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Via Workers World News Service
Reprinted from the March 13, 1997
issue of Workers World newspaper
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Don't ask Clinton to tell you he's your friend

Gays in the military harassed now more than ever

By Kristianna Tho'Mas

On Feb. 26 the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network released "Conduct Unbecoming: The Third Annual Report on `Don't Ask, Don't Tell, Don't Pursue.'" SLDN is an organization that provides legal aid to military personnel accused of homosexuality.

Has President Bill Clinton's "don't ask, don't tell" policy made a difference in the lives of gays in the military? It certainly has.

According to the report, in the three years the policy has been in effect there has been a sharp increase in anti-gay harassment and discharges.

During his 1992 election campaign Clinton pledged to end the ban on lesbians and gays in the military. He not only failed to end the ban. He has actually intensified oppression for gays in the military.

By now, very few would be surprised to know that Clinton stands with the right wing. He pretty much relinquished all claims to be against discrimination and oppression last fall, when he signed the vicious "Defense of Marriage" law barring federal recognition from same-sex couples.

Gays in the military have felt the effects of Clinton's lies and betrayals firsthand.

They ask all the time

The SLDN report shows the effect Clinton's "compromise" has had on the lives of lesbians, gays and bisexuals in the armed forces. It documents how the situation has worsened.

Anti-gay discharges in the military reached a five-year high in 1996, the highest rate since 1987. Eight hundred fifty people were discharged under Clinton's policy in 1996, according to Defense Department figures. That is a 42-percent increase over 1994.

Michelle M. Benecke of SDLN noted, "February marks the third anniversary of the Clinton policy, and ... the number of servicemembers asked, pursued, and ultimately discharged has increased each year since its adoption."

Under the "don't ask" portion of the policy, SDLN found, the Pentagon still uses the 1989 recruiting form that does in fact ask. It includes the questions: "Are you a homosexual or a bisexual?" and "Do you intend to engage in homosexual acts?"

Once in the armed forces, service members are still routinely asked about their sexual orientation and whether they have acted on it. People are forced to admit being gay, lesbian or bisexual, and then forced out of the military.

According to SDLN statistics, there has been a 16-percent increase in the number of violations of the "don't ask" policy. The brass are asking more than ever.

Under the policy's "don't tell" portion, military personnel are advised to keep their sexual orientation a "personal and private" matter. According to the report, the military has expanded "don't tell" into a terror tool.

If a soldier or sailor "tells" anything about homosexual feelings, even privately to family members, close friends, doctors or psychologists, what they told is fair game. If gay military personnel fail to keep their sexual orientation a secret, they "risk investigation and discharge," according to the SDLN report.

"Don't tell" violations went up 72 percent in 1996, SDLN reports. This is partly because "the services ... have reportedly instituted the disturbing practice of requiring health-care providers in the military and those contracted to the military to turn in gay servicemembers who seek their help in private counseling sessions."

Witch hunts continue

The Clinton policy also admonishes the brass, "Don't pursue." This one is most brazenly ignored.

There are more witch hunts than ever in the military, especially against lesbians.

Members of the armed forces accused of being gay are routinely forced to point out others who they know or suspect to be gay. After someone has been accused of being gay, lesbian or bisexual, the harassment begins.

This includes physical abuse, death threats, verbal harassment and constant anti-gay slurs.

"The government's all-out efforts to identify lesbian and gay servicemembers sometimes reaches the absurd," the report says. "In the case of one Marine Corps corporal, the inquiry officer determined, among other findings, that attending the Dinah Shore golf tournament and giving popular Ann Rice vampire novels to a friend constituted homosexual conduct.

"The corporal has since been discharged."

Andre Taylor was swept up in last year's anti-gay witch hunt at Hickam Air Force Base in Honolulu. At the SDLN news conference, he described how he was discharged based on another soldier's accusation that Taylor was gay.

"I could not even see a defense attorney until two months after I first requested one," Taylor said. When Taylor was assigned a lawyer, it was a lawyer based at Andersen Air Force Base in Guam-eight hours away by plane.

Sexual harassment of women in the military has finally been receiving media attention lately. There is little acknowledgment, however, that much of this harassment involves lesbian-bating.

SDLN explains that when women report sexual harassment or abuse they are frequently accused of being lesbians in retaliation. This in turn sets off a witch hunt.

According to Defense Department statistics, women only make up 13 percent of the active-duty force. But women compose 29 percent of those forced out of the military under the anti-gay policy.

The figure rises to 41 percent of the anti-gay discharges in the Army-"an astounding figure that is three times women's presence in this service," the report comments.

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