[natehale1971]

Originally Posted by Fusilier

A long time ago we could have replaced the term "gays" in your post with "blacks" and your post would still make sense. The early days for any change will be rocky, but eventually it will become as normal as previous transitions. Society is changing for the better and as each year passes, just like on civie street, it will be a little bit easier for gays to be integrated and accepted.

The army will get over the fact that nobody should have to hide something that is as natural as skin color.

My gaming group in the Navy touched on this subject alot... because two of our players were gay and in a relationship, and everyone in the group knew it and supported them. And when ever we would talk about the entire issue back when all this started in 1993, they said that they wouldn't want things to be out in the open because it would make an issue of their sexuality. Reducing their humanity and making them nothing more than... their sexual orientation, when they were so much more than that.

And when "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue" came out they were happy with it. Because the fact of who you sleep with shouldn't be an issue and shouldn't be paraded about (because even hetrosexual displays of affection or sexuality NOT ALLOWED in uniform), and as long as you didn't force it on others no one did or said anything about it.

Hell, I never liked it when people would start talking about their sexticapdes, and then expected others to start and describe theirs... and when i would beg off, i'd get hazed because i was a virgin who was waiting for someone i loved to be with.

I knew 75% of the gays that where in any command that i was assigned, namely because I was would end up getting hit on by them on a routine basis (my sexual naivate for some reason seemed to give them the idea i was gay). And they'd be terrified when i would say "I'm fallatered, but I'm straight..." that I was going to turn them in, but they would became close friends when I said "Who you sleep with, is none of my business. It's something between you, your partner (or partners) and God. I'm not putting myself in a position to judge... because I ain't God."

And this would cause them to tell the other gays and lesbians that I was someone who wouldn't make their sexuality a big deal, and I wouldn't report them. And unfortuantely, that caused one of them to keep hitting on me and not take "NO" for an answer. He stalked me, and sexually assaulted me.

This situation is NOTHING like that of intergation... remember that it was Woodrow Wilson who had segreated the Armed Forces and the federal government services. It was an act done by a racist whose so-called 'Progressive' ideals would inspire the Nazis (not just their racial ideology, but their mastery and use of Propaganda to sway the masses to support anything the government leaders wanted).

It really gets to me when the 'in your face' types who make what ever hypenated group that they are more important than everything else. If you are Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender or Questioning it doesn't matter to me. Hell, It's NONE OF ANYONE ELSES BUSINESS. So please stop forcing it down others throats.

Who someone sleeps with or who they get married to just shouldn't be the governments or anyone elses business. It's something that is theirs, their partner (or partners) and God's business... and NO ONE else's business.

And before anyone attacks me for saying this... just know a little bit more about me.

My Aunt Carol was a lesbian and I adored her. Our family was really close, and when she killed her lover Ruth it really caused our family major heartache. Not only did we have to deal with the trial that could have been a death penality case (something that all of us, inculding Aunt Carol supported)... we had to go into the prosecutors bringing out Aunt Carol and Ruth's entire relationship and everything that went with it out in the open.

The fact that Ruth was abusive to Carol and her own children wasn't the hard part to deal with. It was the other things that came out (we really didn't need the fact that Aunt Ruth's oldest son was sexually molesting my male cousin being released to the media). They brought out all kinds of things in an effort to use them to give Aunt Carol motive for killing Ruth.

Trying to make it look like it had been premeditated murder, when the fact of the matter was nothing like that... Aunt Carol and Ruth had gotten into a fight about Ruth's youngest son (who was 14, and she was going to throw him out of the house) while they were at a local gaybar and had been drinking just way too much. It had ended with Ruth throwing Aunt Carol across the bar and breaking a table. Ruth was then thrown out of the bar while they took care of Aunt Carol, and because Aunt Carol had the car keys she started walking the three miles back home. When Aunt Carol woke up she went and got into her car and headed home, and she said that she never rembered hitting Aunt Ruth nor having dragged her dead body under the car all the way home.

