Last spring, after the Family Research Council President
Tony Perkins had been disinvited to an Air Force prayer luncheon
because of his support for “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” I wrote a piece
called
“The Intolerance and Bigotry of Openly Gay Military
Service.”
My warnings were ignored and even dismissed by many
conservatives as overblown. But Washington Post
columnist
Richard Cohen has confirmed my worst fears today
by calling for the dismissal of Marine Corps Commandant Gen. James
F. Amos.
Amos’ crime? Like Perkins (who is himself a former
Marine), Amos had the audacity to speak out in defense of “Don’t
Ask, Don’t Tell.” And, in Cohen’s warped view, this constitutes
impermissible “bigotry,” or “one step short of being a bigot.”
“The Marines of today know that virtually the entire
Republican Party stood up for bigotry,” Cohen writes. And “this is
what concerns me about Amos. His views are on the record…. His
subordinates know what he thinks of gays.”
Of course, Amos never said anything disparaging about gays
per se. He simply fulfilled his constitutional duty, which is to
give his best professional military advice and counsel to
policymakers and the public.
Cohen doesn’t want to admit it, but homosexual dynamics
within small-scale military units are inherently problematical and
disruptive. Amos had not choice but to point this out and to state
the obvious.
But Cohen is absolutely right about one thing: There
certainly is bigotry at work here: intellectual bigotry and
intolerance from leftists like him who cannot countenance
dissenting points of view.
Indeed, I’m reminded of William F. Buckley, Jr.’s famous
line: “Though liberals do a great deal of talking about hearing
other points of view, it sometimes shocks them to learn that there
are other points of view.”
Cohen’s column, though, isn’t so much aimed at Gen. Amos
as it is the next generation of Marine and military leaders. His
column is a warning: If you dare to dissent from the prevailing
left-wing orthodoxy on homosexuality, you will be branded a bigot
and deemed unfit for military service. Traditional conservatives
and religious believers need not apply. Keep your warped
conservative views to yourself.
So it is that the Southern Poverty Law Center has
designated Perkins’ own Family Research Council, a widely respected
Washington, D.C. public-policy organization, a “hate group.” As Pat
Buchanan explains in his column
this morning:
The world has turned upside down. What was criminal vice
in the 1950s — homosexuality and abortion — is not only
constitutionally protected, but a mark of social
progress…
Only in secularist ideology, [however], is it an article
of faith that all sexual relations are morally equal and that to
declare homosexual acts immoral is bigotry…
Not until recent decades have many in America or the West
argued that homosexuality is natural and normal. As late as 1973,
the American Psychiatric Association listed homosexuality as a
mental disorder.
Today, anyone who agrees with that original APA assessment
is himself or herself said to be afflicted with a mental disorder:
homophobia.
But as Buchanan observes, behind traditionalist beliefs
about homosexuality,
lie the primary sources of moral authority for
traditionalist America: the Old and New Testaments, Christian
doctrine, natural law. Thomas Jefferson believed homosexuality
should be treated with the same severity as rape.
The problems with openly gay service are exacerbated by
the nature of military life, which is hierarchical, bureaucratic,
and government-run and –administered. Indeed, as J.E. Dyer
has observed at Commentary magazine’s Contentions
blog:
Gays can already serve in the U.S. military; repealing
DADT isn’t about allowing them to [serve]. It’s about endorsing
their sexual orientation in military operations and
culture.
The course of hands-off neutrality is not an option in
these realms; their unique character is to require affirmative
policy. Civilians should start by understanding this.
The quiescent tolerance they think of in relation to their
own lives must translate, in the military, into endorsement and
administration of an explicit position.
One question that will have to be answered, Dyer notes,
is
whether eligibility for promotion or command will be
contingent on explicit support for homosexuality. The issue will be
forced by lawsuit if by no other means.
A 20-year veteran with combat tours in Iraq and
Afghanistan may not be comfortable, for example, endorsing “Gay
Pride Month” or participating in scheduled military celebrations of
it.
He may be charged by a gay subordinate with creating a
hostile work environment or ordered by a senior officer to get
onboard with gay-pride celebrations.
Perhaps his chain of command would back him up and force
the issue to a higher level. The serious question remains: what
does this have to do with warfighting readiness?
As Perkins
himself explained last spring, after he had been disinvited to the
Air Force prayer luncheon:
Unfortunately, this is just a precursor of things to come
in a post-“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” military. This legislation would
more than open the armed forces to homosexuals; it would lead to a
zero-tolerance policy toward anyone who disapproves of
homosexuality…
Richard Cohen and the liberal-left establishment, of
course, don’t disagree. Political conservatives and religious
believers, they decree, better learn to shut up and censor
themselves if they want to serve in our brave new
military.
But Cohen and the Left needn’t worry: I’m sure they’ll be
plenty of reeducation and sensitivity training to ensure that our
military personnel think the right and appropriate thoughts. The
“gay rights” advocates will make sure of that.
