Don't Ask Don't Tell

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Justin24

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If congress were to change policy to allow gay's and lesbians in the military, do you think there would be an increase in military sign ups?

I am in support of letting them serve.
 
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I'm not understanding the question. Are you asking if homosexuals were allowed be open in the military would sign up increase?

There may be a slight change in sign up, there may be some homosexuals that won't serve unless they can be open, but for the most part I would think most who want to serve already do or will.
 
Thats what I mean, would there be an increase in military sign ups if homosexuals were allowed to join with the knowledge that they are gay?

Cause I am behind letting them serve.
 
BonoVoxSupastar said:


Well if they are good enough to serve, they deserve the right to get married too.

And I agree. But I know private organizations like the church wont allow it, but I think the states should.
 
If the military were to do away with their "don't ask, don't tell" policy and allow gays to be openly gay, then you would simply see less straight people in the military. As a matter of fact, you probably would see them staying away in droves. Now, would this be balanced by gays signing up in droves? More than likely not. As a result, our military would be much smaller which leads me to believe that Uncle Sam might not like that.
Pretty much, I don't see the US changing their policy.
 
[q]Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Revisited
Injured Iraqi Vet Joins New Fight to End Ban on Openly Gay Service Members

By JAKE TAPPER
Feb. 28, 2007 — - The first U.S. Marine seriously wounded in Iraq, Staff Sgt. Eric Alva, lost his leg when he stepped on a land mine, but today he and his prosthetic leg will march right into one of the most contentious battles in American politics.

Alva will stand with Rep. Marty Meehan, D-Mass., as a bipartisan group of Congress members introduces legislation to overturn the ban on openly gay and lesbian troops serving in the military.

Alva says that losing his leg forced him out of the closet.

"It made me realize everything that I had to actually speak up for," Alva said to ABC News in an exclusive TV interview, "basically the rights and privileges of what I as an individual have earned in this country."

He imagines conversations with the political opponents he knows he will now face.

"'OK buddy,'" he said, "'you pick up a gun and you go fight in Iraq or Afghanistan for a while, then you could come back and we can have a talk because I've actually sacrificed, I've actually done duty and served in this country for your rights and freedom.'"

The Pentagon has long maintained that the ban is necessary for unit cohesion.

"The bottom line for the military is, 'Is this a policy change that's going to help promote combat effectiveness?'" said retired Lt. Col. Robert "Bob" Maginnis. "I see no evidence of that."

Alva hopes that he can change minds by arguing the ban is simply unfair to gays and lesbian service members who are already serving their nation honorably, not to mention Americans who want to serve.

He and his partner will never be able to live under the same rules and regulations applied to a husband and wife, for instance.

But increasingly, advocates for lifting the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" compromise that President Clinton signed into law in 1993 argue that the ban on gays and lesbians serving openly is a national security issue.

The military is stretched thin, the argument goes, and the unit cohesion commanders argue is threatened with the presence of "out" soldiers and Marines pales in comparison with the loss of specialists.

Data released today by the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, an advocacy group that supports lifting the ban, suggests that the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" ban is disproportionately affecting troops in key specialties.

Of 742 such dismissals in fiscal year 2005, the highest number than in any category -- 49 -- were medical personnel. An additional 40 were law enforcement officers, along with 14 intelligence officers, 35 infantrymen, and seven nuclear, biological and chemical warfare specialists.

This generally squares with the Government Accountability Office's 2004 study, which found that of the 9,488 service members who at that point had been discharged from the military for gay and lesbian conduct since 1993, approximately 757 -- or 8 percent -- "held critical occupations," meaning the kinds of jobs for which the Pentagon offers selective reenlistment bonuses.

That number included 322 with "skills in an important language such as Arabic, Farsi or Korean."

Maginnis says that the military has "come to the conclusion that if we embrace homosexuality openly in the military than that has far more of a detrimental impact than will keeping someone just because they happen to have a critical skill."[/q]
 
to be honest with you, i'm not saying EVERYONE is like this, but it was when i was in the military i saw the most overt homophobia and sexism being practiced, joked about, and even encouraged. again, i'm not saying that everyone in the military is this way, that was just what i saw in my own regiment. that being said...i'm not so sure if the military would be so welcoming and hospitable to openly gay soldiers.
 
redhotswami said:
..i'm not so sure if the military would be so welcoming and hospitable to openly gay soldiers.



i take your point, but gay soldiers are serving, right now, even in infantry units.

my bigger concern is the conclusion that we need to kick out linguists because they're gay.

freaking linguists. who speak Arabic.
 
Irvine511 said:




i take your point, but gay soldiers are serving, right now, even in infantry units.

Oh I know...for a friend of mine, the hazing was so much that he left. I guess somebody found out. It is really absurd when he told me what he went though.

I agree with you about the linguists. That is absolutely ridiculous. It is obvious where their priorities lie.
 
Irvine511 said:




i take your point, but gay soldiers are serving, right now, even in infantry units.

my bigger concern is the conclusion that we need to kick out linguists because they're gay.

freaking linguists. who speak Arabic.

The "because they're gay" is just an excuse...I'm sure Bush figures anyone who's fluent in Arabic must be a terrorist.
 
