The Intolerable Pace of Bigotry

The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Peter Pace, is facing some tough questions this morning about controversial comments he made about homosexuality and gays serving in the military during a newspaper interview.

Pace was asked about his view on gays in the military by the Chicago Tribune. His answer was carefully worded, but his meaning was unmistakable.

"My upbringing is such that I believe there are certain things, certain types of conduct that are immoral," Pace said during the tape-recorded interview.

"I believe that military members who sleep with other military members' wives are immoral in their conduct, in that we should not tolerate that."

"I believe that homosexual acts between individuals are immoral and that we should not condone immoral acts."

And I am soo opposed to the military's efforts to kick out adulterers. Why it's nobody's busi....wait....what?....they don't?

Nevermind.

Can we all distinguish between personal belief and public policy? Apparently Gen. Pace cannot.

Pace was asked about his view on gays in the military. He was asked a policy question, not about his personal beliefs. That he offered his personal beliefs as an answer about policy is the problem here. He's entitled to his beliefs. But as Chair of the JCoS, his duty is to the law and to the military. As it stands, substituting his personal beliefs for his duty serves neither.

His views on the morality of gay people themselves is wholly irrelevant to that question. His personal moral beliefs, misguided as they are, cannot be the basis for military policy. Again, he wasn't asked for his view on gay people, he was asked for his view on the policy.

His answer revealed that he was basing his support of the policy, not on the best interests of the military or the law, but on his personal beliefs. And he did so in a very peculiar sort of way. For he expressed disapproval of both adultery and gay people, but only gay people are barred from service. Heck, RW Christians supposedly disapprove just as much of anyone who has sex outside of marriage. And yet if kicked out everyone who has extra-marital sex, there'd be no one left. Somehow no one is claiming that allowing fornicators to serve in the military is somehow" approving="" of="" their="">

At a time when we desperate for people, people with families are being forced into third and fourth tours, we're even allowing some people with criminal pasts - saying that gay people are just a bridge too far morally is not in the best interests of the nation or the military. To disallow gay people from serving on moral grounds, while allowing all manner of other "sinners", speaks of a kind of bigotry that transcends mere personal belief. Why that so-called "sin" is sooo bad that that one alone is grounds for exclusion for service when our nation so needs every able and willing person defies logical explanation. And so it is not without consequence for our nation that the top general would reveal that the fundamental basis for his support of the exclusion of gays from service is a bizarre moral prejudice.

Moreover:

Australian, British, Canadian and Israeli allies at the least are on notice that General Pace thinks that their gay service members are "immoral" and that he supports the hugely failed American "don't ask, don't tell" policy.

Every single one of our major allies in NATO, the "coalition of the willing" and the GWoT have open gays in the military. Pace just insulted our allies.

And it is not just side by side with our allies that GLBT service members are risking their lives for our freedom and security.

Gay-rights groups accused the U.S. military of hypocrisy Wednesday after it disclosed a sharp reduction in the dismissal of gays since the beginning of wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The Pentagon said it dismissed 612 people for homosexuality in its most recent fiscal year, fewer than half the 1,227 dismissed in fiscal 2001.

Gay-rights groups said the numbers show the hypocrisy of the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which forbids commanders from asking the sexual orientation of service members but requires gays and lesbians to keep their sexual orientation private.

“It is interesting to watch rates of discharge go down when the military needs people the most,” said Bob Kearney, a senior public policy advocate for Human Rights Campaign, a gay-rights group.

The decline in dismissals comes amid simultaneous wars that have strained the military’s manpower.

“It is not appropriate for the U.S. military to tell lesbian and gay Americans that they are worthy of fighting and dying in a war zone, but unworthy of serving their country on the home front during peacetime,” said Steve Ralls, a spokesman for Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, which provides legal help to military gays facing dismissal.

But this is nothing new.

Prior to the onset of the Korean War, the Navy typically discharged 1,100 sailors a year for homosexuality. In 1950, at the height of the Korean War, that number dropped to 483. In 1951, only 533 gay sailors were expelled from the Navy. In 1953, when the Armistice was signed, the number of naval discharges for homosexuality jumped to 1,353.

In the three years prior to 1966, the Navy discharged between 1,600 and 1,700 sailors each year for homosexuality. From 1966 to 1967, the numbers dropped from 1,708 to 1,094. In 1968, gay discharges fell again to 798, and they dipped to 643 at the peak of the military build-up in 1969. In 1970, the Navy discharged only 461 sailors for homosexuality.

It's supposedly in combat in particular that the need for trust mandates that gays cannot serve. And yet, repeatedly, at times of war, GLBT people don't seem like such a threat.

And then of course, after the crisis and after their service, then it's time to kick out GLBT people and deny them their benefits. That is the morality of the General Pace. Allowing GLBT people to risk their lives to defend their nation and then kicking them to the curb when their service is over. A real paragon of virtue, indeed.

So the question for the general is regarding the policy, what's more important: Liberty and Security or his personal beliefs. And if it's the later, which it appears to be, then we have a problem.

So here's why Pace is a homophobic bigot and not just expressing a personal moral view.

You see, the key word there is "personal". It's one thing to hold that view for one's own personal life and to live one's personal life accordingly. It's another altogether to use the force of law or to seek to use the force of law to punish others who do not share those personal views. Pace isn't some schmoe. He's the Chair of the Joint Chiefs. He has responsibilities. His "opinion" impacts policy. There are real life consequences to having this bigot in his position. We're no longer talking about an innocent exchange of ideas.

Pace framed the issue well himself in his comparison to adultery. Of course I disagree with the comparison. But let's take it at face value, that both are just as wrong in his eyes. Then explain why his personal view that being gay is "immoral" justifies excluding gay people from service but his personal view that adultery is immoral doesn't preclude the service of adulterers.

It's the fact that the homophobes have taken this so-called "sin" and made it the subject and rationale for punitive legislation that separates their actions and beliefs from merely personal views. Where are the Constitutional Amendments making fornicators second-class citizens? Where are the laws prohibiting divorcees from adopting?

Even within the RW fundie mindset, they clearly have decided that this one "sin" and this one alone is the proper justification for a host of punitive measures. Something other than just personal beliefs has to explain that.

Something does. Small-minded, hated-filled, bigoted, intolerant homophobia.

And there's no sin in calling it what it is.