Secretary of Defense Robert Gates will be on Capitol Hill today, discussing the Obama administrations broad plan to repeal the military's "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy on homosexuals. Gates faces an uphill battle against increasingly raucous conservatives and increasingly timid democrats, all who are anxious to put their name on anything controversial in an election year.
Despite this, Congressman Patrick Murphy (D-Pa) and his 187 co-sponsors have publicly thrown their support behind allowing openly gay service members to serve their country. Still, the fodder from the opposition is strong: General George Casey, the Army's Chief of Staff, has voiced that he believed the ban shouldn't be lifted until the US completes its withdrawal from Iraq (though homosexuality in Iraq is less taboo than in America). A second member of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is also in opposition to the repeal: Marine Corps Commandant General James Conway believes the repeal would affect military readiness.
This battle has been fought before. In 1948, despite the opposition from high-ranking members of the military, President Harry S. Truman bypassed Congress and signed Executive Order 9811, effectively desegregating the military. When the Executive Order was signed, many tried to create laws which would have rendered the Order moot, namely Richard B. Russell, a Democratic Senator from Georgia.
Despite segregation laws during World War II, high-casualty units who were low on white soldiers were often forcibly desegregated through reinforcements of black soldiers. When the segregated Eighth Army went to the Korean front in 1950 and suffered staggering losses, black soldiers soon joined the fight and helped push back the communists to the 38th parallel. It seems racial supremacy was an issue until death and defeat were on the line. By 1951, the Army formally desegregated its units.
The military preceded the rest of America in desegregation by over a decade. It was a moral choice: when Truman signed the Order we were not a nation at war. The Man from Missouri knew it was the right thing to do.
Now in the midst of two wars where gays and straights have served side-by-side, we're faced with a similar dilemma. Cries from the right will say openly-serving gays will affect military readiness. I say we are fortunate they are serving in our ranks today, despite our rejection of their lifestyles.
Richard B. Russell, the democrat from Georgia, had tried to pass a bill allowing white soldiers to choose whether they wanted to serve in a segregated military unit or not. The bill was defeated twice in Congress, and defeated again in Korea, and again in Vietnam, and again in Panama, and again in Iraq and again in Afghanistan when soldiers chose to serve with people of different backgrounds in the foxhole next to them. Soldiers in the Army want someone beside them they can trust, a trait that transcends race and sexual orientation. It doesn't matter who they are or how they live. Our laws should reflect that.
Support Patrick Murphy.
Dude, yes. Great piece.
ReplyDeleteI’ve been looking for somewhere to write about this – I’d be interested in hearing your reaction as a soldier.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to me that the ban on homosexuality in the military is a type of segregation exclusive to that type of “otherness” (sexuality) - rather than perhaps gender, religion, or race - and that it is actually a logically and explicitly stated version of a larger social concern.
In our society (and most others), males and females are segregated by gender in intimate situations where sexual objectification or desire by the opposite sex could be a concern – most specifically, bathrooms and locker rooms. As it is the basic existential tool, laws are put in place to protect an individual’s body from vulnerability – you can’t rape somebody, you can’t kill somebody, etc. Based on this principle, it stands to reason and logic, for example, that the shower at your local gym isn’t available to be shared by men and women. These sorts of policies rely not on a belief that any sort of sexual assault is typical, but simply that it could (and does) happen and an individual should be protected against that possibility.
To my knowledge, there has never been a significant political push to change such policies – to either abolish gender-specific private spaces or to prevent homosexuals from accessing them. Effectively, our entire society has a “Don’t ask, Don’t tell” policy in certain situations – but the subject is taboo.
This being said, it is my understanding that the military (and correct me if I’m wrong) frequently segregates soldiers by gender – in barracks, bathrooms, showers, etc. So then the question of lifting the ban isn’t one about being able to trust the person next to you in combat, as you put it, but is instead about the same privacy concerns that are overtly accounted for while being implicitly ignored in our society.
What follows – for either the military or wider society – is necessarily one of two solutions. You can abolish gender-specific private spaces. But really, would you trust a group of teenage-boys to keep their eyes up in a co-ed shower?
Or, there is a solution via some type of ultra-privacy. Individual bathrooms, shower rooms, bedrooms. This seems plausible, and if it is the only answer, then so be it. There is absolutely not an honest case for why homosexuals should be singled out in situations involving basic human functions.
For the military, however, how would camaraderie be affected by stricter privacy settings? Does cohesion suffer at the hands of individualism? And how does that affect the potency of our armed forces?
Christian, I think you raise an interesting point. I’ve also received feedback on the race comparison to sexual orientation, and been told that none other than Colin Powell, the military’s once highest-ranking African American believes: “Skin color is a benign non-behavioral characteristic. Sexual orientation is perhaps the most profound of human behavioral characteristics. Comparison of the two is a convenient but invalid argument.”
