Kevin Marshall's America
A small controversy erupted at the Fox News/Google GOP debate in Florida last week when a now openly gay soldier submitted a YouTube question to the panel.
“In 2010 when I was deployed to Iraq, I had to lie about who I was because I’m a gay soldier and I didn’t want to lose my job. My question is, under one of your Presidencies, do you intend to circumvent the progress that’s been made for gay and lesbian soldiers in the military?”
This was, notoriously, followed by a small portion of the live audience booing loudly with no small amount of derision and hostility.
What was more disconcerting to me, though, was Santorum’s response. Firstly, he did not acknowledge those very loud boos for an American soldier and did not chastise that very vocal group for their treatment of the man and his question, which for anyone with any semblance of decency should have been first and foremost on their agenda.
Instead, he began with this:
“I would say that any kind of sexual activity has no place in the military and the fact that they’re making it a point to include it as a provision and that we’re going to recognize a group of people and give them a special privilege to-and-deh-in removing Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
The video, a little over two minutes in length, is below.
Okay, let’s back up.
Firstly, “any kind of sexual activity has no place in the military.” What exactly does this statement mean? What he wants to say is that sexual orientation has no place in the military. However, Santorum’s pathological bias against homosexuals can’t be hidden. He’s a guy that wears his feelings, and his insecurities, on his sleeve. Homosexuals are deviants. And they are a verb, not a noun, and that verb is a vile act.
The repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” provides soldiers with the ability to acknowledge that they are gay, particularly if they are confronted with it, without fear of retribution from superiors and peers in the military. Rick Santorum, however, seems to think that it means that not only will gay soldiers go around yelling about how gay they are all the damn time, but they’ll follow it up with “and now we will have butt sex in front of EVERYONE.”
I jest, but his phrasing is important because it betrays a very outdated and somewhat warped sense of what being a homosexual is: it’s not an orientation or who you are, but rather a fetish akin to someone who smells shoes or sucks toes. So for me, I wasn’t bothered by the booing, because it really was a small handful of cranks that were quickly shushed, and there were just as many others (if not more) in the audience that applauded the soldier for his question and his bravery. What I was and continue to be bothered and deeply concerned by is not only Santorum’s nervous, blustery bigotry, but the undue sensitivity granted to him and his archaic world view by pundits and the general public. The mainstream media took a small handful of anonymous, boorish crowd members to task, but not the Presidential hopeful who champions the rhetoric.
Rick Santorum complained last week about the search engine Google and how it wasn’t doing anything to eliminate the horrible and offensive search results that come up when you enter his name as a query. I was curious, so I entered his name myself. The second entry is to his Wikipedia page, but the first entry was to Spreading Santorum, a site that lists the new definition of “Santorum” provided by a reader of gay columnist Dan Savage in response to Santorum’s description of pedophilia in priests as a “homosexual relationship.” I felt and do feel for him, and honestly wish Savage had never done it. It’s imbecilic and childish, and only lends the man the appearance of being a victim himself.
It also distracts from what I assumed he meant when he complained about offensive search results: all the terrible things he’s said and believes about gay people.
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6 Responses to Rick Santorum, gay soldiers, and sexy sex in the military
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I think that the audience was wrong to boo but then another audience at another GOP debate clapped when they were told about an uninsured man who died. What’s wrong witrh these people?
It’s a small number, but I agree that it’s still very disconcerting and super weird.
The faces of the Republican party and their ideals (if they actually even have any) have by and large become irrefutably laughable. The one thing that they can universally attempt to sell, fiscal responsibility, is referendum on total hypocrisy. Calling them fiscally responsible is to say Afghanistan has great Real Estate.
That being said, I know of several prominent “famous” (hate that word but) Democrats, as well as friends and family who are Democrats, who openly spoke of wishing death to George W. Bush. A sentiment I saw genuinely applauded. So it is kind of hard for me to get on all Republicans for small portions of supporters being socially backward as distasteful as it often seems.
Politics seems to bring about the absolute worst emotions in people, not dissimilar to sports. We begin to see things through only our own lenses and excuse our own irrational hate as a means to an end.
Most of these issues are poorly constructed from both sides of the aisle. Of course sexual orientation should not be an issue in the military, but considering it is not something that has been widely accepted in the general population to demand that the Military make is simple and so is a little far fetched.
We (all humanity) make a habit of this in the world at large. Even though something is not universal, we want it to be universally accepted, so we apply it as an absolute when it is far from it. The more dramatic a side can make the debate the more difficult it is for any consensus to be drawn. Politicians on both sides excel at the dramatic.
Patrick - Private organizations and the government are not allowed to discriminate, pass over, or terminate someone from employment based on their sexual orientation. Why should the military? We have granted them an exception from discrimination laws due to the increased pressure and dangers inherent in the job while ignoring the fact that unlike the vast majority of other jobs, it’s 24/7 and all-encompassing. Your entire life becomes the military and it is the ultimate in service to one’s country.
With that in mind, how on Earth could we ask anyone to go to such great lengths to hide who and what they are and remain anonymous in a hostile environment? In what world is that right and when is it ever acceptable to measure the viability of civil rights by popular opinion?
When black soldiers were still serving in segregated units, they were still dying for this country. But it was wrong to segregate them, and there are many parallels in the situations beyond simple discrimination. In fact, the military was desegregated two decades before the rest of the country. I know many are loathe to make the comparison and scoff at it. But it is absolutely, 100% apt, particular since the arguments are the same: there were racists in the military who hated & belittled blacks in the same way that there are homophobes in the Army who hate and belittle gays.
The only difference between a soldier that won’t bunk with a gay and one that won’t bunk with a black is a few years. And we cannot, under any circumstances, allow the perception of practicality to justify the limitations or elimination of rights. That leads only to the continuance and strengthening of oppression and discrimination, no matter how noble the sentiment may seem at the time.
I notice that one of the tags for this post is 2012. Between Rick Santorum and Mr. and Mrs. Michele Bachmann (Hey! Hey! Let’s Pray That Nasty Gay Away!), it’s more like 1912.
People who are this backward just should not be in government. -Roz
I can only say that backwards candidates don’t get elected by progressive people. They can only be a reflection of a segment of society. It may be small, and it may be restrained to a district, but it’s there.