The sound is crappy and hard to understand at times, and I generally have reservations about people who want to throw themselves into the abyss that is YouTube stardom* – even when it’s a devastatingly cute serviceman from Alabama who still calls his dad “Sir” and says “Oh my lord”.
Nevertheless, this made me cry:
ETA: It’s the moment about 5.14 where he says “Yes, sir” and the look on his face, like a little boy who has finally told the truth and been told in turn that he is loved, that chokes me up every time.
Google “Don’t ask don’t tell” and you will find a huge number of articles which mention members of the armed forces coming out as a result of the repeal, some publicly**:
FOX News: It was the tears of Marine Captain Sarah Pezzat, whose nickname in the military is “Short Shot,” that put a human face on “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” and what it’s repeal means for the estimated 65,000 gay members of the military currently serving.
On Capitol Hill today she said before a bipartisan group of Senators: “I’m 31 years old. I’m a woman. I am a Marine,” and this is where she chokes back tears, “and I’m a lesbian.” She then says, “I’m sorry… Prior today if I said that I could be discharged.”
and others much more quietly:
“I still have quite a few friends in the military who are looking forward to this day. Some of them will come out some won’t,” Almy told Fox News on the eve of the repeal. “I have a good friend named Todd. He is currently serving on active duty. Tomorrow he will not make a big announcement, but he is going to go to work and he will put a picture of his partner on his desk.”
Consider this: over the next few weeks and months (or perhaps, in some cases, years, because fear and the closet are powerful things), hundreds, thousands of nice, ordinary American servicemen and women of various ages, creeds, colors and preferences for pink, squishy bits, from all over America, are going to come out to someone, are finally going to say “This is who I am” to their mother, or their best friend, or their commanding officer, or their entire platoon, or their little community in Alabama, or even just to themselves.
It’s the biggest mass coming out since the Castro 1969.
It won’t all be easy, and not every dad is going to say “I love you, I will always will, no matter what”, but there’s just a chance it might change America for the better.
* Blogging being, of course, a pursuit entirely unmotivated by vanity or greed.
** I wouldn’t normally link to Fox News, but it’s not a bad article aside from the one paragraph of “illegitimate blah blah gays will touch each other in the shower and did I mention that the President is blackity black black and probably a gay” vomit from some poor sad arsehole at the end.
EATA:
Fuck you, sir. Fuck you, as a friend of mine would say, with a rusty pitchfork.
Jenny
but, but, but… Obama is a homophobe and repealing DADT was merely a bone to the base
Violet
I’m not watching the Republican debate, but apparently the audience just booed an active duty servicemember who happens to be gay. Bunch of bigots, that’s the Republican party.
Lysana
I had someone tell me Obama’s use of Rick Warren mattered more than DADT. No, not kidding. She thought it was proof he’s a right-winger. To this DAY she still considers Warren to outweigh policy changes.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
I was at the gym yesterday, and one of the TVs was on Fox. There was a commercial on for this number you could call to have your name put on a list to indicate that you are a “Defender of Israel.”
1. I would be OK with that commercial if they said that if you sign it they can call you up so that you can actually defend Israel from attack.
2. I wonder what they would do if they knew that Israel allowed gays in their military.
MAJeff
And tonight, GOP audience members boo’d a gay servicemember. So much for “supporting the troops.”
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/09/audience-members-at-fox-news-debate-boo-gay-solider-video.php?ref=fpa
The TeaParty/GOP is a hate organization.
OzoneR
@Lysana:
which is why pandering to the 10% of disaffected liberals IS A WASTE OF FUCKING TIME.
Ando_Chronic
I’m military, and I’ll be in combat or having drinks with my comrades again, and again, and again. This is good. And, I want to say to you guys and gals, who I proudly serve with, that there are people in your ranks who support you. We’re family at least in the military no matter what.
Ron
This video is pretty amazing. and @Lysana, that person honestly is really no better than the crazy teabaggers.
The Dangerman
@MAJeff:
I happened to turn on to the post-debate Luntz analysis; one would have thought that FOX would know better, but of the reasonably large sampling of folks (I’d guess around 30) not one African American or Latino. I think I saw a couple that might pass for Asian. Now, to be fair, I didn’t listen for long, so maybe I missed someone, but…
rikyrah
I cried when I first saw the video, calling his father ‘ Daddy’ and ‘Sir’ in the same video.
