A Black, Gay 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Soldier Shar Inspirg Story of Survival New Memoir

Contents:

• 'THE INSPECTN' HIGHLIGHTS A GAY BLACK MARE'S EXPERIENCE UNR 'DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL'
• ‘INSPECTN’ DIRECTOR LLS NEW MARE FILM THE ‘BLACK, GAY ROCKY’
• ARMY VETERAN ROB SMH: SAYG I'M CONSERVATIVE HARR THAN COMG OUT AS GAY
• CONFSNS OF A BLACK, GAY SOLDIER 6 YEARS AFTER DADT REPEAL
• IN WWII, TWO GAY SOLDIERS’ FORBIDN ROMANCE LIV ON IN THEIR LOVE LETTERS
• THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE GAY SOLDIERS WHO SERVED THE FIRST WORLD WAR
• "COMG OUT UNR FIRE": THE STORY OF GAY AND LBIAN SERVICEMEMBERS
• I THOUGHT I COULD SERVE AS AN OPENLY GAY MAN THE ARMY. THEN CAME THE DEATH THREATS.
• GAY SOLDIERS AT FORT CAMPBELL OPEN UP ON G OUT
• TELL: AN INTIMATE HISTORY OF GAY MEN THE MILARY
• THE REVOLUTNARY WAR HERO WHO WAS OPENLY GAY

'THE INSPECTN' HIGHLIGHTS A GAY BLACK MARE'S EXPERIENCE UNR 'DON'T ASK, DON'T TELL'

Multihyphenate filmmaker Elegance Bratton said his latt project, “The Inspectn, ” about a gay homels Black man who jos the Mar, hs pecially close to home after he was kicked out as a teenager for beg gay and spent a livg on the streets. The film, which is loosely based on Bratton’s life, foc on the challeng the ma character, Ellis French, experienc as a young gay Black man durg the ary’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” era. His directorial but, “The Inspectn, ” is a fictnalized retellg of his own experience as a young, gay Black man who, after beg shunned by his own mother for g out, cis to jo the Mare Corps.

"When I me out as a gay veteran and I was fightg for 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' repeal, I was dog bee I knew there was a future that would clu lbian, gay, bisexual soldiers the ary beg open and hont about who they are and they wouldn't re, " Smh former Print Barack Obama signed the repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell, " Smh attend a ceremony as the print's gut. "I know that five, 10, 20, 25 years om now, me beg out as an openly gay nservative, an openly gay and black nservative will open doors for this to not be as shockg and surprisg to people, " Smh explaed. He jt don't let them dictate his polics, so he rejected the ia that bee you're black or bee you're gay you have to thk a certa to Tmp, Smh admted there are polici he agre wh and polici he don't support, but he said if his prence and platform allows him to be part of the solutn, he's gog to do whatever he n to be part of .

‘INSPECTN’ DIRECTOR LLS NEW MARE FILM THE ‘BLACK, GAY ROCKY’

But ’s important to not dimish DADT’s impact as a policy that solely prevented gay and lbian service men and women om partakg ordary nversatns about their relatnships; the people who matter to them most.

In Confsns of a ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Soldier​, Smh reveals his personal experienc as a gay ary man servg unr DADT and remds that for many LGBT people, the battle for equaly the ey of the ary is not over. Now, he lifts the veil on his workg-class Oh upbrgg, the btal fantry basic trag procs, g of age as a Black gay man the overwhelmgly whe LGBT muny of Colorado Sprgs, Colorado, and his ary service durg the ial vasn of Iraq. In Epimic of Gay Lonels, the thor explor sexualy and agg, and not that beg gay n drive isolatn and prsn, which n create damagg physil, mental, and emotnal nsequenc outsi of the ary and doubly wh.

ARMY VETERAN ROB SMH: SAYG I'M CONSERVATIVE HARR THAN COMG OUT AS GAY

“Livg at the tersectn of beg Black and gay, you have to have imag that affirm you and learn to affirm yourself that you are worthy and valid of everythg else that everyone is entled to.

