out of the war weren’t willing to debase themselves that much — they’d rather flee to Canada.
Once this is hurdle is negotiated, they'll move on to the next.
Having women does cause some sexual issues.
On the other hand, the logistics at least are manageable.
If you allow women, and want to segregate into groups that are NOT sexually attracted, all you need to do is set up two baracks, two showers, and if you really want, two lower chains of command (they don’t do this last step). You can easily monitor fraternization because you can identify who are the women and who are the men.
Now, suppose you have 10 gay men in a troop. How do you separate them so there is no sexual attraction?
Well, you can’t put the gay men TOGETHER. They are attracted to each other.
You can’t put the gay men with straight men. The gay men are attracted to the straight men.
You can’t put the gay men with straight women. The straight women are attracted to the gay men.
The best you can do is pair up a gay man with a lesbian, and put them in separate quarters with separate facilities. And you have to do that with each group of 2.
In other words, it is impossible to have a “group” that includes gay men that doesn’t have sexual issues. And that is because it is fundamentally unnatural to be gay.
Nice try, but as soon as you put TWO gay men in with the girls, those two gay men could hook up with each other.
And the straight women could be attracted to the homosexual men, and might even think it a challenge to bunk one of them.
The best you could do is put one gay man in with one lesbian woman, and hope they weren’t lying about it.
If the woman is bisexual, they pretty much have to be kept in isolation.
The poster I was responding to has put herself into a situation where she must lie or tell herself something doesn't exist to make it okay. Think about that situation and why that's any more normal or right than someone being queer.
That won't help. Gay men are attracted to other gay men. So you can't put them together in a bunk. You have to isolate them from all other men.
But you can't put them with women, because the women are attracted to them. Also, men might lie to get to bunk with the woman, or a "gay" man might in fact be bisexual.
There is no way to appropriately segregate gays and lesbians -- they are simply unnatural, and don't fit into the normal societal structures.
As I always say: You can't have a "gay boy scouts", because you might as well be putting guys and girls together in tents for the night.
Yes, don’t ask, don’t tell is set up to keep people in the dark, so some troops don’t freak out, or worse, discriminate or take action, against other troops.
And while the general attitudes in society may be getting more permissive towards deviant sexual activity of all types (look at the rise in teen girls giving random blow jobs to guys for the fun of it), the mentality of the “real men” who volunteer to go possibly get their brains blown out may not be the type of thinking that says “love to have a gay guy showering with me”.
They may much more likely be the kind to say “no f-ing way I’m hanging around with a f*g*t, no f-ing way I’m trusting some girlie man with my life”.
And if I was gay and in the military, I wouldn’t want to tell, because if you think the enemy is particularly cruel to women who they catch in combat, imagine what they’d do if they caught an openly homosexual soldier.
I hate to ruin anyone's fantasy here, but group showers aren't exactly commonplace in the military anymore, outside of basic training. If you shower at the gym you go to, you're likely more exposed, so to speak, than the average troop is.
Again, this is not what the generals are worried about. There are sexual harassment mechanisms in the UCMJ that work as effectively on gay men as they do on straight men. What the leadership fears is that their system does not permit half measures. There is no 'tolerance' level, it's either on or off. An officer that said, "I tolerate the presence of women and minorities in the military, because I am legally required to, but I don't believe they should be here" in public may as well resign.
If gay rights are permitted in the military, being militantly (heh) pro-gay rights will be as mandatory as supporting women and minorities. Failure to aggressively adopt a pro-gay viewpoint will hurt promotions (which are centralized, and central boards bend to top pressure easily). Once pro-gay is the military party line, you cannot respect it as part of your job, but otherwise agree to disagree. You have to be 100% for it, publicly, or your career is over.
It may not start out that way, but within one generation of officers, the old guard will be brushed aside, and the new breed will throw their less ardently pro-gay colleagues under under the bus left, right and sideways, if it helps them get promoted. That's what the military leadership is worried about. Not flying HIV blood or gay shower scenes. They know what the system will become, and what effect it will have on the entire military culture.
I think it's ridiculous that some guy can be seen holding hands with another guy off base and be discharged. If another soldier can hold hands with his wife or girl-friend and not be discharged, that would seem to be obvious discrimination in how the military carries out discipline.
Serving in the military is a responsibility, if people didn't volunteer, we'd have to have a draft.
My first comment on the thread was that there have been homos in the military forever, some distinguished themselves by their bravery and service. Somehow the military managed to survive that. So, what's the problem now?
It's a volunteer army. If your battle face requires you to spout off about how heterosexual you are perhaps there's something wrong with your game plan.
How about they all take a public oath in boot camp about how much they love the opposite sex?
But you can't put them with women, because the women are attracted to them. Also, men might lie to get to bunk with the woman, or a "gay" man might in fact be bisexual.
Pretend that your comments were made by a general to a Democratic congress member, and this was the response.
Democratic congress member: "I see. What if we funded separate, individual rooms and facilities for all gay and lesbian troops?"
General: "That would solve the housing issue, but it won't be very cost effective."
Dem: "In accordance with equal protection under the law, everyone has the right to serve, regardless of the cost. We'll just shave some money off of R&D or weapons systems to fund it. Here's your check, go provide every gay service member with BAH and separate facilities."
This isn't far from happening. Beware of using any argument against a military course of action that involves throwing enough money at. At some point, someone with enough money will come along and take you up on it.
It may not start out that way, but within one generation of officers, the old guard will be brushed aside, and the new breed will throw their less ardently pro-gay colleagues under under the bus left, right and sideways, if it helps them get promoted. That's what the military leadership is worried about. Not flying HIV blood or gay shower scenes. They know what the system will become, and what effect it will have on the entire military culture.
