Last Thursday, the AP reported the story of Sgt. Robert Stout, a decorated soldier from the 9th Engineer Battalion fighting in Iraq. The openly gay Stout wants a chance to continue to serve his country without having to lie about who he is. The military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy, which forbids openly gay soldiers from serving, will likely result in Stout's discharge from the Army.
The official policy holds that homosexuals create "an unacceptable risk to the high standards of morale, good order and discipline, and unit cohesion that are the essence of military capability." The story of Sgt. Stout, who says he is out to most of the 9th Engineer Battalion, suggests otherwise. According to the AP write-up, Stout "was awarded the Purple Heart after a grenade sent pieces of shrapnel into his arm, face and legs while he was operating a machine gun on an armored Humvee last May." That's a far cry from the stereotype of the mincing queen copping feels in foxholes. It looks like Stout conducted himself exactly like—surprise, surprise—any other soldier.
"Don't Ask, Don't Tell," a half-assed (so to speak) policy brought on by President Clinton's inability to live up to his campaign promises, is doomed, just like policies barring minorities and women from the armed forces were (both of these policies used the same argument that "justifies" DADT now). The only question is when it will fall. All indications are that now is as good a time as any for the US to join the 24 nations—including Great Britain, Germany, France, Australia, Canada and Israel—that allow openly gay people to serve in the military.
As the military struggles to meet recruitment goals, it is increasingly indefensible to allow the discharge of thousands of skilled troops because of bigotry and homophobia. The military's anti-gay policy puts America at greater risk abroad and at home (click here to read how DADT purged dozens of Arabic and Farsi translators both before and after 9/11, even as the official investigation into the terror attacks listed an insufficient number of translators as one of its causes).
It will be interesting to see how Sgt. Stout's case will be handled, just as it will be interesting to gauge the reaction to prominent Republican consultant Arthur J. Finkelstein's recent marriage to his male partner of 40 years. Perhaps this is an opportunity for conservatives to actually stand up for the conservative ideal that the government should judge people on their merits, not the details of their private lives.
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Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - bhw
Well done.
2 - Steve S
There are many stories of valiant American soldiers, many of who were instrumental in winning our wars, who then get their careers ruined because of prejudice. Margarethe Cammemeyer was the first of many, many years ago.
For a great read on many gay people who the military destroyed career-wise, I'd suggest adding Randy Shilts 'Conduct Unbecoming' to your Amazon book list.
3 - Richard Porter
Interesting post and I am glad to see that there are some things that Bush cannot be blamed for though Clinton can.
4 - Pete Blackwell
Bush could overturn Don't Ask, Don't Tell in a second, so he shares the blame with Clinton.
5 - Richard Porter
Well Pete, lets depart now. I said your post was interesting, I did not necessarily say I share your point of view.
Richard Porter
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6 - Victor Plenty
Sure, Bush could overturn "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" but in which direction?
From his other statements on subjects like gay marriage, it seems more likely he would try to steer the military back toward investigating soldiers and forcing them to come up with convincing evidence of heterosexuality.
7 - Richard Porter
Obviously it has never been brought up so he is satisfied with what President Clinton had set up.
8 - SFC SKI
Well, I take the long view, the personnel needs of the military have caused a lot of changes both in the miltary and society as a whole. This may be the time and place to finally address this ultimately harmful policy.
9 - Dave Nalle
My impression was that Clinton wanted to allow soldiers to be openly gay, but was stopped short of that by objections from the military brass. Bush would presumably face the same problem if he tried to change the policy.
That said, it's a nonsensical policy. Considering that we have women serving in the military should we be worried about the 'openly straight' soldiers? Ridiculous. The issue here is not what the soldiers are, but how they act. No one in the military is supposed to be having sex with anyone else or sexually harassing anyone else, regardless of sexual orientation. That should be the policy.
Dave
10 - Richard Porter
Dave
I agree. Sex in the military should be completely banned so our troops can stay focused on the goals at hand.