"The private prejudices of heterosexual service members are illegitimate reasons for government-sanctioned discrimination against gay and lesbian service members."
-Judge Nickerson
 
As an Infantry Platoon Leader, I can tell you this is not a good idea. We are asked to live too close and too tight to be worried about sexual tension. This is the same reason women should not be in the Infantry.

"Male bonding" of a non-sexual type is a key component to the Infantry. Adding the sexual element would be interfering with unit cohesion - and would put lives at risk - all for the sake of making a very small minority comfortable. This is unacceptable. Is this truly about making a better Army or is it about making a political statement?

The modern Infantry is not designed for everyone. You can quote me all the articles you want about Greek soldiers and Alexander the Great - and we could debate whether or not these articles are true or simply revisionist history. There just isn't enough information about these armies. However, we have volumes and volumes of information from the Revolutionary War through today.
 
There's sexual tension anywhere and everywhere, human beings can learn to deal with it and be professional. That's no justification for excluding anyone-women or gay men and women. It's a cop out.
 
AEON said:

"Male bonding" of a non-sexual type is a key component to the Infantry. Adding the sexual element would be interfering with unit cohesion - and would put lives at risk - all for the sake of making a very small minority comfortable. This is unacceptable. Is this truly about making a better Army or is it about making a political statement?

we have already stated that there are gays that currently serve in the military. they aren't adding a sexual element to the unit at all! just like everyone else, they are there to serve. so tell me, how is allowing gay soldiers, who are CURRENTLY SERVING, to be OPEN about their culture, adding a sexual element???
 
AEON said:
As an Infantry Platoon Leader, I can tell you this is not a good idea. We are asked to live too close and too tight to be worried about sexual tension. This is the same reason women should not be in the Infantry.


I'm a woman and it's not that I would want to join an infantry unit or the army in general (I'd rather quite frankly be shot in the head than be in the military), but are men so sexually frustrated and so unable to control their urges?

I'd like to see a study on this.
 
AEON said:
As an Infantry Platoon Leader, I can tell you this is not a good idea. We are asked to live too close and too tight to be worried about sexual tension. This is the same reason women should not be in the Infantry.


All that discipline you're suppose to learn in the military, you'd think you learn how to keep it in your pants.:|

I honestly think this is one of the worse statements I've seen in FYM for weeks.
 
AEON said:
This is the same reason women should not be in the Infantry.
Interesting. So in conservative Islamic societies women are seen as sexual objects and must be separated from men in order for men not to submit to their uncontrollable base urges. You've made comments before to the effect that you want to fight so-called "Islamofascism" in order to halt the spread of such ideas. And yet here you're espousing a version of the same idea. That doesn't cause any cognitive dissonance for you?
 
The reason that I said that a lot of straight people would stay away in droves is because most straight men who go join the military have some sort of problem with openly gay people. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that's how it is. The military isn't going to change their policy.
 
AEON said:
As an Infantry Platoon Leader, I can tell you this is not a good idea. We are asked to live too close and too tight to be worried about sexual tension. This is the same reason women should not be in the Infantry.

"Male bonding" of a non-sexual type is a key component to the Infantry. Adding the sexual element would be interfering with unit cohesion - and would put lives at risk - all for the sake of making a very small minority comfortable. This is unacceptable. Is this truly about making a better Army or is it about making a political statement?

The modern Infantry is not designed for everyone. You can quote me all the articles you want about Greek soldiers and Alexander the Great - and we could debate whether or not these articles are true or simply revisionist history. There just isn't enough information about these armies. However, we have volumes and volumes of information from the Revolutionary War through today.



aside from the fact that gay soldiers are already in the infintry and serving bravely, and the fact that most of the rest of the modern world (UK, Australia) doesn't think it's okay on the rights of all citizens to serve their country, and you give me a single good reason to dismiss a linguist fluent in Arabic just so you don't have to shower with me?

oh, and i'm quite insulted that you seem to think that i can't bond with straight men in a non-sexual way. as i've written about before, at length, i was an athlete from the age of 8, count straight men among my very, very best friends, and not once has there ever been a sexual element to our friendship.

perhaps you're all about sex, but i'm not.

and you've given the same argument that was once used to enforce racially segregated units -- "cohesion" and all that.
 
Irvine511 said:


oh, and i'm quite insulted that you seem to think that i can't bond with straight men in a non-sexual way.

With some the fear might be more the other way round ;)
 
are homosexuals still not allowed in the military in the u.s.?

you guys are good at cracking the rest of the world up sometimes :lmao:
 
Irvine, try to remember we're talking about the US military here? Fuck all this cohesion bullshit! The simple fact is that there are a lot of homophobes in the military who aren't going to serve with openly gay people. This ain't the swim team for Pete's sake!
 
Irvine511 said:

and you've given the same argument that was once used to enforce racially segregated units -- "cohesion" and all that.

I think this is a really important point. Yes, it may cause some friction initially (although as Irvine and others have pointed out, there are already gay service men and women), but that was also the case when army units were racially integrated. Just because it might take some serious adjustment and time to resolve doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile to try.

It seems a bit ridiculous to suggest that in the heat of battle anyone would really be worried if the fellow soldier watching their back is gay or straight.

Why does everything always have to be about sex anyway? Forming bonds of friendship doesn't have to be dependent on presence of or lack of sexual tension. Maybe I'm missing something important about the way things work in the military though.:shrug:
 
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