ReplyDeleteWhile I question Mr. Powell’s psychological qualifications to make such a statement, I’d prefer to discuss not race vs sexual orientation, but to touch on the point you raise. You state that the segregation of genders in public society is done to “protect an individual’s body from vulnerability” and provide as an example the fact that you (nor I) would trust an adolescent group of boys to keep their hands to themselves in a co-ed locker room (we’ve all seen Porky’s).
Non-western societies take gender segregation to much higher heights. In Iraq, women are segregated from guests in homes. In Saudi Arabia, they cannot even escort a man on the streets but walk three paces behind him. In Afghanistan, they wore (and continue to wear) the infamous hijabs. The rationale is that such segregation is done to protect the ‘honor’ of the female, which is a colloquial term for her sexuality. Such societies look west and see the United States as a sexually-addicted gang of immorals because of our objectification of women. Each year hemlines go up and waistlines go down, billboards become more racy, and pornography becomes more ubiquitous in our everyday lives (thanks, Internet!).
By their logic, and the argument that gender segregation begets morality, rapes and sexual crimes in western societies would be astronomically higher than in Muslim communities. Such is not the case. While reliable statistics from Muslim countries are hard to come by, cross-examinations of rape statistics in European countries with Muslim communities have been made. The result is that, overwhelmingly, more convicted rapists were born on foreign soil or from foreign parents. A 2005 study in Sweden showed that 85% of convicted rapists were immigrants, largely from the Muslim countries of Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia.
ReplyDeleteEven accepting that there are other factors involved in such studies—class, income, etc.—the statistics argue that gender segregation and sexual discipline are not correlated, in fact, quite the opposite.
You are correct. In the military, males and females are segregated in bathrooms and showers and barracks when possible. However, in many locations across both Afghanistan and Iraq, in small outposts in Baghdad or Taji or Balad or Kandahar, there are no separate facilities. Female soldiers sleep right next to male soldiers, share the same bathrooms, etc. While consensual and non-consensual sex certainly occurs in these areas, I have heard little of it.
Conversely, on larger bases, whether it’s because individuals are more inclined to report sex crimes or for other unknown reasons, I would argue more sex crimes occur per capita than in small combat outposts, despite the fact that facilities exist where bathrooms and bedrooms are segregated (admittedly the statistics for this are hard to come by).
The reason, I would argue, is that in smaller units that are more vulnerable to the risks of warfare there is tighter unit cohesion--a ‘family’ atmosphere exists. On ‘urban’ bases like the Victory Base Complex in Baghdad, there is less unit cohesion, more free time and more crime. In those smaller groups where privacy is nil, there is more respect among peers, in spite of gender differences and, I would argue, sexual orientation.
My point (really, I have one), is that highlighting gender differences through increased segregation and sex crimes are unrelated, or possibly inversely related. A woman who uses a men’s bathroom isn’t “asking for it” in terms of rape, nor is a gay man who showers in a male locker room looking for an orgy.
I am not advocating turning all restrooms and showers in American and abroad into coed affairs, but I also believe that such segregation isn’t as strong a deterrent from a sexually aggressive person as one might think. I would argue instead that self-discipline, respect toward our peers, and respect toward sexuality as a whole is more essential than shower curtains and bathroom stalls, regardless of whether we’re talking gay or straight, or civilian or military.
Great response. The crime statistics are very interesting, although (to me, at least) they do make sense. Societies that thoroughly repress sexuality would seem logically prone to a larger degree of assaults since there aren’t other outlets for sexual tension.
ReplyDeleteAnyhow, after re-reading, I think my initial post might have been too reductive. I’m not sure that gender segregation exists exclusively to prevent assault. I think it also taps into the notion that pursuit of freedom should occur exclusive of shame – ie, you should be able to happily live your life without having to be embarrassed. An ironic claim for this particular subject, I know.
But that idea boils down to me not wanting to clean myself in my birthday suit while an old woman is doing the same two feet away. Or maybe I’m not fit enough to impress the hot girl standing across from me. Either way, it isn’t a question of fear in this case. Shame might be more inherent in the U.S. as a lingering, collective effect of our Puritan history – Europe doesn’t seem to have the same problem.
The more I think about it, the more I realize that the ban only really makes sense in the context of showers and stall-less bathrooms. Your point about co-ed bunking is a good one. So what we are left with is a question about how a situation as specific and small as showering is weighed as a privacy concern.
Mandate private shower stalls and accept the fact that there will always be people who make you feel uncomfortable for some reason. Problem solved, I think?
Also, as a broader topic, I think Colin Powell is right about the difference between race and sexuality. That would be an interesting debate to have.
ReplyDelete