| |
|
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Peter Pace, recently went on record with his opinions regarding the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy towards homosexuals in the armed forces. His statements were made in response to questions he was asked about legislation to repeal the DADT policy. Among reasons for the legislation, introduced by democratic Rep. Martin Meehan -Mass., is the dismissal of 10,000 troops and approx. 50 Arabic translators due to outward homosexuality (aka, a strong desire to “tell”).
“I believe homosexual acts between two individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts…
“From that standpoint, saying gays should serve openly in the military, to me, says that, by policy, we’d be condoning what I believe to be immoral activity…
“I do not believe the United States is well served by a policy that says it is OK to be immoral in any way.”
In response, human rights and gay advocacy groups demanded an apology. In response to them demanding an apology, I’m making this request; Pick your battles, Gays. Jesus. Do gay people need to be accepted and embraced in our society? Yes. Unconditionally. Society. Do they need to be accepted and embraced in our military? I don’t know man, but you better stop telling that General about your life partner because it looks like his head is going to explode. I mean come on. He’s a General! He made his bones making bones for Christ’s sake. Aside from that, he has nothing in common with any gay person anywhere, and you expect him to be more tolerant? His job has always been killing people and training people to kill people. He was a marine. The United States Military is not the same as society. I don’t think that his thoughts on the military’s policies should be considered as if he were discussing the culture it serves. Yes he made a blanket statement about “morality”, but he’s a general, a life long employee of the military. He’s going to speak in generalities. Generals tend to speak in generalities. And Euphimisms. They have to. I like that about them. Otherwise they wind up telling people who would never do what they do about the things that they would never do. We need them on that wall. Not that our military shouldn’t have to be accountable, but we’ve dropped 2 A-bombs, like I said, pick your battles. They’re there to fight and not explain themselves.
Was Pace doing his job? No. Was he giving away national secrets? No. As a general has he earned the right to say how he thinks certain policies affect the army? Yes, even if he’s being an idiot. But lets not pretend like the rest of the army doesn’t trend towards the homophobic side of the debate. In that context, his comments are less idiotic by virtue of the fact that he is speaking to the impact of open homosexuality on a culture in a military. One that is sensitive, and entirely dependant on its own rigid simplicity. I would dare say, in light of what it does and is doing, it doesn’t have time to spend on this debate. I’d rather my Generals fix the problems they’re trained to fix than apologize for the opinions they’re trained to have.
The debate itself is totally unnecessary, unless gays are really serious about needing to lead an outwardly gay lifestyle while serving in the army. To which I would say, Gays, we are talking about the Army! Don’t join the Army! It obviously doesn’t want you. Dodge your own draft. Guilt free.
The Army isn’t known for tolerance. In many ways the purpose of the Army is to not tolerate things. It doesn’t tolerate not wearing the same clothes as everyone else, not eating with everyone else, not sleeping in the same room as everyone else, not fighting with everyone else and barely tolerates not believing in the same god as everyone else (http://www.counterpunch.org/cassel10202003.html), it is definitely not going to tolerate believing in a different vagina than everyone else. You shouldn’t expect it to. It’s there to fight. And if you’re gay and in the army, you’re there to fight. It shouldn’t break your heart that Jackson and Fitzsimmons don’t want to hear about all the hot muscley cock you handled while you were stateside. And if you’re a lesbian, you’re a woman; they didn’t want you there anyway. Gay soldiers of the world; you really only have one option; come out when you get out. Or before you make the terrible decision to join. One of the two. Or you could get fired for “immorality”. Which would be absurd, but way better than dying. Way better.
by Nate Craig
20/03/2007
RSS 2.0 / trackback
|
March 21st, 2007 at 12:30 pm
Look at General Pace’s uniform decorations, and you will find decorations for good conduct, valorous unit award, and a service ribbon. But you will also find a decoration for best man on man in Vietnam, a feng shui barrack ribbon, and most swallowed.
April 2nd, 2007 at 6:23 pm
I’d like to supplement this with some points:
first, i was in the navy for over 6 years so the majority of my opinion comes from personal experience…
my take on the DADT policy is that it solves the very issue that this guy just started.
the facts are that some people think homosexuality is immoral, some people don’t. but what can be agreed on is that every American should have the right to serve his/her country if they choose.
the problem with allowing openly gay men or woman in the military is not whether or not its immoral, its in the military commands fraternization policies.
the policies themselves are designed to regulate and provide discipline for inappropriate behavior that undermines good military order and discipline. like intimate relationships between members and so forth.
eg: on a navy ship a male and female are not allowed to be alone behind closed doors.
this assumes that the individuals in question are heterosexual and thus the potential exists for the above mentioned inappropriate behavior.
the problem with that is that the military can no longer assume both parties are heterosexual, nor can they assume that if two individuals of the same gender are of the same sexual orientation.
its almost impossible to write a fraternization policy that takes into account every male/female, male/male, female/female situations based on a declaration of sexual orientation that a person could lie about in the first place.
so instead of figure it out the military just said :”we wont ask you what your sexual orientation is as long as you don’t tell us.”
this way anyone of any race, gender, background or sexual orientation has a chance to serve their country in the US military.
and at the end of the day your sexual orientation isn’t anyones business anyway.
we used to have a saying on the ship: “we are not black, white or brown, we are all blue and we are not men nor woman we are sailors.”