The quietness of the soldier putting the picture of his partner on his desk..hits the gut too.
some guy
the repeal of DADT and the fact that thousands of people can finally live freely and openly has little to nothing to do with the petty, internicene wars some of you engage in with your imaginary political opponents.
get the fuck over yourself, please.
Mark S.
@MAJeff:
From that link, Santorum:
Jesus, you’re risking your life for your country and you’re supposed to be a virgin while doing it? I’m sure recruitment will go way up with President Santorum as Commander-in-Chief.
I know no sane people are watching these debates, but I hope at least some of the crazy (and downright nastiness) is filtering through to the masses. This is a terrifying crew to entrust our nation’s future with.
Comrade Mary
Leave aside the bigotry, leave aside the stupidity (No sex in the military? Overturning DADT is an invitation to an orgy?), that worthless fuckstain on stage can’t even manage to scold the audience for their boos, let alone muttering a generic “Thank you for your service.” Scum-sucking shitstain Santorum, classless all the fucking way.
Ando_Chronic
I am over it “some guy”. You and your fellow tax payers just paid for my grad. school! HA!
Rathskeller
@Mark S.: Come on, that is brilliant, loopy stuff there! It implies that Santorum thinks gay sex is now some kind of mandatory exercise that everyone in the military has to participate in, whereas before, people waited until they fulfilled their entire term of service in quiet celibacy before retiring to civilian life, where finally they could have some good old heterosexual action.
Face it, in a room of mean lunatics, he’s really staking out new territory. It’s a bold move.
No one of importance
My heart broke from just the way he said ‘Daddy’. You knew that if his father had blown it, it would have killed his boy. And his daddy came through.
Fuck Rick Santorum. No. Hang Rick Santorum upside down, use a speculum on him, and pour a bucket of festering leeches inside him. They’ll still be more wholesome than anything in his rotting brain.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Rick Santorum is a little bit Lindsay Graham, a llitte bit Cliff Clavin, a little bit Norman Bates and a little bit Ted Haggard.
I don’t watch GOP debates, but everything I’m reading is the Perry keeps looking worse and worse, and that he keeps getting stronger in the primary polls
Mark S.
@Rathskeller:
It’s a bold and serious plan, worthy of discussion.
Jenny
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
That is confounding the MSM, but it makes perfect sense. An anti-intellectual candidate will connect and flourish within an anti-intellectual party.
suzanne
@Mark S.:
Frothy Mix also apparently lives in a land in which high schoolers don’t fuck.
Kola Noscopy
Now I kind of wish this adorable young soldier and all his fellow gay and lesbian compatriots in the military would fucking quit, and give the murder by drone, random country invading, military/industrial/complex a sweet kick in the ass that would cripple it for a while…this would save a LOT of lives.
OzoneR
@Kola Noscopy:
They’re like 2 percent of the military, they can be replaced before you finish reading this sentence.
Kola Noscopy
@OzoneR:
2.5 – 2.8 per cent is a rough estimate, as many as 65,000 soldiers. OK, so maybe all of them quitting wouldn’t “cripple” the machine, but it would put a kink in its operations, and how can that be a bad thing?
Really now? Can they, really? Before I finish, even? You’re such a pompous little Obot.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Kola Noscopy:
Given that he’d probably end up being young, gay and (best of all) unemployed in Alabama at the height of a recession, the kick in the arse for the military/industrial/complex might well have something of the pyrrhic about it for him on a purely personal level.
Unemployment goes up 65,000 straight off, followed by another few thousand support roles. Thousands of young gay and lesbian people go back to their (often small) communities without a job or skills, rather than earning an income, developing skills and personal integrity, being exposed to foreign cultures, having a career and being privileged to serve their country with honour. The military never becomes integrated, as all gay and lesbian servicemembers are immediately characterized as ungrateful quitters who hate their country, leading to the rapid reinstatement of DADT+ as soon as there is a Republican president. There are never any gay generals who might have implemented policy in a more humane way, or lesbian ex-servicewomen politicians who might push for more humane policies in the first place.
Sounds like a plan.
Yutsano
@Kola Noscopy:
Ahh special Timmeh. Always incapable of giving up our little obsessions are we?
