Don't Ask Don't Tell // Current

104 military leaders request end of don't ask don't tell

"More than 100 retired U.S. military leaders -- including the former head of the Naval Academy -- have signed a statement... more

uroborus8
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Freedom To Serve - Gay in the Military

Mary Verne was discharged from the Army for being a Lesbian. This is her story.

jcwelker
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Conservatives wage PR battle against gay service

Social conservatives, sensing they are on the losing side of a public relations war, are plotting ways to turn military leaders... more

dkincheloe
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Gay American war hero with Purple Heart did not tell unless asked

Major Alan G Rogers, 40, was an American patriot, committed to the US Army in which he had served for 18 years. His death, from a... more

JanaPokana
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House reconsiders 'don't ask, don't tell'

A House panel weighed overturning the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy Wednesday, the first time... more

sheamus
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Sorry We Asked, Sorry You Told

Don't ask, don't tell. And, whatever you do, don't ask Elaine Donnelly to tell you what she thinks about gays in the military.

The House Armed Services personnel subcommittee made just such a miscalculation yesterday. Holding the first hearing in 15 years on the "don't ask, don't tell" policy, lawmakers invited a quartet of veterans to testify on the subject and also extended an invitation to Donnelly, who has been working for years to protect our fighting forces from the malign influence of women.

Donnelly treated the panel to an extraordinary exhibition of rage. She warned of "transgenders in the military." She warned that lesbians would take pictures of people in the shower. She spoke ominously of gays spreading "HIV positivity" through the ranks.

"We're talking about real consequences for real people," Donnelly proclaimed. Her written statement added warnings about "inappropriate passive/aggressive actions common in the homosexual community," the prospects of "forcible sodomy" and "exotic forms of sexual expression," and the case of "a group of black lesbians who decided to gang-assault" a fellow soldier.

At the witness table with Donnelly, retired Navy Capt. Joan Darrah, a lesbian, rolled her eyes in disbelief. Retired Marine Staff Sgt. Eric Alva, a gay man who was wounded in Iraq, looked as if he would explode.

Inadvertently, Donnelly achieved the opposite of her intended effect. Though there's no expectation that Congress will repeal "don't ask, don't tell" and allow gays to serve openly in the military, the display had the effect of increasing bipartisan sympathy for the cause.

Rep. Vic Snyder (D-Ark.) labeled her statement "just bonkers" and "dumb," and he called her claims about an HIV menace "inappropriate." Said Snyder: "By this analysis . . . we ought to recruit only lesbians for the military, because they have the lowest incidence of HIV in the country."

Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), a veteran of the war in Iraq, called Donnelly's words "an insult to me and many of the soldiers" by saying they "aren't professional enough to serve openly with gay troops while successfully completing their military mission."

Don't ask, don't tell. And, whatever you do, don't ask Elaine Donnelly to tell you what she thinks about gays in... more

TyMarshal
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2 responses

4 months ago

Gay Pride 2008

Sights and sounds from the 2008 Gay Pride Weekend in Los Angeles, where the recent Supreme Court ruling extending the right to... more

estone
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32 responses

5 months ago

75% of Americans say gays should serve openly in military

Seventy-five percent of Americans believe that gays and lesbians should be allowed to serve in the US military, according to a new... more

JanaPokana
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116 responses

4 months ago

"Don't Ask" policy hits female soldiers hardest

As a lesbian serving in the U.S. Navy, Cmdr. Zoe Dunning routinely accepted dates from men simply to avoid accusations that she was homosexual. That was more than 16 years ago. Yet a recent report indicates that the atmosphere in which women in the military operate has worsened.

Today, more than 12,000 service members have lost their jobs because of the so-called don't ask, don't tell law. A disproportionate number of those discharges are women, according to statistics gathered by the Washington-based Servicemembers' Legal Defense Network from the government under the Freedom of Information Act, and released to the public June 23.

"'Don't ask, don't tell' is clearly a women's issue," said Dunning, who is on the board of the Servicemembers' Legal Defense Network. Upon her retirement in 2007 from the Naval Reserves, she was the only openly gay person to serve in the military.

This vast difference between the numbers of women discharged from the military may add impetus to those calling for an end to the "don't ask" law.

The problem for women has worsened in recent years, the data gathered by the service members' network indicate. In fiscal 2006, women made up 17 percent of the Army but 35 percent of discharges under the "don't ask" law. One year later, women were 15 percent of Army members, yet discharges of women increased to 45 percent of the total.

Dunning, who stated publicly in 1993 that she was a lesbian, stayed in the military despite the passage later that year of the "don't ask, don't tell" law requiring members of the military to hide their sexual orientation. The law was characterized by then-president Bill Clinton as a "compromise" from his promise to end the ban on gays serving in the military.

"Don't ask" wasn't a compromise at all, says Cathy Westcott of the service members' network. Before the law, the status of gays in the military was left to the discretion of the commander in chief; after the law, there was a mandate to discharge them. And by singling out homosexuality as a reason for discharge, the law has actually increased discrimination against gays in the military, especially women, Dunning added.

As a lesbian serving in the U.S. Navy, Cmdr. Zoe Dunning routinely accepted dates from men simply to avoid accusations that she... more