CONFSNS OF A BLACK, GAY SOLDIER 6 YEARS AFTER DADT REPEAL

Smh openly discs criqu of the ary and how is harr to serve beg Black and a member of the LGBTQ muny, but wants to rema visible, pecially llg out racist and homophobic stctur. In his newly released memoir, Confsns of a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Soldier: How a Black, Gay Man Survived the Infantry, Comg Out, and the War Iraq, Smh reunts g to terms wh his sexualy the hypermascule and homophobic U. HomeHistoryIn DepthDiscrimatn and persecutn has led to gay soldiers of the Great War beg seen as tragic figur, but this was not always the seGetty ImagThe Royal Brish Legn is lnchg a mpaign today to mark 100 days before the 100th anniversary of the armistice that end the First World will be revealg a 3D “Thank You” stallatn on London’s Southbank before embarkg on a natnal cy tour to “thank the First World War generatn who served and sacrificed to benef generatns to e” centenary has also offered an opportuny for the ls well-known figur of the war to be discsed, cludg women, black and mory ethnic people and homosexuals, many of whom faced discrimatn spe servg their acts between men often rulted rporal punishment or imprisonment, and th acunts of gay servicemen om this time are rare.

Homosexualy was not only illegal the UK at the time, but there were also “strong social currents, particularly among the upper class, opposg same sex relatnships”, East Ssex WWI a rult, Harvey wr that “at least 230 soldiers were urt-martialled, nvicted and sentenced to terms of imprisonment for homosexual offenc” were homosexual solirs treated? Stephen Bourne, thor of Fightg Proud: The Untold Story of the Gay Men Who Served Two World Wars, pots to Edward Brta, a soldier om Macclfield who earned the Milary Cross for his “gallantry” the Battle of the was killed by Atrian gunfire 1918, but after the war his sister Vera revealed that the prev day he had been acced of homosexual activy after a letter of his was opened by a censor.

IN WWII, TWO GAY SOLDIERS’ FORBIDN ROMANCE LIV ON IN THEIR LOVE LETTERS

Although many gay men quietly outed themselv and were accepted by their ras, efforts would have been taken to hi this fact om stggle is evint cryptilly phrased letters om the example, celebrated poet Wiled Owen, who never me out but is believed by some to have been gay, wrote to his 1918: “There are two French girls my billet, dghters of the Mayor, who (I suppose bee of my French) sgle me for their joyful gratu for La Déliverance.

THE SECRET HISTORY OF THE GAY SOLDIERS WHO SERVED THE FIRST WORLD WAR

“Gay soldiers who survived the bloodlettg returned home nvced their ernments owed them somethg – full cizenship, ” he Germany, anisatns sprang up llg for LGBT rights, cludg the League for Human Rights, which drew 100, 000 members.

Neverthels, the UK’s persecutn of homosexuals perservered through the Send World War - where many men felt forced to hi their, even then, took until 2000 for the Brish armed forc to accept openly LGBTQ people, markg a dramatic shift attus.

C., signalg the war’s begng, s gay Conferate and Unn soldiers didn’t have to worry about the morn famo DADT policy, which blatantly discrimated agast gay, lbian and bisexual servicemembers.

"COMG OUT UNR FIRE": THE STORY OF GAY AND LBIAN SERVICEMEMBERS

” And “un hn, ” the big battleground issue durg the fight to repeal DADT which posed that the “homosexual gaze” would be the root e for disptn (which was totally bunked by a 2002 study), was not an issue. But the qutn, some would argue, of who were LGBTQ service members and who weren’t the Amerin Civil War is a disgenuo query sce the words “homosexual” and “heterosexual” weren’t part of the Amerin lexin until thirty years after the war end. However, many would also argue that not havg a word like “homosexual” back the day of the Civil War to pict same-sex attractn among soldiers do not negate our e of to scribe them this prent day.

I THOUGHT I COULD SERVE AS AN OPENLY GAY MAN THE ARMY. THEN CAME THE DEATH THREATS.

