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A Discharged Gay Vet: Let Us Back in the Army
Woods, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, was discharged from the U.S. Army in 2008 for violating the military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy.
Just a handful of loud town hall meetings could send politicians running away from reversing Don't Ask, Don't Tell. Anthony Woods, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom who was discharged under DADT, on how to implement smart policy.
On Tuesday, Admiral Mike Mullen told Congress, “I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens.” Thousands of honorable men and women discharged under this misguided policy have argued this for years. Serving your country and maintaining your integrity should never be in opposition to one another.
Our military is still a huge bureaucracy with countless policies and rules to update, and classes and procedures to develop in order to guarantee a smooth transition.
During this time of war, abolishing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell will strengthen our fighting force by allowing all capable Americans to serve our country honorably, regardless of their sexual orientation. To suggest the men and women of our military are incapable of handling this is an insult to their professionalism.
Those who oppose this policy—rapidly dwindling in their numbers—are growing in their desperation. Arguments at Tuesday’s hearing ranged from Senator Chambliss’ predictions that our troops will devolve into a life of booze and “body art” as order and discipline disintegrates into chaos to Senator McCain’s insistence that the policy should be kept in place because it is “well understood.” Well, senator, just because blacks understood their place was at the back of the bus or that they weren’t fit to be served at the counter, does that mean those policies should have stayed in place, too? I think not.
• The Victims of Don't Ask, Don't TellBut, those of us who support repeal shouldn’t break out the Champagne just yet. While Secretary Gates, Admiral Mullen, and now Colin Powell have delivered mortal wounds to this discriminatory policy, we cannot rest until we’ve accomplished the mission. If the battle for health care has taught us anything, it’s that a handful of citizens screaming in a town hall meeting can send even the best-intentioned politicians running away from smart policy.
While our friends in opposition continue to stand in the way of progress, we should be calling for smart repeal.
So the question becomes, what does smart repeal look like? First, Admiral Mullen and Secretary Gates are right to ask for time, and Congress and supporters of repeal should give it to them. Successful repeal requires a change in climate from the top down—and that takes time. Our military is still a huge bureaucracy with countless policies and rules to update, and classes and procedures to develop in order to guarantee a smooth transition.
In the upcoming defense appropriation, Congress should include a provision repealing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell at the end of a period of 12 to 18 months. In the meantime, the military should suspend all discharges on the basis of orientation. Secretary Gates has ordered the halt of a small number of discharges—why not stop them all?
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It's Not an Army of One
Woods, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, was discharged from the U.S. Army in 2008 for violating the military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy.
End This Bigoted Policy Now
Woods, a veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, was discharged from the U.S. Army in 2008 for violating the military's "Don't ask, don't tell" policy.
wareagle82
Anthony, your argument takes a huge step backward in attempting to equate race with sexual orientation. Hardly the same thing. It cheapens what could otherwise be a credible argument - that social views toward gays have changed dramatically since the policy's implementation in '93, that today's enlistees are much more likely to know openly gay folks and to have decided for themselves that it's not a huge deal, and that this policy is, to a large degree, an anachronism. Then again, so are the civil rights movement, feminism, and organized labor but they don't seem to be going away, either.
A change will occur and it will take time. To go back to your faulty analogy, desegragation didn't occur overnight and not everyone was instantly okay with it. But it did occur. The key point is, your orientation has no place in the military and by "your" I mean everyone. to include straight troops. The armed forces are not a fraternity; no one's sex life ought to be on display. However, you are not correctly reporting the temperature of those in uniform if you believe this will stop being an issue simply because of an administrative directive.
Monk66
"After the military has had time to wargame possible hiccups on the road to repeal-and I believe there will be some-the military will be in an excellent position to move forward with a stronger, fully integrated force."
I think the author fully understands it wont be overnight. The problem with your argument is that yes, sexual oreintation has no place in the military. BUT, only gays get discharged because of theirs being found out, not straights.
By your posting name, I assume you served. Myself and my family is forever thankful for people like you. With that said, I also assume you are not a part of this generations soldiers. I can understand your views on gays as you grew up in a different time, but so has my generation. We don't see gays in the same light, and with each passing generation the light gets a little brighter.
MatKen
I was in the military. USMC 92-96. I can assure you that the topic of conversation is quite often about sex. In fact, it probably goes like this: 1. Sex 2. guns 3. fighting 4. what a great athlete I was and 5. sex. The armed forces are far more fraternal than any college fraternity could ever be. Ever slept in a room with 300 of your closest friends for 6 months while at sea? Perhaps it's different for those people in the "service", but this is how it is, was, and always will be for those of us in the military.
andygirl
I disagree. It's not an analogy. He's using a rhetorical comparison by degrees. They may be two seperate issues but they are comparable in ways regarding civil and human rights. The feminist movement and organized labor, I think, are also comparable by degrees. You can't place them side by side, but we can learn from the societal implications.
However, I do agree that social movement generally takes time. While I do think that Don't Ask Don't Tell should be repealed now (my opinion), I think we should not become discouraged when things don't happen overnight. It took women in American almost 100 years to get the vote. It took Black Americans about 100 years after slavery was abolished to get a vote (which they still had to fight for their lives to do). Social movements evolve over time, it's true. But that does not mean we cannot start a social revolution now. Now is the time to work hard and we cannot stop until we succeed, even if it takes a century.
sonofloud
"your argument takes a huge step backward in attempting to equate race with sexual orientation. Hardly the same thing".