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
Not to mention reasons for wanting to serve in the military run the gamut of human emotions. He obviously wasn’t trying to escape his family. The motivations for him (and any other soldier regardless of sexual orientation) are personal and private unless he chooses to share them.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Yutsano:
And that, yes. The video suggests he a nice boy who is doing what he does for all the right reasons, and whose dad and mum are proud of him. Enough said.
Oh, and did you see the arms? Yum.
Yutsano
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Between him and Steven Hill I’ve had more than enough drool material to last awhile. I’m actually glad the ones speaking out are blowing away the image of the gay man as weak and effeminate.
Yutsano
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Ahem. Do you even watch you links dear? Did you forget your meds again? :)
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
A truer quote has never existed.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Yutsano:
Fuck you, fucker. I remembered the tight t-shirt, not the damn name. Story of my life.
ETA: How are you, dear?
Kola Noscopy
Do you people ALL masturbate to military-themed porn, too?
Who gives a fuck if the greatest machine of death in the world is gay-inclusive or not? Fuck it.
Jebediah
@Yutsano:
That is a good thing, I think. Didn’t Eddie Murphy sort of start that ball rolling a long time ago with a joke about it not being smart to make fun of gay guys, cuz they’re dudes and will kick your ass, or something like that? Or am I remembering wrong?
When I taught 3rd and 4th grade, my teaching partner was a gay fellow who was anything but weak or effeminate, which can only help the developing world-view of the kids who knew him. Very handsome he was, too, although I suppose that is irrelevant…
Kola Noscopy
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
Not to mention the thousands and thousands of innocents they get to have a hand in killing. Sarah, I didn’t figure you for a military death porn enabler. Interesting to know.
Yutsano
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Trying not to drop, as I have an extremely busy day tomorrow, then finally a goof-off day, then car shopping Sunday. I’m hoping by this time next week I’ll have an Audi convertible broken in. :)
@Jebediah: The funny thing is even the effeminate ones are nowhere near weak. It takes a shit ton of courage to go against what society insists you have to think and act like. I’m of the school of thought that those who are most opposed to queer folk are trying to suppress that part of themselves, mostly for that reason.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Kola Noscopy:
I’m none of those things. I just happen to be able to see the world in shades other than black and white. US wars and US military policy may be dreadful, but that’s not the fault of the ordinary soldiers who are trying to live their lives and have a career.
Kola Noscopy
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
By taking part in, and filling roles within it, are these soldiers not directly enabling the activities of the U.S. military and its “dreadful” policies?
Where do you draw the line?
When these soldiers are sent to Iraq or AF and inevitably end up taking part in mayhem, are they not responsible for what they do?
These questions are as old as war: Where does personal responsibility enter into it?
Will Reks
@Kola Noscopy: You sit in judgement. That’s your right. Thanks for paying taxes.
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Thank you.
Jebediah
@Yutsano:
Bucking conformity is definitely not for sissies! And yeah, I also think lots of homophobes can’t handle that they are a little bit gay. According to Iggy Pop, every boy is, so just relax about it already!
And I would MUCH rather take sociological advice from Iggy Pop than, say, Santorum or Bachman, et al.
Console
Meh, a job is a job and a paycheck is a paycheck. Don’t like the fact that some army dude kills people for a living… well sorry bruh, but you bought the fuckin bullets for him. Culpability in a free society doesn’t magically start and end with the military.
So yeah, if the US is going to kill people in my name (and your name, and everyone else’s name), I’d like them to at least treat the people doing it with respect.
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Kola Noscopy:
Are the US peacekeepers in the Sinai desert or Kosovo culpable? How about the desk-jockey in Berlin or Hawaii or the soldiers on the Korean border? Are they all evil, or just the ones in wars you don’t approve of?
Yutsano
@Console: It’s okay. I’m just waiting for Special Timmeh to say he doesn’t pay taxes. Because paying into the system is like, immoral, and stuff. Idiots like that keep me employed. :)
@Sarah Proud and Tall: Shh, dear. You’ll confuse the poor child.
Kola Noscopy
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
They all contribute to and enable the machine, the policies of which you yourself labeled “dreadful”. How is that even arguable?
Anne Laurie
@Jebediah:
If Murphy said that, he owed a debt to Lenny Bruce, circa 1960: “Everybody makes fun of the fags — fag this, fag that. But nobody makes fun of the lesbians. Because the dykes are tough, and they will KICK YOUR ASS!”
