GOP Congressmen object to a commitment ceremony held on a Louisiana army base.
"The liberal social experiment with the military continues." You mean
the one that allowed black soldiers to join Union regiments in 1862? Or
the one that led the U.S. armed forces to desegregate in 1948, well
before the civil rights movement of the 1960's?
I think I'm okay with that.
Or
perhaps he means the liberal experiment that abandoned the European
tradition of an aristocratic officer class in favor of granting
comissions for merit or ability?
I'm okay with that, too.
Perhaps
he means the social experiment where soldiers, sailors, and marines can
profess a multiplicty of faiths: catholic, protestant, jewish, muslim,
buddhist, wiccan, pastafarian, agnostic, athiest, and on and on? Where
the bigotry and misunderstanding of ignorant fools at least doesn't have
official support from the chaplin corps?
I'm okay with that.
The
U.S. armed forces have pretty much always been a mechanism of social
change. There's something about living together, digging trenches
together, fighting together, bleeding together, and dying together that
tends to vividly demonstrate that we're all pretty much the same on the
inside. And when the fit hits the shan, it becomes clear that some of
our social conventions and niceties (along with our prejudices and
hatreds) are kind of foolish.
And I'm okay with that.
......
Although I have to say, I'm not okay with this "commitment ceremony". Louisiana does not recognize GLBT marriage. They don't even recogognize civil unions. And current DoD regulations require that the armed forces aknowledge state laws in this matter. I believe this is entirely unfair and inappropriate. No reason not to actually allow full civil rights to everyone.
After all, the comittment ceremony isn't anywhere near legally binding. There are no survivor's benefits for the spouse. No assumption of writ of attourney. Limited hospital visitation rights. Difficulties in adoption and child custody. All those legaland financial benefits that come with a marriage contract in our particular society.. And this for people in a dangerous job that could call upon them to go overseas for years at a time, only to become injured or killed in action. Leaving their spouses with little legal or financial recourse.
That's just wrong. And easy to fix.
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2 comments:
The big problem I see, and this is a criticism of marriage laws, not gays serving in the military, is that a gay accountant can (but really shouldn't have to) have a job that allows him/her to live in a state that has laws that give his/her relationship at least a level of legal recognition. A military career doesn't give you that option. You go where the government tells you.
In other words, DOMA should have gone away at the same time as DADT.
I agree. Though I feel we should aknowledge that DADT was a policy of a department of the executive, and could (and was) removed through the executive's power to run it's departments as it sees fit. DOMA is a federal law that can only be removed by a) an act of congress repealing it, or b) a supreme court decision finding it unconstitutional.
To the extent that the executive can choose to instruct the justice department not to pursue DOMA violators, the executive has already done so. So I give them credit for that.
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