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Service Members, Vets, and Families Marching for Justice

By Aubrey Sarvis
Huffington Post
June 25, 2009

The uproar over President Obama's failure to deliver on any of his campaign promises regarding LGBT issues -- DADT ("Don't Ask, Don't Tell"), ENDA (Employment Non-Discrimination Act), DOMA (the misnamed Defense of Marriage Act) -- is turning into a din that's got to be penetrating even the thick walls of the White House. It's a racket that won't stop until our nation's leader, the President of the United States, acts.

As I write, a racket about DADT is going on up on Capitol Hill. A clip of the colloquy is posted on YouTube. Freshman Congressman Jared Polis (D-Colo.) and Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), the new House lead on H.R. 1283 to repeal DADT, are engaging House Chairman of the Armed Services Committee Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) on when the House will take up repeal legislation. Mr. Polis wants a hearing this summer. Mr. Murphy does too, and both want full repeal. Chairman Skelton says not so fast but he did agree to hearings this summer. The night before, in the House Rules Committee, Mr. Polis had sought Chairman Skelton's support on an amendment to the Defense Department bill to stop DADT investigations while Congress considers full repeal. The Speaker, who controls the House Rules Committee as well as the debate that take place on the floor, is watching, listening. And no doubt the White House is too.

That's why this Saturday, the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall Riots, we are acting. Service members, veterans, their families, loved ones and supporters will be marching to the White House at 2 p.m. to demand action against the DADT law passed by Congress in 1993 that makes gays and lesbians second-class citizens in the military of their own country. The 265 men and women leading the march represent the astonishing number of service members discharged under DADT--because they are who they are--since President Obama took office five months ago and the new Congress was sworn in.

More than half the population of the United States was not yet born at the time of the Stonewall Riots, so maybe a little history is in order. On the night of June 27, 1969, New York City police conducted one of their routine raids on a popular gay bar near Sheridan Square in Greenwich Village known as the Stonewall Inn, arresting 13 and resulting in what the New York Times described as a "melee." It was the third raid on a gay bar in two weeks but this one was different. This time the 200 patrons forced out of the bar fought back, and they were soon joined by 200 more and then more and thus began four nights of rioting now known as the Stonewall Riots. The gay liberation movement was off and running, but it's been a forty-year marathon to get from there to where we are today. That is a very long run, and the race is by no means over.

The Stonewall Riots were about equality, dignity, and fairness then, and we are marching for the same treatment now. The protests were about ending secrecy and subterfuge then, and that's what we are about today. The fight in 1969 was about ending the indignities of second-class citizenship; that is our fight today.

No one could reasonably deny that progress has been made but much more remains to be done. In 1969, gays and lesbians could not enter the military. If you checked the box on your paper work that said "homosexual tendencies?" you were toast. Since the 1993 DADT law went into effect, they no longer ask that question when you enter the service. But once in, if you tell or if someone else tells, then your services are not wanted, just as they weren't wanted in 1969 at the height of the Vietnam War, when there was a draft that was difficult to avoid unless you could get the repeated deferments that kept some out of harm's way so they could send others to fight another day. (Others, including my own brother, went the National Guard route, which was almost as good as a deferment.)

The 65,000 gays and lesbians on active duty now still have to serve in the closet where rumors and innuendos can get them in trouble. While a majority of the DADT discharges are usually honorable, on the service member's DD214, an important piece of paper that most employers ask to see, the word HOMOSEXUAL is still written. It becomes the service member's scarlet letter, like the scarlet letter A Hester Prynne bore on her chest in the 17th-Century Massachusetts Colony. It should be noted that the scarlet letter intended to shame and humiliate her, she turned into an emblem of pride.

The protests against these shameful, archaic rules are growing louder by the day among progressives of all stripes, gay and straight. Polls show a vast majority of the American people favor repeal. Just this week Rachel Maddow returned to the case of Lieutenant Colonel Victor Fehrenbach on her MSNBC television show. Newspapers across the country, from the New York Times and the Washington Post to the Los Angeles Times have called for Presidential and Congressional action on DADT as have commentators and bloggers too numerous to mention.

Last week Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid Senator Reid said in a statement: "We would welcome a legislative proposal from the White House on repeal so as to provide clear guidance on what the president would like to see and when. With presidential leadership and direction, I believe we can find the time to get repeal done in this Congress. We need all the troops we can get right now."

On Monday Rep. Alcee L. Hastings (D-Fla.) and 76 other House members sent a letter to the President urging him to consider suspending DADT investigations--but contrary to some reports, not a word about a "Stop/loss order--and "to exercise the maximum discretion legally possible in administering 'don't ask, don't tell' until Congress repeals the law." The White House replied with its standard "President Obama remains committed . . . ."

We're always happy to hear that he's committed, even though he's said that many times before--but why doesn't he do something? Why doesn't he end his silence on DADT? Nowadays the self-described "fierce advocate" of gay rights appears to be fighting more fiercely to forget those promises he made during the electoral campaign than to act on them. But service members and their supporters won't let him forget. And we won't let Congress off the hook, either.

Senator Reid has spoken, but we need to hear more from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Whip Steny Hoyer. Will these Congressional leaders support the growing calls to stop the DADT investigations, to stop these disgraceful discharges? Will they support Congressional defunding of those DADT investigations? SLDN has provided the language to Congress and will gladly share it with the White House today. Our service members need action now.

For all these reasons we're marching to the White House Saturday afternoon. A former community organizer, the President understands that very well.

06-25-09 By Aubrey Sarvis, SLDN Executive Director |