by Benjamin Doherty
But Israel’s propagandists continue to try to make pinkwashing work for them, though they’re apparently the only ones who don’t notice the stench it emits.
Photo of two Israeli soldiers holding hands staged by the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit transformed into an internet meme image by hasbara blogger Elder of Ziyon.
Pinkwashing involves efforts to portray Israel as a country that espouses ostensibly Western liberal or progressive democratic values such as feminism, gay rights and multiculturalism. The hope is that target audiences will identify with Israel and thus discount concerns about Israel’s human rights abuses against Palestinians.
Or as I put it on another occasion, pinkwashing is an attempt to change the subject: ‘don’t look at Gaza where we’re besieging 1.6 million people, look over here where we’re having a gay pride parade!’
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As LGBT advocates continue to press their agenda forward, they rightly look back at the past to learn what works. While some view “the past” as meaning the start of the Obama administration, understanding the true, long-game strategy that was necessary to secure our advances in recent years is critical to building on those gains, both for LGBT issues and other kinds of progress.
Fortunately, some insight can be gained from a newly published academic volume that takes a deep look at the political history of “don’t ask, don’t tell” (DADT). The volume, a special issue of the Journal of Homosexuality, includes an article I wrote describing what I call “research advocacy”—the use of data and other evidence to gain visibility, credibility and action on LGBT issues. It was part of a twenty-year reframing campaign that LGBT advocates successfully used to make repeal of the military’s ban on openly gay service politically palatable once a friendly president and winnable Congress took power in 2009.
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Congress has introduced a bill to further extend the rights for same-sex partners of people in the military and their families. The Military Spouses Equal Treatment Act, re-introduced with about 40 co-sponsors as of Thursday, would allow the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs to recognize any marriage that has been recognized by a state, the District of Columbia, commonwealths, territories or possessions and provide the same benefits to the spouses of all service members. The act is designed to act as a stopgap between Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s announcement earlier this week to extend more rights to same-sex military couples, and the repeal of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits the federal government from officially recognizing marriages of gay and lesbian couples.
“While we wait for a decision from the Supreme Court on DOMA, we look forward to seeing action from the President and the next Secretary of Defense to make sure our troops and their families are protected from discrimination and prejudice,” said American Military Partner Association president Stephen Peters.
Chief Warrant Officer Charlie Morgan fought in her final months to extend benefits to the same-sex partners of military personnel. She passed away last week after a five-year battle with breast cancer, leaving behind her wife Karen and their daughter Casey. Panetta’s announcement this week will allow same-sex military partners to obtain dependent identification cards, family support programs, child care, joint assignments, and other benefits. Still other benefits, such health care and housing allowances, can only be granted to same-sex couples once the Defense of Marriage Act is repealed, because those statutes are governed using the words “spouse” and “marriage.” DOMA bars the federal government from recognizing the legal marriages of same-sex couples.
“All spouses in the military, regardless of orientation, put up with tremendous hardships, and it’s time we recognize their contribution and sacrifice with true equality,” Rep. Adam Schiff of California, the lead sponsor on the bill, said Thursday.
Chief Warrant Officer Charlie Morgan, a lesbian member of the national guard who came out on national TV the day “don’t ask, don’t tell” was repealed, succumbed to cancer earlier today, according to a statement from OutServe-Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. Morgan is survived by her wife, Karen, and the couple’s five-year-old daughter, Casey Elena. Morgan was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008, and underwent a double mastectomy and chemotherapy, after which she was declared cancer-free, and served another tour of duty in Kuwait. But in September 2012, Morgan learned the cancer had returned — metastatic and incurable.
Morgan came out on MSNBC on September 20, 2011, and became a nationally recognized voice against the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, which denied her wife, Karen, and their daughter, Casey Elena, from receiving military, Social Security, and pension benefits readily offered to the opposite-sex spouses of straight soldiers. OutServe-SLDN reports that the Morgans are plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of DOMA and other statues which prohibit same-sex partners from receiving equal military benefits.
“Chief Warrant Officer Charlie Morgan, a courageous fighter for our country, for her family, and for the equality of all who wear the uniform of our nation, passed away early this morning,” said OutServe-SLDN Executive Director Allyson Robinson in a statement. “On behalf of her wife Karen and daughter Casey Elena, we thank all those who have supported Charlie so fervently since she proudly came out on national television on the day ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ was repealed, and who have stayed by her side through her brave fight with cancer. She made an indelible mark on everyone she met with her integrity, her positive outlook, and her unflinching commitment to righting the wrongs visited upon gay and lesbian military families. The fight for full LGBT equality in this country is forever changed because Charlie Morgan took up the cause.”
