A Different Angle: a random collection of essays and observations, mostly about lesbian/gay/bi issues. © Todd VerBeek, Radio Zero(tm)

Beyond Gaysinthemilitary

For the past six months, much attention has been focused on the issue of lesbian, gay, and bi personnel in the U.S. armed forces. Washington pundits have debated it. Colin Powell, Sam Nunn, and other bigots have vowed that the military could not survive it. Bill Clinton has hedged on how he would make it happen. Barney Frank has risked his status as community hero by offering a compromise on it. The networks have done special reports about it. It's been mentioned so much that Webster's dictionary is probably considering adding an entry for gaysinthemilitary in the next edition. And our community has rallied 'round the flag in support of our sisters and brothers in uniform.

I've gotten tired of it.

This isn't a burning new issue. Leonard Matlovich came out on the cover of Time magazine nearly 20 years ago; Perry Watkins, Miriam Ben Shalom, and countless less successful individuals have fought it for years. But then Bill Clinton brought it up on the eve of his inauguration, and it became a national obsession. Even the March on Washington, which had been years in the planning (with a politically correct 55-point agenda six feet long), came across as just a flag-waving gaysinthemilitary demonstration.

Don't get me wrong: I believe that gay people have a right to serve their country however they see fit. My uncle, some of my friends, a number of my "heroes", and various objects of my lust have been in the military. I respect that choice.

But I think this business has distracted us too much from matters that are more urgent and more important.

There's a federal civil rights bill (which would give job protection to civilians) that's been stalled in Congress since the days when Matlovich came out. HIV is now infecting and killing people of all ages, by the thousands. Bigots are getting away with murder and abuse, left and right. Teenagers are killing themselves out of self-hatred and despair.

Here in Michigan, christo-fascists are circulating a petition to kill our tenuous legal rights in their infancy. A decade after my uncle Jim introduced state gay rights legislation, the Dressel Bill is finally back. City elections starting in September hold the key to a local ordinance. We have an opening for constructive dialog with the GR Public Schools. Anti-violence and AIDS education projects are on the Network's drawing boards, waiting for people to make them happen. Anyone interested?

We can't do everything at once. One thing that's become painfully clear to me in the past few years is that there are never enough people with enough time to do it all. We need to pick our battles, based on how much energy it will take, and how much we stand to gain. It may have seemed that this would be an easy, big victory: Clinton signs an order, and a major bastion of homophobia is opened up. Not quite.

Whatever happened on July 15 (I'm writing this a few days before), I'm sure it was a step in the right direction. We've won some territory which we can hold onto and build on. It was a battle worth fighting. But it's time to move this one to the back burner. Because there are other matters that just can't wait. Comments?
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