11 - Steve S
I would think no sex would make it pretty difficult, pretty quickly, to stay focused on much else. That's why priests have such a miserable success rate at celibacy, right? I thought that's why sailors were given shore leave in certain 'ports of call'. An unwritten understanding that they go to bars and/or prostitutes, so that when they get back on the ship, they CAN focus on the goals at hand.
12 - Richard Porter
Okay, well count Steve out of the army . Next?
13 - Steve S
I am so not cut out to be a soldier. I respect what they do, and think they are courageous beyond belief. I do not slight them, when I realize I am just not cut from that mold.
My primary reason being I do not do well following orders.
14 - Victor Plenty
Let's surgically remove all sex organs at enlistment! We'll cryogenically preserve them, both the internal and the external sex organs. Then reattach and reimplant them when (or if) the soldiers are honorably discharged from further service to their country.
Yep, that would let them fully focus on the task at hand.
We'd probably have to pretty much forget about this "all-volunteer" military, though.
15 - SFC SKI
Sometimes I am amazed at how people who know so little are willing to prove it to so many.
Basically, in a combat environment, sex is prohibited as being against good orderr and discipline. There are also the practical complications of no privacy, rank issues, chains of command, and a whole lot of other obstacles that keep a lot of folks out of each others personal space. Still, there are surely some soldiers still having sex, it's not something you can regulate away.
Unless you subscribe to the "gay male predator" myth, the issue is not about the sex being forced upon a straight male, it's about others responding to a person's choice of lifestyle. All the arguments being made against openly gay servicemembers were made with minor modifications against racial minorities, religious minorities, and females, and one by one they have been cast aside.
16 - Steve S
oh, we were talking combat environment? In that case, sex would be the last thing on a person's mind, I would think, regardless of when they last had it.
There was talk about banning sex in the military, and I took that to mean from the time you went into boot camp until the time you left the force.
17 - Margaret Romao Toigo
Back in the 1960s, if a man wanted to get out of the draft, he could not simply say that he was homosexual -- whether it was true or not -- because he could be arrested or institutionalized just for being gay and admitting it.
Fast forward to today when the spectre of a draft keeps hovering about the national conversation and being homosexual is no longer illegal or thought of as a mental illness.
If there is a draft -- and no one can really say for sure whether there will be one or not in the future -- DADT provides young men and women a fairly easy way to get out of it, they just have to "tell."
18 - Dave Nalle
I don't believe anyone meant banning all sex for all soldiers all the time. I'd go with no sex with other soldiers while on active duty, which I think is about what the policy is now. If you want to have a relationship when you're off duty with another soldier or something else I wouldn't see that as much of a problem - though like the police, soldiers in relationships should not be put in the same unit.
Dave
19 - Steve S
I agree.
Comment ten said "sex in the military should be completely banned", how was I to know that meant only combat environment or only on active duty?
20 - SFC SKI
Actully, Steve S. the comment wasn't directed at you.
It all comes down to combat, anything that disrupts the team, the unit, makes it less ready as a whole to succeed in combat, this is the argument that is made against gays in the military now. As for sex, where there is a will there is a way, but there are so mnay restrictions and cautions, that it is somewhat prohibitive, but you could never enforce a ban on sex.
Again the issue id not sex, it's the reaction of others' to a person's lifestyle.
21 - Dave Nalle
It struck me funny too, Steve. It was clearly poorly phrased, because the way it was written people in the military wouldn't be able to have sex with their wives while on leave. That seems like a bad idea.
Dave
22 - Victor Plenty
Learning to write more clearly is one goal we can all get behind. Yes, we should take a long, hard look at the importance of clarity in writing.
So to speak.
23 - SFC SKI
Agreed.
24 - bhw
It was clearly poorly phrased, because the way it was written people in the military wouldn't be able to have sex with their wives while on leave.
Wow. What an assumption that "people in the military" are men.
25 - Victor Plenty
Wow. What an assumption that only men can have wives.
Heh heh.