OutServe-SLDN reports that funeral arrangements are pending, and highlights a memorial page called “Remembering Charlie Morgan,” where supporters, friends, and family can leave messages and remembrances of the courageous veteran.
Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Gen. Martin Dempsey If the United States had previously allowed women to serve officially in military combat roles, including special operations forces, there might be fewer sexual assaults in the armed services, the Pentagon’s top general told reporters Thursday. Having studied the issue of rampant sexual misconduct in the ranks, Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, noted that he has concluded that the phenomenon exists partly because women have been subordinated to men in military culture: “It’s because we’ve had separate classes of military personnel.”
The road to full equality may well be rocky; each of the armed services has until May to report to the incoming defense secretary (presumably Chuck Hagel) on how—and how quickly—it will integrate women into combat billets. “We want to make sure we get the standards right, and we don’t overengineer them either,” Dempsey said.
Nevertheless, the move largely codifies a practice long under way in combat zones like Afghanistan and Iraq, where women serving in what are technically non-combat roles—such as patrolling in vehicles and aircraft—can find themselves under fire. And the transition to women serving fully side-by-side with men has been happening in several services already. “Women are now in submarines, and that was one of the concerns at the time,” Panetta said, answering a reporter’s questions about “privacy issues” among troops. “Women are fighter pilots now. So Air Force, Navy have moved in that direction. The Marines and the Army are now gonna move in that direction.”
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Allyson Robinson is a decorated veteran, a wife, a mother, an ordained Baptist minister, and the executive director of the recently combined advocacy organization for LGBT people in uniform, OutServe-Service members Legal Defense Network. The Army veteran was tapped to lead the 6,000-member organization in October, and her appointment is noteworthy not only because she is one of the few women leading a military group but also because she is the first transgender person to lead a national LGBT organization.
Robinson’s appointment is anything but an affirmative-action hire, said retired Navy captain April Heinze, cochair of OutServe-SLDN’s Board of Directors in a statement announcing the hire. “Allyson Robinson is exactly the right person at the right time to be our leader and voice in Washington in the fight to achieve full LGBT equality in the military,” said Heinze.
Indeed, Robinson is exceedingly qualified for her new position. A graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Robinson served as a commissioned Army officer commanding Patriot missiles in Europe and the Middle East, a senior trainer for NATO, and an adviser to the armed forces of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Qatar.
Now Robinson is ready to engage in a different kind of battle — one of words instead of weapons.
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First Lt. Nakisha Hardy, left, and her spouse, LaTiya Hardy. They were denied marriage counseling at a military retreat last year.
By RACHEL L. SWARNS
SANFORD, N. C. — Nakisha Hardy spent the first nine months of her marriage on a remote Army base in Afghanistan, a tour of duty punctuated by sporadic mortar blasts and constant e-mails to her spouse back home.
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A former Air Force Sergeant discharged under “don’t ask, don’t tell,” David Hall, has been chosen as one of eight Americans to serve as “citizen co-chairs” of President Obama’s inauguration, taking place this weekend in Washington, D.C. The choice of Hall, who is currently the director of development at OutServe-SLDN, which supports LGBT service members and veterans, is intended to help highlight Obama’s first-term accomplishments.
“This is certainly the honor of a lifetime, and I am grateful to President Obama for his leadership in repealing ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ so that no qualified American who wants to serve this country in uniform will ever again be denied that right simply because they are gay or lesbian,” said Hall.
Hall and his seven comrades will join in the National Day of Service, which kicks off the inaugural events on Saturday. He will attend the swearing-in ceremony Monday and along with the other co-chairs will ride on an inaugural parade float highlighting the inaugural theme of “Our People: Our Future.” Monday evening, he will attend the official inaugural balls.
“There is a great deal more to do on the road to full LGBT equality in our military, but it’s important for us to take a moment this weekend to honor the leadership of this President and recognize just how far we have come. There could be no better personification of that than former Air Force Sergeant David Hall,” said Army Veteran and OutServe-SLDN Executive Director Allyson Robinson.
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A transgender woman who went absent without leave from the US Military 31 years ago has received an honourable discharge. Elizabeth Tremblay joined the service in 1980 before she had transitioned from male to female. After completing boot camp at a base in California and facing a forced move to North Carolina, Tremblay decided to leave the marines, and fled to her home state of Maine, effectively becoming a deserter. The Androscoggin County Sheriff’s Office last September discovered a warrant and desertion charge against Tremblay in a federal database.
Tremblay was arrested and jailed for more than two days. She’s been waiting since then for the discharge, and finally got the good news in her official discharge papers that were received earlier this week. When Tremblay enlisted, she was promised that she would be trained in teletype communications. But after her duties were changed to driving jeeps and trucks, she decided to leave without being properly discharged or granted leave.
