Re "Don't Ask; Don't Tell 👬

NOTE: This essay was written before the repeal of DADT. Nevertheless I stand by the opinions expressed.

NY Times Oct 13, 2010 – Judge Orders Military to Stop “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell

I believe this blindness surfaces yet again in the Left’s insistence that gays be allowed to serve – openly -- in the military. What on earth – you might ask – could be wrong with that?

Well, first let me point out what should be obvious -- that the historical/cultural reasons for the military’s refusal to let gays into its ranks are rooted in the exact same instinctual feelings that explain why most parents don’t want their Girl Scouts going on overnight camping trips with Boy Scouts or under the leadership of male scoutmasters: given the awesome power of the sex drive, there is simply too much potential for mischief and trouble.

Let me pull in a seemingly disconnected thread – straight women in the military.

NY Times -- April 2012 -- A Defense Department report released Friday showed that reported sexual assaults were up slightly in 2011, to 3,192, from 3,158 in 2010. The Pentagon believes such crimes are vastly underreported and says about 19,000 assaults are committed every year.

Irony Alert: We have here two females in military environments – one straight and one gay – straight Jessica downplaying her heterosexuality to avoid trouble and gay Katherine Miller (quoted in the NY Times article above) eager to declare her homosexuality – this despite already “enduring gay slurs” on a very self-discipline-oriented, elite campus.

If Katherine was suffering slurs in a relatively pristine environment like West Point, it seems obvious that in the real military “high school” world the prejudice she would encounter by being openly gay would be significantly worse.

Costs versus Benefits for the Military

A simple costs vs. benefits evaluation would suggest that there are high costs to having women in the services (a third get sexually assaulted; the expense of prosecuting those assaults and imprisoning the perpetrators; the expense of separate housing and bathroom facilities; the distinct possibility that they may get pregnant and be unable to perform their duties; etc., etc.) but the benefits of having women outweigh those costs.

I’m not exactly sure what, if any, benefits to the military would be manifested by having openly gay soldiers, and I seriously doubt homosexual military productivity is much, if at all, compromised by DADT. I am, however, sure of some of the costs of repealing DADT.

In particular, with openly gay soldiers, a great victimological can-o-worms would be opened up. That bastard sergeant viciously chewing out seemingly straight Bob would become that bastard sergeant viciously chewing out gay Bob. In an exponential rise similar to the increase in female sexual assault cases, the military would go from zero homosexual harassment, assault, and discrimination cases to through-the-roof – only here the military’s costs vs. benefits relationship would be profoundly in the red.

Then, there's so-called "troop morale" -- could it be affected? This is impossible to calculate. However, in my struggle to find an analogous situation, these questions occurred to me:

How differently might I behave around my barrack buddies if I were sleeping with a girl -- or guy -- or several -- living in our quarters? Or, to reverse it, how would I feel about my barrack buddy if he or she were sleeping with a girl -- or guy -- or several -- living in our quarters?

In either case, these tension-laced scenarios would seem to be devilishly fertile soil for sprouting intense, jealousy-based conflicts, and certainly not at all -- not at all -- conducive to group cohesion.

In fact, should DADT be repealed, I predict -- with much confidence -- that very soon after that repeal you will find homosexuals primarily socializing with their own -- much as they do in NYC. This, it seems to me, would -- rather than building group cohesion -- foster bias.

A Reasonable Compromise:

So . . . it must be remembered that the military has never wanted to open its doors to homosexuals. Same-sex inclination has long been considered to be incompatible with military service. However, by 1993, when DADT was implemented, post-60s leftists and their mainstream-media allies had succeeded -- somewhat -- in mollifying the public’s “sex-in-the-barracks” fears by (a) framing the issue as being one of civil rights and discrimination, and (b) by persuading the public – rightly -- that there was nothing whatsoever wrong with being a homosexual.

But . . . there is also nothing whatsoever wrong with being a male or a female – yet our society, for valid reasons – believes there are situations in the real world where segregation of the sexes is preferable – situations where it is highly desirable to keep sex out -- of -- the -- "mix".

NBC News – May, 2009 – Fort Dix Female Soldiers Filmed in Shower

. . . A soldier familiar with Fort Dix operations said male and female soldiers do sleep in the same buildings, but are segregated by floor. . . "Soldiers are soldiers," the soldier said. "They're 19- 20-year-old kids, with hormones flowing. They do stupid stuff. "

DADT was an attempt to find middle ground between what the military and most citizens wanted – and what gay activists and the leftist intelligencia wanted. Simply put, the compromise was: “We’ll let you serve if you’ll keep your homosexuality under the radar.” The Left loves to compare this forced sexual-preference charade to the brutal “you-are-inferior” discrimination that blacks were long subjected to by the military. But the military’s reasoning for these two types of discrimination was rooted in two entirely different perceptions. Regarding blacks, the military simply did believe blacks were inferior – a perception that it eventually came to realize was grossly mistaken.

Regarding gay soldiers, however, the military’s discrimination was based on the realities of human nature – specifically, the sex drive.

It is one thing to have straights and gays of both sexes mixed in the normal workplace – the office, the network, the restaurant, the school, the whatever – but it is a drastically different thing to have them together in a workplace that keeps its workers together 24 hours a day and requires them to bunk together. That’s why male and female soldiers have different quarters.

Gay soldiers throw a major wrench into this simple male/female "no-sex-please" segregation. They are biologically inclined to have same-sex sex, and sexual inclination combined with opportunity is not something to casually dismiss. Just ask the Catholic Church. History has endlessly demonstrated that the sex drive is astoundingly good at hijacking the brain.

Big Trouble in the Barracks

Alas, in the real world, good intentions and fairness cannot always trump cold, hard facts. As preferable as it might have been -- and even though the Disabilities Act required it -- the NY City Subway system could not afford to accommodate wheelchairs -- and did not do so.