Did you catch the big story out of Afghanistan the other day—the one about how a U.S. platoon was decimated in a nighttime raid? The soldiers couldn’t fight effectively because their unit cohesion had disintegrated after one of them mentioned he is gay.
How about the recent study showing it is now impossible to train new jarheads at Parris Island? Marine recruits are so afraid a gay bunkmate might be eyeballing them in the shower that they can’t follow even basic commands.
What about the recruitment crisis generally—and the tens of thousands of military personnel who have announced they will not re-up because they don’t want to work with gays and lesbians?
You didn’t hear about those developments? Don’t be alarmed. Nobody did—because they never happened. Yet they certainly should have, if those opposed to gays in the military were right. More than a year ago, the military’s policy of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” (DADT) was formally repealed. Social conservatives had repeatedly predicted nothing less than utter disaster if that were to happen…..Writing in The Wall Street Journal recently, co-authors Sherif Girgis, Ryan Anderson, and Robert George oppose gay marriage by arguing that “weakening marital norms will hurt children and spouses, especially the poorest” and will foster “family breakdown.” What’s more, they write, same-sex marriage is unnatural, since it omits “sexual-reproductive complementarity.” And furthermore, this truth has been recognized by “ancient thinkers untouched by Judaism or Christianity—including Aristotle, Plato, Socrates, Musonius Rufus, Xenophanes and Plutarch.”
Ah, well then. Who could possibly argue with Musonius Rufus?
These arguments from tradition and natural law also have some ugly historical echoes. When Judge Leon Bazile convicted Mildred and Richard Loving, an interracial couple, of violating Virginia’s law against miscegenation, he insisted: “Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages.” When, a few years earlier, the black group The Platters was arrested for playing music for white women, Cincinnati judge Gilbert Bettman berated them: “You have taken that which can be the core of reproductive life and turned it into a socially abhorrent, tawdry indulgence in lust.” Sound familiar?
Nothing more to add! A friend of mine once said, Gays are kinda like guns, they seem scary when you hear people talking about them, or see them on the news, but once you have one in your home, you feel pretty silly about all of that.
h/t Mrs. Weer’d
Like someone at Black Five wrote (I paraphrase): If they let gays serve, I hope he’s one of those big, buff gays that can carry my wounded ass out of the firefight.”
As I’ve said before, I served with gays — even back in the old pre-“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” witch hunt days. The ones who were good soldiers, the ENTIRE unit would have lied our asses off to cover for if IG or CID came sniffing around. “SGT Bruce, gay? Well, that’ll be a surprise to a LOT of ‘ladies’ in downtown Columbus. . . Dude gets more action on TDY than James Bond gets on film. If I got laid that often, my dick would fall off.” (That’s a near quote I heard a buddy give to an investigator. He didn’t even like the guy he was covering for, and was totally creeped out by homosexulaity. . . but he wasn’t about to let one of the best NCOs he’d ever served with go down for something that had zero effect on the unit.) Even the guy who was studying to be a fundamentalist Southern Baptist preacher in night school at at Liberty University covered for the good guys. That’s what you do — you provide cover fire for your brothers when they are endangered by BS Mickey Mouse regs from outsiders.
Most good units I was aware of handled things the same way. . . but like Fight Club, you don’t talk about Fight Club — certainly not with people outside the Family.
Shitbags in uniform who happened to be gay? Yeah, we dimed them out. Not because they were gay, per se, but because it was a handy way to dump them, and a whole lot easier and faster than trying to flush them for being a general turd (there is no specific Chapter for “general turd”, and proving “failure to adapt” can be a tough sell).
Just like we’d dime out a straight shitbag for still being drunk at PT formation when he overindulged the night before, whilst literally propping up a good guy who overestimated his capacity, so he could stand an headcount formation. (However, the “propee” WAS going to make the run, WITH the unit, and FINISH, if we had to drag his puking ass along by the short hairs — TANSTAAFL.) BTW, the chain of command knew we were doing it, too — so long as we gave them plausible deniability and ensured “dumb mistakes” didn’t turn into “shitbag pattern of behavior” by handling disciplinary measures at a lower, and less formal level. For example, assigning a guy with a massive hangover to be ammo bitch at a machinegun range all day or scrubbing out mess hall dumpsters in August prior to an inspection is not only often more effective than official paperwork, it also prevents generating a paper trail that torpedoes a career over one stupid move.
I always felt that Clinton should have just told Congress that he was de-emphacizing homosexuality investigations to the point where not a single dollar or man-hour was authorized for a gay witch hunt, and dared Congress to either match him or openly stop him. (You know, like Teddy Roosevelt and Truman did.) After all, he DID run on the issue.
You know, when I had to fight a Fire on my First Submarine back in 1980, I didn’t give a Rat’s Ass if the Guys on the Hose with me were Gay, Straight, Black, White Asian or Klingon. All I cared about is that they did what was necessary to put out the Damn Fire!
Oh, BTW, in 1979, on my First Ship, we had Women Officers and Cadets from Annapolis aboard. Didn’t mean a thing.
I was in the Marines (late 80s, early 90s). In one combat training school, I shared a tent for a few days in the field with an (obvious to me) gay Marine. There was no problems because we were both professional about it. Much like I would expect any good Marine to be. Later, I shared a 3 man room in the barracks with a couple of guys that I’m still not sure if they were a “couple”, or if they were just REALLY close friends… like disturbingly close (if one was disturbed by such things). Again, no problems. Actually, some of the better room-mates I ever had in the Marines.
When people, many of whom had never been in the military, started all this clap-trap about readiness, and shower-gazing etc. I had to just laugh.
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