A gay soldier’s story of Vietnam and after - Dallas Voice

Contents:

• I THOUGHT I COULD SERVE AS AN OPENLY GAY MAN THE ARMY. THEN CAME THE DEATH THREATS.
• "COMG OUT UNR FIRE": THE STORY OF GAY AND LBIAN SERVICEMEMBERS
• GAY SOLDIERS CRICIZED - WHAT WOULD YOU DO
• GAY THE MILARY
• THE FOTTEN GAY SOLDIERS OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR
• A GAY SOLDIER’S STORY OF VIETNAM AND AFTER
• TELL: AN INTIMATE HISTORY OF GAY MEN THE MILARY

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

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. As long as gay soldiers kept their mouths shut, the burn of proof fell on those makg the accatns.

A uple were more elaborate: tailed scriptns of what might happen to me if I was ught alone, and proclamatns about the wrongns of gays the ary.

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

There are moments when feels wrong to claim my stat as a veteran; as if beg gay ma me ls of a soldier and somehow validated my service.

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. Half a after the repeal of don’t ask, don’t tell, most lbian, gay, bisexual and transgenr service members still felt reluctant to be open about their sexualy wh their lleagu and cha of mand, acrdg to a study released late study, published by the journal Sexualy Rearch and Social Policy, found that 59 percent of rponnts did not feel fortable beg out at work, eher bee of reer repercsns or bee of the burn of beg a token rponsible for tg their peers. ”Dpe the orrs om above, many veterans publicly opposed the 2011 repeal of the ban on gay, lbian and bisexual service for troops who had grown up that environment, the policy’s mise did not flip a swch terms of fort level ― theirs or their lleagu.

“The stctor was reported to e the pejorative term ‘fags’ durg class, disclose other people’s sexual mory inty to his stunts whout their permissn, and munite that he believed sexual mori were more promiscuo than heterosexuals, ” acrdg the the study, based on a rponse om a gay soldier.

GAY SOLDIERS CRICIZED - WHAT WOULD YOU DO

I am about to be put on a board for major and I do not want to not even have that opportuny to put myself where they n easily be like, ‘Get rid of this guy; if we have to cut 55 percent of the officers up for , he’s one of the easy on we n jt fd a reason to jt ver [ourselv], ' " said one rponnt, a gay Mare.

“I had a few iends there [ trag] that I got to know pretty well, but I knew a uple of them had some pretty strong relig backgrounds and I did not really feel like ttg the waters at that pot, ” one rponnt, a gay soldier, said.

I’m like well, the bt way to keep people om beg homophobic is to have them have someone that they know and rpect, who is gay, ” one sailor said.

GAY THE MILARY

RELATEDAnd on Monday, the Supreme Court led that the employers nnot discrimate agast their homosexual or transgenr employe. "An employer who fir an dividual for beg homosexual or transgenr fir that person for tras or actns would not have qutned members of a different sex, ” Jtice Neil Gorsuch wrote the cisn. What Would You Do: Male soldier berated bee of homosexualyIn a rtrant, a male soldier uniform is stg at a table when a woman at another table begs to flirt.

Liebman and more than 9, 000 Amerin servicemembers, however, eventually were given a Sectn 8 "blue discharge" for beg homosexual.

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. In 1993, the Uned Stat was batg the discrimatory “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy regardg homosexuals the morn ary. At the time, homosexualy was classified as a mental illns by the medil muny; mental illns was one ndn that disqualified young people om service.

THE FOTTEN GAY SOLDIERS OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR

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. Instead of chargg dividuals wh sodomy, a urt-martialed offense, the ary began intifyg spected homosexuals as psychopaths.

Such a move created an efficient system of discrimatn and prosecutn of homosexual members of the ary. The new iendships gave gay and lbian GIs refuge om the hostily that surround them and allowed for a distct subculture to velop wh the ary. 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.

Soldiers reprented female characters ary plays, and some homosexual soldiers found refuge om rigid genr rol. The irony that the ary selected two homosexuals to reprent the ial image of the Women’s Army Auxiliary Corps was not lost on Abry. The feral discrimatory actns drove LGBTQ people further to the shadows of society and embolned law enforcement and policians, who beme more vlent toward gay and lbian cizens.

A GAY SOLDIER’S STORY OF VIETNAM AND AFTER

Patrons of the gay bar fought back and sparked a vlent uprisg that started the gay rights movement the Uned Stat.

Gay and lbian veterans of World War II beme some of the first to fight ary discrimatn and blue discharg the years followg the war. My only hope is that anizatns around the untry m to pturg the voic of gay, lbian, and transgenr veterans and that we fd a place our history to honor their service as well.

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.

TELL: AN INTIMATE HISTORY OF GAY MEN THE MILARY

Wartime film star Patsy Kelly's most fiant act was beg an openly gay woman an hospable climate for the LGBTQIA+ muny. All episosAllCast & crewIMDbProRealy-TVAdd a plot your languageStarsBen BrLorrae Rodriguez-ReySee productn, box office & pany See productn, box office & pany See more at IMDbProPhotosAdd photoTop stEdBen BrGay Man 1 (2014)Lorrae Rodriguez-ReyLeadAll st & crewProductn, box office & more at IMDbProStoryleEdTop picksSign to rate and Watchlist for personalized remendatnsSign DetailsEdSee more pany creds at IMDbProTechnil specsEdRuntime1 hourRelated newsContribute to this pageSuggt an ed or add missg ntentIMDb Answers: Help fill gaps our dataLearn more about ntributgEd pageMore to exploreRecently viewedYou have no recently viewed pag.

By the law of averag – even if only two per cent of people are homosexual, and not the one 10 that some people thk – that means an awful lot of gay men fought and died. Lrie Marhoefer, an assistant profsor of history at the Universy of Washgton, said: “Gay soldiers who survived the blood-lettg returned home nvced their ernments owed them somethg – full cizenship. ” In Germany, he add, anisatns cludg the German League for Human Rights, which had about 100, 000 members, lled for some sort of gay equaly.