(My dad had that routine, on vinyl, but my mom wouldn’t let him play it around us kids after my primary-school self heard that bit and said, “Huh. Can I be a lesbian when I grow up?”)
Kola Noscopy
@Yutsano:
I’ll ask again: who the fuck is special timmeh?
Sometimes I forget this blog is hosted by a former military cog; it’s no surprise the jackboot vibe is a little strong here…
Yutsano
@Kola Noscopy: LMAO. You’re precious. Now I suggest silence before you make an even bigger fool of yourself.
@Anne Laurie: I think there’s an old joke about how the best comedians are also the best thieves, because they can steal a joke and no one will be the wiser. And Lenny has been stolen from by everybody from Roseanne Barr to Kathy Griffin.
Jebediah
@Anne Laurie:
What was the answer?
I am trying to imagine the response if I had asked if I could be gay when I grew up. I should ask my mom what she would have said. I would like to think my dad would have just said “if your mom says it’s OK.” He was somewhat conservative and a business guy but made it clear when I was growing up that he really didn’t care what I pursued as long as it made me happy. I guess not all Nixon voters were dicks…
Sarah Proud and Tall
@Kola Noscopy:
Actually, I said:
as in, it is an arguable position for which I have some sympathy while recognizing that these issues are both complex and a product of historical circumstances. I should have spelled that out but I assumed that an ordinary person might expect it as implied. I apologize for the ambiguity.
I think there is a moral difference between the ordinary grunt who is (for the most part) trying to get a better life or follow in her father’s footsteps or make a career for himself and who therefore follow the orders given, whether that is to build a well or shoot someone who is shooting back at him, and the politicians who ultimately give those orders.
Maybe you should reserve your scorn for those who really deserve it.
Yutsano
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
That was the problem right there. Special Timmeh has always tried to argue from the most illogical position possible, to the point where I think he has about as many core values as Willard. You know which Willard.
Kola Noscopy
@Sarah Proud and Tall:
There is plenty of scorn reserved for those at the top.
OK, good night and toodles!
Anne Laurie
@Jebediah:
My mom immediately threw one of her patented hissy-fits, on the grounds that I’d “say something” at my parochial school the next day and shame her in front of the whole neighborhood! ! ! One of the few functional parts of my late parents’ marriage was the tooled-machine precision of the vaudeville routine between Snark Guy and Straight Woman… my sister and I still joke that the family humor gene is X-linked, because we are both snarksters and not one of our four brothers can catch a joke unless they’re told to expect one, have the schematics carefully explained in advance, and then get a signal for when they should laugh. My mom, poor woman, thought that Cosby guy and his chicken-heart routine was a little on the risky side… what if some innocent child (or, more likely, my little brothers) were to get ideas about setting fire to the furniture from him?
harlana
why do gay republicans exist? please, someone explain it to me, i don’t understand at all.
Lojasmo
@Kola Noscopy:
This honorably discharged conscientious objector says “fuck off to you.”
Lots of lively and honorable souls in the service.
PurpleGirl
@Comrade Mary: It’s time for a Google search and picking you know which site as the one you want… Keep SpreadingSantorum #1.
Paul in KY
@No one of importance: I like this one I read in one of George R.R. Martin’s books:
Slit open his abdominal cavity & sew a weasel up inside. I wouldn’t do this if I thought it might harm the weasel, though.
Emma
@Kola Noscopy: Then stay away and your purity won’t be contaminated. Simple solutions for simple minds.
Brian R.
@Kola Noscopy:
Jackboot? I never served in the military, so on behalf of civilians who aren’t insane, let me invite you to go fuck yourself with that kind of talk.
Perfect name, by the way, for someone with his head so far up his own ass.
angela
NO, it’s not a bad article consider it’s from Fox News, but I wasn’t surprised by the incorrect punctuation of “it’s” in the first quoted portion.
beergoggles
@harlana: Just because a segment of the population is gay doesn’t make them immune to the crazification factor.
Kola Noscopy
@Lojasmo:
Quite a cogent rebuttal. Idiot.
Kola Noscopy
@Emma:
Sorry, dipshit. It’s the military bootlickers here who think simple mindedly. Your support is welcomed by the military/industrial complex.
