US military ban on gays and lesbians ends

Fred Sherman

Well-known member
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...ary-service-official-tuesday/?test=latestnews

This is a big mistake.

And the mistake is that we should even care.

When an American citizen raises their hand, takes the oath of enlistment or commissioning, committing themselves to defending the constitution and expresses a selfless wiliness to place themselves in harms way for something more important than self, then their sexual orientation doesn't mean jack.

Our troops are the best trained, best equipped and most professional in the world. They will be able to handle it. The dire predictions about troop moral and retention problems will turn out to be a load of crap.
 
amen.gif


You always make a lot of sense Fred and you say it well.
 
I agree Fred.

Additionally, I don't give a crap about someone's sexual orientation, whether they prefer to have sex with a man, woman, or horse. So you're homosexual. Big damn deal.
I need to know this.... why?

Geeeezes, I don't broadcast that I'm heterosexual, and I do NOT need to know who or what anyone else prefers, sexually. It is none of my business, and I resent your efforts to forcefully make it my business.

/end rant
 
I resent your efforts to forcefully make it my business.
Did you resent Martin Luther King marching for black folks' civil rights?

In order for blacks, women or any other minority group to get recognition - let alone a stab at equality - they have to wave their flags in the world's face. If they didn't, the world would be more than happy to continue to ignore them and treat them as less-than.

It isn't about who they like to bed down with, it's about people discriminating against them because of who they like to bed down with. If someone working hard or even risking their life to be recognized makes you uncomfortable, you need to get over it (and realize that you just might be part of the problem they are trying to overcome).
 
I agree Fred.

Additionally, I don't give a crap about someone's sexual orientation, whether they prefer to have sex with a man, woman, or horse. So you're homosexual. Big damn deal.
I need to know this.... why?

Geeeezes, I don't broadcast that I'm heterosexual, and I do NOT need to know who or what anyone else prefers, sexually. It is none of my business, and I resent your efforts to forcefully make it my business.

/end rant

Well, on the horse, I suppose I would ask if it was a consensual relationship.
 
Did you resent Martin Luther King marching for black folks' civil rights?

In order for blacks, women or any other minority group to get recognition - let alone a stab at equality - they have to wave their flags in the world's face. If they didn't, the world would be more than happy to continue to ignore them and treat them as less-than.

It isn't about who they like to bed down with, it's about people discriminating against them because of who they like to bed down with. If someone working hard or even risking their life to be recognized makes you uncomfortable, you need to get over it (and realize that you just might be part of the problem they are trying to overcome).
Thats a load of crap. Anytime you get up in someone face, you invite a backlash. Honey and vinegar, right?

To my mind, the approach is the difference between putting a "gay stamp" on a person, or putting a human face on gay issues.

If someone gets up in my grill when I met them, declares their homosexuality and demands I recognize or be a homophobe, thats generally a negative experience that does their cause no good.

But if they just introduce themselves, allow interpersonal relations to occur organically neither promoting nor hiding who they are, over time, I'll learn they're gay and they'll learn my issues. You don't hold the fact that my brains is wired differently against me, and I won't do the same.

it puts a human face on an issue instead of putting an issue in your face.
 
I need to know this.... why?
Wasn't the issue that if they said their girlfriend or boyfriend, being same sex, then they would be kicked out?

Hetro-sexuals use these terms constantly... gay couples would have to constantly scrutinise everyday words, otherwise they would fear the loss of their job from the US military.

I say... about time... like military officials said, it doesn't affect their ability to fight in conflicts or do their job, they're already doing it now... they just have to be secretive about it, which in itself, would cause more issues than good.
 
I say... about time... like military officials said, it doesn't affect their ability to fight in conflicts or do their job, they're already doing it now... they just have to be secretive about it, which in itself, would cause more issues than good.
A threath to dob them in to their superiors could cause them to give out classified information.
 
But but but... if we don't stick our noses in other people's business and try to get ourselves involved in things that don't have any affect on us at all, what ever shall we do? Do you realize how much time would be left over for productive things?! Entertainment Tonight would be out of business if we paid attention to things that mattered, putting people out of jobs and on the streets! It's un-American.

We can't have that, now can we? :rolleyes:
 
Wasn't the issue that if they said their girlfriend or boyfriend, being same sex, then they would be kicked out?

Hetro-sexuals use these terms constantly... gay couples would have to constantly scrutinise everyday words, otherwise they would fear the loss of their job from the US military.

I say... about time... like military officials said, it doesn't affect their ability to fight in conflicts or do their job, they're already doing it now... they just have to be secretive about it, which in itself, would cause more issues than good.
It's not a matter of being secretive. I'm not secretive of my heterosexuality. But I don't feel the need to broadcast it either. Why? It's no one's business but mine.
And if someone is homosexual, it's none of my business. It doesn't matter to me. I'll like you anyway. But I do not need to know, nor do I want to know, which gender you prefer to have sex with, and I resent them thinking that I absolutely MUST know. I don't care!
 
Thats a load of crap. Anytime you get up in someone face, you invite a backlash.
Well I would hazard a guess that no one has ever "got up in your face" with their sexuality. What does that even mean?

What seems to bother a lot of people is seeing others, who happen to be different from them, openly being themselves. It's the fear-of-the-different, like most racial, sexual or cultural biases are. It doesn't make you a bad person. Some would even argue that it's human nature, and I wouldn't disagree.

The problem is, it leads to inequality, because the majority, left to its own devices, will always impose restrictions on the minority. Whether those restrictions are based on their fears or justified in some other way.

So we have to strive to be better than our nature. Even when it's difficult or uncomfortable. Especially when it's difficult or uncomfortable. That's what makes us a great and enlightened society.
 
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/201...ary-service-official-tuesday/?test=latestnews

This is a big mistake.

And the mistake is that we should even care.

When an American citizen raises their hand, takes the oath of enlistment or commissioning, committing themselves to defending the constitution and expresses a selfless wiliness to place themselves in harms way for something more important than self, then their sexual orientation doesn't mean jack.

Our troops are the best trained, best equipped and most professional in the world. They will be able to handle it. The dire predictions about troop moral and retention problems will turn out to be a load of crap.
The first time I gave a quick glance, you nearly got an extremely long and winded rant about how very wrong you were. And then I reread it. I thought you were saying the repel was the mistake. I'm all for equal rights, and would vote for it any day. However, I'm with Peggy that they don't need to publicly display their homosexuality to the world. Gay Pride parades are something that I don't think should go on, personally at least. But I agree, its a good thing that they repealed this.
 
Aslong as I can have a St. Patrick's Day parade to celebrate the greatness of being Irish, then I have no problem with a gay pride parade. Too each their own.
I have no problem with St. Patrick's Day. It's just a personal opinion for that... I think it's a little flamboyant (pictures of the one in Pittsburgh have cropped up on my facebook, and some of the things are seriously something that shouldn't be done in public.)
 
St. Patty's day = green beer.
Gay pride day = purple beer.

Variety never hurt anyone.

I heard a soldier on TV say this about the policy change: "To be truthful, it is the last thing on our minds".
Amen.
 
I have no problem with St. Patrick's Day. It's just a personal opinion for that... I think it's a little flamboyant (pictures of the one in Pittsburgh have cropped up on my facebook, and some of the things are seriously something that shouldn't be done in public.)
Are we going to do away with Mardi Gras in New Orleans?
 
Top Bottom