I am active on the religious and political blogs of our local online newspaper, CJOnline. Recently the Hot Topics author Carisa Wells blogged about Gays in the Military. Carissa starts out by stating that she feels gays should be allowed to serve in the military and ends with how having to shower with them would make her feel uncomfortable. While she is attempting to appear to be very open minded and “tolerant”, she comes off as homophobic and sanctimonious, something she manages in pretty much every blog article.
I was curious as to how others would respond and I have to admit that I was pretty incensed by the responses of the Christian conservatives. I knew that they would be against it for the most part but I wasn’t ready for the reasons that they actually put into print. It seems as though they all feel that being gay means you have no control over your animal like sexual instincts, and will sexually harass somebody because of it.
They were horrified at the thought that a gay person may see a straight person of the same sex naked and not be able to control their impulse to jump on them then and there. Another commenter thought that gay men would not be able to take someone giving them stern orders and become emotional and endanger the lives of the others in his unit.
The entire logic behind their argument is ignorant at best. They each brought up how “real” of a problem this is to our average service man or woman. In an effort to shed some light on what actual service people feel I posted the link to the Zogby poll of service people about this very issue. This is the same poll that was partially responsible for the change of heart John Shalikashvili had regarding the necessity of keeping our military openly-gay free.
Out of 500 returning soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan, 3/4 of them were just fine with openly gay soldiers serving with them. Hmmmm, so apparently a majority of ACTUAL soldiers have no issues with the gayness so what gives? Oh, yeah the bible says it’s wrong. It doesn’t matter that the bible is only taken by them literally when it serves the purpose to discriminate against whichever group is in fashion at the time. The bible was quoted to justify slavery, oppose women’s rights, and now it’s homosexuals.
It doesn’t seem to matter to them that we specifically have separation of church and state mentioned in the constitution of this country, what the bible says on anything should have no bearing on our political decisions. Now that the fight to repeal “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” is heating up, it’s time to know what your representatives in government support. Please go HERE to find out and to let them know what you think.
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2007-10-11 20:47:27
Before you try to “quote” the constitution, perhaps it would help if you actually read the document. I challenge you to find it. Because it is not there.
The U. S. Constitution does not say “seperation of Church and state.” In fact the term only appeared in U. S. History in a letter Thomas Jefferson wrote to a Baptist Minister. Further the only Constitution the phrase was ever in was the now defunct Soviet Union.
Which is funny because it was Atheist State. And if you go by websters diffinetion for religion (a deeply held belief) then Atheism is a religion.
Given this info, it is impossible to have a true seperation of church and state, because one way or the other you will be recognizing someones religion. Even if it is the religion of Atheism.
OK, enough with the civic lesson.
Now for you assertion, that straight people who are uncomfortable undressing/showering infront of a homosexual are afraid of being jumped, is ludricus and at best a total misrepresentation of what they said. A person can be uncomfortable without feeling threatened.
2007-10-11 21:12:37
You’re right, which is why I didn’t “quote” the constitution. What we have is a first amendment that states “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof . . . .”
Under that amendment we have the establishment clause and the free exercise clause. These have been interpreted to effectively be a separation of church and state. Indeed that exact phrase has been used by the Supreme Court in rulings more than 25 times.
John Locke, Thomas Jefferson, and James Madison were among the early users of this term and ideology and it continues to stand up today. Thus the separation of church and state is in the constitution.
2007-10-12 08:54:17
Summer,
I thought it was interesting that you and I have been acused of attemped censorship when neither of us has ever told anyone over there to stop “arguing” with us.
If you are going to put your thoughts and beliefs out there for everyone to read why would you expect EVERYONE to just agree with you and do as you say?
Better yet why would you want that to happen?
Discourse is the higest form of communication and everyone learns something every time they do it. Unless they refuse to participate that is.
2007-10-12 09:23:29
I agree with you. It certainly seems strange to accuse us of censorship because we don’t agree with them. I’m pretty hard pressed to figure out exactly how anyone came up with that idea.
2007-10-12 09:46:32
It’s a childish response to an adult conversation is all.
2007-10-12 15:47:02
So glad to provide you with material since you can’t come up with your own ideas. I hope the people who read your blog are intelligent enough to know that you have seriously taken my words out of context. Read my blog for youself and come to your own conclusion.
Maybe on your next blog, you can come up with your own ideas.
2007-10-12 16:04:10
As you can see I linked to your blog so they can see for themselves what I am discussing. I believe in being fair after all. Contrary to popular belief, I don’t wish to censor anyone. I’ve written several articles on this site alone and this is the only one that mentions your blog. It does so because I found the responses and your blog itself to be representative of what I see as a bigger problem.
Thank you for taking the time to comment and I hope you do so in the future.
2007-10-17 03:08:25
perhaps gaya can seperate from no gays in the millitary, this can reduce the contradiction.
2007-10-17 08:56:22
Hi fabianlander,
Could you explain what you mean? I am not sure if you mean that gays should be segregated in the military or if this is something that should debated amongst gays?
Thanks so much,
Summer