Usg archival documents such as urt-martial and medil rerds, newspaper articl, pornographic books and rds, and letters and diari of the soldiers, Lowry’s foc was to addrs the problem of prostutn – straight and gay – and why both the Unn and Conferate Armi had to work to stop sexually transmted fectns om cripplg their soldiers, bee STIs were stg more soldier’s health and liv than actn on the battlefield. “Unsirable” behavr—specifilly, an accatn of “attemptg to perpetrate an act of Homosexualy, ” as he explaed a letter to the Natnal Associatn for the Advancement of Colored People, om whom he was seekg legal help. ” Wh WWII’s massive human mobilizatn, the ary shifted om s practice of jailg soldiers acced of homosexualy (which required time-nsumg, expensive urt-martials) to simply emg them psychologilly unf.

GAY SOLDIERS AT FORT CAMPBELL OPEN UP ON G OUT

Acrdg to Jon, the NAACP worked wh Black service members acced of homosexualy, like Lemuel Brown, to appeal to the Discharge Review Board for a changed stat—ually wh ltle succs. READ MORE: The Supreme Court Rulgs That Have Shaped Gay Rights Ameri‘Scientific’ Attempts to Intify HomosexualsIn their effort to screen out queer nscripts, ary officials ran to a problem: They didn’t have a nclive way of intifyg them, beyond a set of subjectively terpreted “signs” such as “feme bodily characteristics” and “effemacy drs and manner, ” acrdg to Allan Bébé, thor of Comg Out Unr Fire: Gay Men and Women Durg World War II. The doctor proclaimed that a tongue prsor tt uld screen out gay people not jt om ary service, but om other feral agenci as doctors began explorg whether they uld diagnose homosexualy—through Rorschach tts or by measurg sexualy through hormone tts.

) None of the theori panned part bee of the difficulti of scientifilly measurg queerns, the War Department January 1944 began to allow discharg on the basis of “latent homosexualy. ” That gave officials license to eject someone for homosexualy unr the blue discharge system simply bee they seemed gay—even if the ary lacked MORE: How LGBT Civil Servants Beme Public Enemy No. Among them was Harvey Milk, a Korean War veteran who went on to bee the first openly gay polil official the Uned MORE: For Centuri, Blackmail Was a Tool Used to Intimidate Gay Men.

This is where the Natnal Black Jtice Coaln (NBJC), the natn’s leadg civil rights anizatn dited to the empowerment of black lbian, gay, bisexual, transgenr and queer (LGBTQ) people and my role as the anizatn’s Ambassador for Veterans Affairs to play. The 1994 documentary Comg Out Unr Fire giv voice to the experienc of thoands of gay and lbian servicemembers who joed the ary durg World War II, a story that is largely ignored by historians and mms across the untry. Gay and lbian recs were forced to answer qutns vaguely, or lie about their sexualy, orr to be allowed to serve; otherwise, they would n the risk of beg sent home and brand as “sex perverts.

TELL: AN INTIMATE HISTORY OF GAY MEN THE MILARY

Servicemembers on every waront enjoyed drag show entertament; an entire gay lexin was veloped om the wrgs of Dorothy Parker; and eventually an unrground queer newspaper emerged. We sat down wh Sir John Dermot Turg, Alan Turg’s nephew and thor of a new book on Bletchley Park, to discs his uncle’s role pivotal role puter science and his persecutn for beg gay the 1950s. In rponse, and apparently to monstrate his petency his assigned posn, the nonmissned officer had taken upon himself to approach the person he nsired cled toward mtg a siar offense the future: me, the only openly gay soldier my un.

Together we approached our un’s learship, where she sisted that the ments had stemmed om the reprentative’s own homophobic feelgs and remend that he be reprimand and removed om his posn as the un’s sexual harassment watchdog. But by then was hard to ignore the anxiety I felt durg required social activi — “mandatory fun, ” as ’s lled the ary — or the tensn om my fellow moment I cid to bee a soldier and the moment I chose to live openly as a gay man occurred so closely time that ’s hard to remember which me first. It was still four months before the repeal of “don’t ask, don’t tell, ” a double-edged policy prohibg askg any service member about his or her sexualy while enforcg a ban on openly gay service members.

THE REVOLUTNARY WAR HERO WHO WAS OPENLY GAY

Every memory evok an emotn: rage that I had to serve wh a nstant sense of fear of my fellow soldiers; paralyzg sadns for those who endured ab worse than I n know; and, the worst, guilt over the service members — gay or straight or transgenr — who died while servg the ary while my body is still whole.