After she was found guilty and senticed to prison, we would travel the four hours to go see her every month, and my mom and grandmom would have to put up with the security checks to get into the prison... and I would have to sit with my sisters (one was a toddler and the other an infant) because we were not allowed inside to see Aunt Carol because we were too young and it was a max security prison. We didn't get to see her until they transfered her to a minimum security prision during the last years of her sentice before she was finally paroled.

When Aunt Carol died earlier this year i put my broken body in a tiny car and rode for 4 hours one way for her funeral. That's how much i loved her and cared for her.

Oh... I also have two 'adopted' brothers who are openingly gay, and many of my stances comes through our relationship together.

Now, I recently tried to give an 'intersexed' person a word of encouragement... and all i got out of it was a flipping hatefilled stalker that the police had to deal with, because they accused ME of being the one filled with hate because of my political affiliation when it was THEM who was attacking me with nothing but HATE.

So none of this is coming from hate... but a philosophy that there are things that are public, things that are private. And that if you allow someone to take a single part of you, and identify you ONLY by that... you are allowing them to control you.

John Wayne said it best...

The Hyphen

The hyphen. Webster’s dictionary defines as a symbol used to divide a compound word or a single word.

So it seems to me that when a man calls himself Afro-American or Mexican-American or Italian-American or Irish-American or Jewish-American, what he’s saying is “I’m a divided American.”

Well, we all came from other places, different creeds, different races, to form a nation, to become as one. Yet look at the harm a line has done, a simple little line, and, yet, as divisive as a line can get. A crooked cross the Nazis flew, and the Russian hammer and sickle, too – time bombs in the lives of Man.

But none of these could ever fan the flames of hatred faster than the hyphen.

The Russian hammer built a wall that locks men’s hearts from freedom’s call. The crooked cross flew overhead above 20 million tragic dead, among them, men from this great nation who died for Freedom’s preservation.

A hyphen is a line that’s small. It can be a bridge or it can be a wall. A bridge can save you lots of time; a wall you always have to climb.

The road to Liberty lies true. The hyphen’s use is up to you.

Used as a bridge, it can span all the differences of Man. Being free in mind and soul should be our most important goal.

But, if you use the hyphen as a wall, you’ll make your life mean and small.

An American is a special breed whose People came to her in need. They came to her that they might find a world where they’d have peace of mind, where men are equal, and (something more), stand taller than they stood before.

So you be wise in your decision, and that little line won’t cause division. Let’s join hands with one another, for in this land, each man’s your brother. United we stand; divided we fall.

We’re Americans. That says it all.

And even if you aren't an Ameircan... this goes for your nations as well.

Look at what the type of multicultralism that divides people has brought to Europe. You have enclaves of extremists that are being breed in government sponsored poverty and misery mills that natives of their own country are terrified of going into (or entire parts of their home towns that they are being forced out of thanks to racially motivated violence against them). This is happening all across Western Europe & Great Britain, it's blatantly obvious for anyone willing to admit it to themselves.

The simple fact is this...

"A house divided against itself cannot stand." - Abraham Lincoln

And this new policy is taking something that should be PRIVATE and is making it PUBLIC. It's making it to where the types of people at the Gay Pride Parades who dress in a nun's habit and invade a Catholic Church hurling profanty and other epitahs at everyone... or run around naked in fetish gear and perform actual homosexual sex acts in front of children can join the armed forces and make EVERYTHING about their sexual orientation.

And all this does is make for a hostile work enviroment for EVERYONE. It can make morale a major problem, and the first time one of the 'in your face' types does something that is a major violoation of the UCMJ, it's going to be made into a federal case and they'll be screaming that it's all about homophobia and not the fact that they did something wrong.

All this current situation does now is make an issue that should have remained private in the first place. The military is not a place to be playing with 'social engineering' because any mistakes can end up getting alot of people killed.

There are those where who supported the idea of Summery Executions during T2k for 'troublemakers'.

So think about that for a second.

Is any unit going to be able to handle someone who is so "in your face" about their sexuality that it becomes uncomfortable for others who don't share their sexuality in the unit? And what's going to be the answer to that problem. Is the fact they are causing morale problems going to be dealt with without cries of Homophobia?