A High School friend (we will call Mr. Cars) I reconnected with on Facebook recently sent me an intriguing message/musing about DADT (Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.) I have reprinted it here in its entirety (with permission.)
Have you weighed in about the current push to end don’t ask/don’t tell and remove the prohibition against gays serving openly in the armed forces?
Before putting you on the spot for your thinking, here’s my streamoconsciousness. I’m against removing the requirement that folks attracted to the same sex in the military keep that to themselves.
I haven’t read/studied the issue, and I’ve only come at it from the perspective of the armed services being very peculiar functional and goal-based organizations, not analogous to other subcultures, associations, and the culture/society at large.
You don’t have to do or accomplish anything in particular to be a citizen. Born here? Congrats. Most of us aren’t required to promise or take any kind of oath to be/remain Americans. It’s automatic no matter what we think or say. Even breaking the law doesn’t get citizens kicked out of the county. It can get us punished, because the alternative is anarchy. But for those of us for whom citizenship is automatic, there’s not much we can be/think/say/do to be disqualified from citizenship.
The church says bring all your past, problems, and perversions and we will take you as you are. But contentedly stay as you are, and you’ll be disciplined, maybe even kicked out. We promised or took oaths. Having been raised from the dead spiritually and desiring to be transformed are the qualifications for joining/remaining. Like me, members can show a remarkable lack of progress and be shot full of conflicting and troublesome beliefs/views/confessions/behaviors and still…we’re in.
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