Excellent insight.
Thanks for posting.
As a member of the military, I’ve suffered homosexuals grabbing my butt, trying to crawl into my rack in the middle of the night, outright obscene propositions, leering in the locker room. I can testify that this did affect my trust and opinion of the people involved, and unit cohesion.
The problem in the scenario you congratulated is that the military should promote on the basis of merit, not that gays shouldn't be in because they have AA.
I have to agree too- sexual orientation just isn't a big deal for the under 30 set much anymore. Not with the kids I work with and not with 2 of my best friends in the world- 20 year vets (1 Army, 1 Navy) told me last year that they had gays serving with them, everyone knew it, and no one seemed to care. Someone even tried to say they were gay to get out of going to Iraq and the CO told them it that wasn't enough to get thrown out anymore....
Times are changing I think.....
I think it's ridiculous that some guy can be seen holding hands with another guy off base and be discharged. If another soldier can hold hands with his wife or girl-friend and not be discharged, that would seem to be obvious discrimination in how the military carries out discipline.
This is the crux of the problem with 'Don't ask, don't tell'. In accordance with the extremist, absolutist strain of logic that the military generally works under, this is an irreconcilable paradox. It's basically the same as saying, 'It's okay to sell secrets to the Chinese, so long as you're discreet'.
Does. Not. Compute.
My first comment on the thread was that there have been homos in the military forever, some distinguished themselves by their bravery and service. Somehow the military managed to survive that. So, what's the problem now?
Without delving into the historical details of mandatory service, military discipline, and sexual tension, suffice to say that how armies behave has historically been something nations regard as necessary evils. Slaughter, rape, brutality, any number of dark things brought out of people forced into fighting for their lives, and made monsters by the stress. Even for notionally good causes and when heroism and bravery were also present. Once you move into the mid to late 20th century, American society had turned against forced service and low moral standards.
With the advent of an all volunteer service, the military has transformed with each passing decade into an increasingly neo-Puritanical, legalistic organization. The values America wants most are programmed in, and the troops adhere accordingly. Even to the point of drunk driving awareness, environmental awareness, multiculturalism, workplace harassment, gender and racial integration, and any number of progressive social concepts, you'll find that the military is pretty much ahead of the civilian pack, because they have to be, because it's mandatory.
I heard Carlos Mencia drop the n-bomb in a jam-packed MWR building in Baghdad, and you could have heard a pin drop from down the street, over a joke that any civilian crowd of whites, blacks or anyone would have cracked up at.
Why? Because the military is programmed to treat racism like a mortal sin, under all circumstances. Since racism is bad, the military bans it, with severe penalties. They ban everything that is bad, with severe penalties. Every time a new element that is deemed 'bad' is entered into the military bloodstream, it is banned, with severe penalties.
Despite your adorable use of the word 'homo', you clearly support gay rights. That's fine. But what if, as a condition of your job, you had to publicly and regularly state that homosexuality was wrong. If you were caught saying that you didn't care if someone was gay or not, it would damage or end your career? Even if it was an organization you loved, you'd feel that it just wasn't right for you, and would feel that it was time to move on.
That's what the problem is now. The military will make it mandatory to support those who practice homosexuality. Not even neutrality will be permitted. This will chase out most people who are opposed, and many people who are neutral, to pro-gay opinions.
There may be an untapped reservoir of enlightened knuckle-draggers out there, brave men and women with extremely liberal political views, and yet extremely old fashioned attachment to personal sacrifice for God, family and country. But we're already pushing our luck as it is with hard core social experimentation, and the balance the military is running now is still questionable as far as being long term viable.
Can a touchy-feely, risk averse, enlightened military actually fight wars the way they often need to be fought? We get by now on an awesome advantage in weapons and organization, but we've steadily lost our primitive, natural core to a more progressive, perfectionist ideal. What further damage will the military do to the testosterone-driven base of personnel, by becoming pro-gay? How far can you push liberalism on your steely eyed killers before they quit on you?
That's the problem now.
Oh, NO!!!
It's just too complicated.
And we haven't even begun to consider two man person foxholes, hot-bunking, tent-mates or mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
Instead of our schools encouraging youngsters to "experience" alternate sexual relationships (like homosexualism, lesbianism, pedophelia) they should start teaching them that the BIG GUY did have it right the way he originally designed and equipped us.
They could start by examining the principals that make the nut and bolt work so well together, move on up to putting round pegs in round holes, and graduate to the study of why you can't use one sink hole to fill up another sink hole.
There is a very cheesy movie from 1967 called "The Gay Deceivers" about two young men who pretend to be gay to get out of being drafted. In the movie, it turns out that the Army had been run by a "Gay Mafia" all along, and used "the question" to bring more gay men in. Rather tacky film, but a funny premise nonetheless.
I don't support gay rights. I support human rights. Some people happen to be homosexual. Unlike some knee jerkers here, I don't fight everything associated with homosexuals. I decide on the issue and take my stand in accordance with what I believe about it.
I am not asking the army to support homosexuals. I am asking the army to leave them alone unless they violated some standard of conduct. In this case, unwanted hitting on others or assaulting others. I believe the military already has those behaviors prohibited. To have a "don't tell" rule which includes being "found out" off base for what would otherwise be legal activity is ridiculous and at best unequal enforcement of the military code.
And when it comes time for our child to get a blood transfusion from one of his buddies in this “gay” army, are we gonna hold our breath?
You bet.
That hiv test is good for the week its administered, and there are more blood-borne pathogens than just hiv....the only one tested for.
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