Military Discharged Fewer Gays, Lesbians In '06

[Hissyspit]

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/03/14/MNG6AOKQP61.DTL&feed=rss.news

Military discharged fewer gays, lesbians in '06
Joint Chiefs' chairman catches flak for calling homosexual acts immoral
Ann Scott Tyson, Washington Post

Wednesday, March 14, 2007

(03-14) 04:00 PDT Washington -- The number of homosexuals discharged from the U.S. military under the "don't ask, don't tell" policy dropped significantly in 2006, according to Pentagon figures released Tuesday -- continuing a sharp decline since the Afghanistan and Iraq conflicts began and leading critics to charge that the military is retaining gay men and lesbians because it needs them in a time of war.

According to preliminary Pentagon data, 612 homosexuals were discharged in fiscal 2006, fewer than half the 1,227 discharged in 2001. On average, more than 1,000 service members were discharged each year from 1997 to 2001 -- but in the past five years that number has fallen below 730.

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"It is the height of arrogance for the general to judge the morality of those serving and wanting to serve their country by volunteering to join the Armed Services," said Thom Lynch, executive director of the San Francisco Lesbian Gay Transgender Community Center. "The first major casualty in Iraq during this war was a gay man, Marine Staff Sgt. Eric Alva. The general owes this man and thousands of other gay men and lesbians an apology."

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"It is appalling that while the president is promoting sending more troops to Iraq and Afghanistan, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs would attack gay and lesbian members of our armed forces who are second-to-none in their bravery, sacrifice and commitment to serving America. Gen. Pace owes an apology to all men and women in uniform; he should tell them that their service is deeply valued by our nation regardless of their sexual orientation."

Sen. John Warner, R-Va., told ABC News Tuesday that he strongly disagrees with Pace's view that homosexuality is immoral.

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[shadowknows69]

1. I suspect the military's ACTUAL policy on gays these days is a little fluid

I suspect there's a quota for expulsions to make it look like they're busy to bigoted morans like Pace but in my experience, on the base I work near anyway, they aren't going out of their way to hide it. There's a very popular, prodominantly gay/lesbian club in town and it's pretty well known for what it is. Well occasionally and hilariously you get new soldiers in town who don't know it. My wife and I used to go there frequently and watching the realization come over the faces of a group of young troops who just entered looking for women to conquer was really quite funny if a little tragic. Anyhoo the troops that go there as regulars don't seem to make any effort to hide it from fellow soldiers. We have to pick them up at several destinations to come in sometimes and there is very little "take me to the store across the street" requests. Indeed many vehicles parked in the parking lot are adorned with batallion and theater experience stickers and other things that would identify them as being driven by troops. Our base is one of the most heavily deployed in the army with most of them set to go back for tour number four. I suspect it depends on how valuable you are to the military that determines whether you get expelled for your sexual orientation or not.