Kola Noscopy
@Brian R.:
Spoken like a true fellator of the U.S. military machine. Anti-military talk is not allowed, comrade! We need to “watch what we say, watch what we do.” You are a true friend to the Bushies and Cheneyites.
Feel free to fuck yourself in return.
Oh, and why aren’t you serving in the military?
Kola Noscopy
As a final question to you military lovahs, where will you be if and when this handsome, sweet gay soldier featured in the video ends up coming home with no legs and a colostomy bag? Where will you be if he comes home in a box from fighting one of the U.S.’s endless wars? How much of a life and career will he have then?
Idiots.
lethargytartare
@Kola Noscopy:
we’ll probably be voting to fund the VA and increase death benefits for dependents, while also arguing for or against individual deployments of our military on a case-by-case basis.
you know, kinda like what goes on here every other frakking day.
you’ll still be whining about purity while supping on the fruit of others’ labor, jackass.
brantl
@Kola Noscopy: If you paid yor taxes, so did you. What makes you think that every soldier is culpable? How about the guy that put the helicopter down between Lieutenant Calley and the Vietnamese civilians, to stop him from shooting them, is he culpable too, asshole? Grow/borrow a brain. There’s one marked “Abby Normal” over there on the shelf, it’s better than the one that you are working with now.
Kola Noscopy
@lethargytartare:
And those noble efforts on behalf of the powerless cogs will certainly help this sweet young man with so much promise before him grow new legs, or rise up out of his coffin to lead that promising life SP&T spoke of.
But his dad will get a nicely folded flag, so it’s all good.
Kola Noscopy
@lethargytartare:
Could you expand on that little bit of wisdom, please? Exactly whose labor fruits am I supping on again? Oh, you must mean all the benefits accrued to me and others by the endless killing and the billions of dollars wasted in AF and IQ…
…moron.
Cole, is that one of your sock puppets? You drinking already?
Kola Noscopy
@brantl:
Hi Cole.
No, that doesn’t cut it…I pay taxes under duress, a part of which goes against my will to fund the machine. You and your brethren join up willfully and go do the killing. So…maybe I’ll concede a .5% responsibility for my indirect/indirect/indirect involvement, if you’ll assume a responsibility level of 95% for your hands-on, so called “service.”
“asshole, “jackass,” yup from the knee jerk name calling, and the Young Frankenstein reference gleaned from thousands of hours of idle movie watching and boozing on the taxpayer’s military retirement dime, it’s cole or a clone/minion.
Lee
We talked about this at work yesterday.
We wondered if the first words Dad said after hanging up the phone was “Psssst, like I didn’t know”. Even with the bad sound Dad did not sound surprised at all.
brantl
Not Coie, moron. You jump to quick, stupic conclusions. But we already knew that, we’ve read your speil.
Kola Noscopy
@brantl:
“But we already knew that, we’ve read your speil.”
Who, exactly, is “we?”
It’s important to you to identify yourself as part of a clique here, isn’t it? Too timid to speak for yourself alone? Does your self-inclusion as one of John Cole’s buddies make you feel better about yourself?
Tehanu
@Kola Noscopy:
You “pay taxes under duress,” you say. So does everybody else. That “under duress” crap means nothing because you could choose not to pay them, if screaming about “military bootlickers” means so much to you. Of course, then you’d have to go to jail and actually live up to your noble purity principles. Until you do that, you’re just as guilty as the rest of us, so shut the fuck up about how we’re all so evil for supporting the troops.
Kola Noscopy
@Tehanu:
utter horseshit
No one of importance
@Kola Noscopy:
Hey, Monsieur HeadUpYourArse? Why are you trolling Miz Sarah’s thread but not making a peep on Cole’s post on the exact same subject?
I’m gonna make a guess and assume it’s because Sarah’s probably too louche and lovely to bothered with banning you but Cole would tear you into teeny tiny bits of Tunch food for the way you’re disrespecting the military and its gay personnel.
Chickenshit troll. You give the same fuck about the welfare of brown people in foreign places that Dubya did. That is to say none at all except where it serves your nasty, fecally stained agenda.
Redleg
Kola writes like the kind of person who’d go apeshit over someone stereotyping and derogating his/her own social group but seems to have no problem at doing the same to our military members. Doosh.