I was doing the holiday braving the crowds at the mall when I got the text message that the U.S. Senate, a body that recently has been one of the most cowardly and creepy bunch of people, finally voted to repeal the noxious Don't Ask Don't Tell policy. It will take 60 days for the Pentagon to put this fully into effect, but that means that in another two months, LGBT members of the armed forces are going to have a sword of Damocles lifted from over their heads. They can then go about their business of serving the country, and receiving support and love from their same-sex partners.
It's only fit
ting that a lame-duck Democratic Congress made this happen. After all, it was the Democratic President Bill Clinton who tackled the dismissals of LGBT service members as one of his first acts of his administration. But the push-back was so much that it ended in this horrible policy that has stuck around for seventeen years.
I am grateful to the 65 members of the Senate who voted to repeal this policy. I am even more grateful to Lt. Dan Choi who put himself and his incredible West Point credentials on the line to make the case for why this discrimination was hurting our military. And I am also grateful for the many men and women who have been serving, and being discharged, under this policy for so long. I think of Col. Grethe Cammermeyer and what she went through when she came out... and won a court battle to be re-instated into the military after her dishonorable discharge. All because she self-identified as a lesbia
n during a security clearance.
Today is a great day for LGBT people. Even if you are not a person who supports the military this is still good news. If people are willing to serve and die for their country, the least the country can do is let them be who they are.
And, even as we celebrate this news, it is still a mixed message from our Senate. Another bill, the Dream Act which would have granted citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants if they sign up for military service or completed two years of college, was effectively killed by a 55-41 vote. Some must always be treated as unequal in our land of the free and the brave.
Today we've taken some more steps toward liberty and justice for all. And--as Robert Frost notes-- we have miles to go before we sleep.
It's only fit
ting that a lame-duck Democratic Congress made this happen. After all, it was the Democratic President Bill Clinton who tackled the dismissals of LGBT service members as one of his first acts of his administration. But the push-back was so much that it ended in this horrible policy that has stuck around for seventeen years.I am grateful to the 65 members of the Senate who voted to repeal this policy. I am even more grateful to Lt. Dan Choi who put himself and his incredible West Point credentials on the line to make the case for why this discrimination was hurting our military. And I am also grateful for the many men and women who have been serving, and being discharged, under this policy for so long. I think of Col. Grethe Cammermeyer and what she went through when she came out... and won a court battle to be re-instated into the military after her dishonorable discharge. All because she self-identified as a lesbia
n during a security clearance.Today is a great day for LGBT people. Even if you are not a person who supports the military this is still good news. If people are willing to serve and die for their country, the least the country can do is let them be who they are.
And, even as we celebrate this news, it is still a mixed message from our Senate. Another bill, the Dream Act which would have granted citizenship to the children of illegal immigrants if they sign up for military service or completed two years of college, was effectively killed by a 55-41 vote. Some must always be treated as unequal in our land of the free and the brave.
Today we've taken some more steps toward liberty and justice for all. And--as Robert Frost notes-- we have miles to go before we sleep.
7 comments:
Amen Sister, Amen
'Simon Says' take giant steps! May our congress (reps and senators) listen!
The best news ever on the Anniversary of your Grandmother's birthday. She would have been thrilled.
Peggins
In fairness, DADT (as boneheadedly stupid as it was) was an improvement over the status quo ante. Under DADT, at least in theory, a "discrete" LGBTQTS person would not be harrassed. They were only supposed to be subject to sanction if they told, and they were not to be asked.
Of course, it didn't really work that way. And even if it had, it still would have been a stupid and bigotted policy.
But prior to DADT, the military was free to conduct periodic anti-gay pogroms. What I hear from the few LGBTQTS people I knew in the US military, while the pogroms never disappeared entirely, they were greatly reduced under DADT.
So, while DADT still marks a failure by the Clinton administration, it did constitute a baby step in the right direction - and one that might even have been sustainable if it had been honoured less in the breach than in the observance.
All that said, welcome to the 21st century. In the Canadian Forces, there were no significant problems when we emilinated homophobic policies in the early 90s. Things aren't perfect, but there is little tolerance - and none at the leadership level - for blatant homophobes in any part of the CF.
Malcolm+: It is true that DADT was a baby step in the right direction. But it was an enormously painful step. It stopped the open harassment of LGBT members of the military, but it didn't free them. Now, they're free. With this policy in the history books, I look forward to a time when, perhaps finally, the essensce of my being will not be used as a political football. Which is why my heart goes out to the many immigrants, illegal or otherwise, who are in this country. It seems that they are the next scapegoat.
SCG, I absolutely agree. I'm just concerned that some of the commentary almost appeared to suggest that DADT was implemented to introduce discrimination when it was actually brought in to decrease discrimination - however ineffective it was.
Oh, no. Sorry you had that impression.
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