Care to give anyone reasons why you think that?
I'm just curious as sexual orientation, like race, cannot be chosen......unlike a person's choice of religion.
wareagle82
am I really having to explain to you that while it is easily apparent that Mr Woods is black, we only know he is gay because he told us? Really?
sonofloud
yes, please explain what his being gay and black means?
kevinf
Maybe Mr. Woods should have chosen a different way to phrase the issue, instead of equating sexual orientation with race, he could have equated it with religion. The religion of a person is not always clear just by their physical appearance, most people are not aware of another person's religion unless the person makes it apparent by verbalizing it. As you have said sexuality is a private matter but so is religion. The difference is that the military is not allowed to discharge members on the basis of their religion.
I myself do not believe that sexuality is a choice but there are many who do, yet I doubt that most of these people feel that discrimination should occur against people for other choices that they make, i.e. religion, political affiliation.
sonofloud
So I guess what your trying to say is that he can't pretend to be white but he can pretend to be straight?
sonofloud
re: kevinf
The problem with equating sexual orientation to religion is that you do not choose your sexual orientation but you do choose your religion so your comparison is flawed.
amantell
There are many cruel ironies regarding our nation's relationship to its military, and the DADT policy is among the most absurd. In an era when we have a standing professional all-volunteer army and no draft, we have thousands of men and women who WANT to serve, but have to do so under false pretenses or not at all.
Our armed forces aren't designed for long engagements in far-flung corners of the world, nor have they been since Nixon was in office. The military needs every able-bodied citizen it can get. Patriotism among gays and lesbians should far outweigh other considerations that are private matters and don't affect their willingness or ability to risk life and limb.
gak001
DADT is a dinosaur on its way to extinction. It's inevitable and the neanderthals need to get over it.
sophia5
Race . . . Sexuality . . . WHO CARES.
Both are irrelevant to this debate.
Mr. Anthony Woods is willing to risk HIS life on behalf of OUR lives.
He wants to protect and defend this country.
THAT IS ALL THAT MATTERS. Period.
Let him back in.
electrasteph
"am I really having to explain to you that while it is easily apparent that Mr Woods is black, we only know he is gay because he told us? Really?"
Yes, actually. As a gay person who has been open about it for over 22 years, I can attest that you don't have to do any "telling" for people to figure out that you're gay. People's love lives and personal activities naturally come up as conversation for people who spend time around one another. When you walk into a room with your partner or spouse, do you introduce them to people? That's telling people about your sexual orientation.
To hide your sexual orientation, whatever it may be, you have to actively conceal it by leaving out large chunks of conversation or by actively lying about your life. Try doing that someday - go through a day without talking about your family or romantic partner. It quickly becomes clear that "don't tell" is an act of active deceit.
You may not realize right away that a gay person is gay in the way you would that they are black, but you sure will figure it out eventually, unless they are working hard to lie to you, as are most gay people in the military.
This user is no longer registered.
maxfolger
It's about time we cleared up the communication gap in the armed forces:
http://bit.ly/9YNli3
(satire)
MatKen
" If the battle for health care has taught us anything, it's that a handful of citizens screaming in a town hall meeting can send even the best-intentioned politicians running away from smart policy."
I respect Mr. Woods opinion on DADT, however his assertion about town hall meetings having politicians running away from smart policy, or that there has been any smart policy presented during the so-called healthcare debates, seriously undermines his credibility in my mind.
SharnCedar
I had a hard time taking this article seriously after he made a misleading comment early in the piece - saying that current DADT policy forces service people to "lie" about who they are. That might be how he feels, subjectively, but its not a good objective description of the policy. The policy doesn't ask anyone to lie, as far as I know. Not saying I support DADT, its probably a policy that is silly in a modern context, but I support even less the notion that people who mislead the nation should rule the nation. Emotional, non-objective statements have no place in a serious policy discussion. This article is disappointing, and it reflects poorly on gay service members. Hopefully all gay service members will disavow this piece. Making a false accusation, in which a policy is stated to do something which is explicitly does not do, is not a good basis on which to establish trust. How do we trust our leadership when they cannot tell a truth even more compulsively than George Washington could not tell a lie?
ronald64
Although the policy doesn't explicitly ask service members to lie, it implicitly asks them to be evasive or even decaptive about their sexuality. Sexuality may not be an appropriate topic while on duty, but any veteran can verify that it quickly becomes a topic off-duty. What is everyone so threatened by anyway? As a heterosexual male, shouldn't I approve of gay men because that means less competition for the women? Or should I be worried that somebody is having more sex than I am? Either way, let's just get over it. Some people are gay and we have a war on terror to fight.
armchairfirebrand
Unlike their counterparts in Israel, Canada, and the United Kingdom, homosexuals are not allowed to serve openly in the United States Armed Forces. President Clinton attempted to rectify this inequity in 1993 but backlash from the right was so severe that he was forced to compromise, leading to the infamous "don't ask, don't tell" policy. The time has come to repeal this insufficient half-measure and honor the contribution of courageous, gay Americans by inviting them to come out of the closet.
Read more @ http://armchairfirebrand.wordpress.com/
andygirl
Anthony,
BRAVO!
Matt Gibbs
The human rights issue here is the paramount consideration. While I appreciate the point made in another comment here that it is very different to the civil rights movement, the foundation of the issues remains the same. This is one of the major human rights issues of our time. Shame on a country that makes a far-reaching policy limiting the freedoms of the very people who are seeking to defend the freedom of their fellow citizens.
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