After returning to Maine and working at L.L. Bean and Bates of Maine, Tremblay began taking hormones, changed her name to Elizabeth and underwent partial gender transition surgery. During that time, Tremblay says she never received any word that the US Marines were looking for her. She told the Lewiston-Auburn Sun Journal that there were no phone calls or letters, and she lived openly in the community. When she received her discharge papers on Monday, she was pleased to see that the military had used her new name, Elizabeth Marie Tremblay. The papers made no mention of why it was an honourable discharge.
Today is the first anniversary of the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the military policy that prohibited gay and lesbian service members from serving openly and honestly in the U.S. military. For years, service members in loving and committed same-sex relationships needed to hide their love and conceal the truth about their families to ensure that they would not be discharged from the service.
The repeal of the ban is an enormous step forward for the LGBT community and translates to broader visibility for gay and lesbian service members and their families. The one-year anniversary merits huge celebration and thanks to all of the organizations and individuals who helped push through repeal last September. But even though gay and lesbian service members can now serve openly, they continue to face discrimination from the federal government. Because of the so-called Defense of Marriage Act, which prohibits federal respect of lawful marriages between same-sex couples, gay and lesbian military couples do not receive the same federal protections that heterosexual couples receive.
Since May, Freedom to Marry and Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) have been working together on a national persuasion campaign calledFreedom to Serve, Freedom to Marry. Through a series of videos and other multimedia content, the campaign has illustrated the various ways that DOMA negatively impacts military families by highlighting the stories and struggles of gay and lesbian service members and their families. The Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs guarantees a long list of federal protections and responsibilities to married military couples: They can share health insurance and medical coverage, be issued military identification cards, live together on military bases, seek support from morale and welfare programs, and receive surviving spouse benefits. However, because DOMA denies federal recognition of their relationships, same-sex couples are not afforded these benefits and protections.
DOMA is at odds with the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” and now, gay and lesbian service members and their families are caught in the middle. After dealing with the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy for 17 years, same-sex couples are continuing to face discrimination. Until DOMA is repealed, Americans will continue to be divided into two classes. To highlight some of the keys ways that DOMA hurts military families, Freedom to Marry and SLDN have created this infographic. Share the graphic on Facebook and show your friends that while there’s much to celebrate on today’s anniversary of the repeal of DADT, there’s also much work to be done.
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by THINKPROGRESS
In a letter responding to questions from Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Defense Secretary nominee Chuck Hagel addressed concerns about his support for LGBT equality in the military. He made it clear that he supports the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” the policy that required gay, lesbian, and bisexual troops to hide their identities, and expressed his intent to provide equal benefits to the same-sex partners and families of service members.
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by Aaron Belkin
When it comes to gay issues, the world has changed since Chuck Hagel served in the Senate. And among all those gay issues that have shifted over time, change has been perhaps most dramatic in the Pentagon, which executed a 180-degree turn with respect to its culture and policies concerning gay troops. As a result, all future Defense Secretaries will need to address gay issues with the same respect that they bring to all other decisions concerning diversity and military personnel policy.
This is particularly true for Chuck Hagel, who has a disturbing, career-long record of staking out anti-gay positions despite his recent support for openly gay service. The standard that he must meet is simple: he must demonstrate the leadership of a 21st-century Defense Secretary by putting his money where his mouth is when it comes to policies concerning gay troops. On gay issues, Chuck Hagel needs to become the most supportive Republican Defense Secretary in American history, a tough standard given the outstanding and inclusive track record of former Secretary Robert Gates.
Here are five concrete steps that Hagel should take as Secretary of Defense to prove that his about-face on gay issues is not just talk.
(1) He should repudiate the conscience clause of the recently-passed defense budget bill. That clause created special rights for service members who oppose serving with gays and lesbians on the basis of their religious or moral beliefs, and it could cause enormous problems under a future Republican administration. Hagel should reiterate President Obama’s pledge that the clause will have no implications whatsoever for the full repeal of DADT and open service among gay and lesbian troops.
(2) He should support gay and lesbian military families to the fullest extent allowed by law. While the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) prevents the military from providing some benefits to gay and lesbian families, the Pentagon could do more to standardize the way it treats all troops. And, Hagel should start preparing the Pentagon for DOMA’s eventual repeal.
(3) He should express his willingness to sign an official Pentagon directive, or to call for a White House executive order, with an affirmative non-discrimination mandate for the military’s treatment of gay and lesbian troops. Because the statute repealing DADT did not include such a mandate, future administrations could, in theory, reinstate discrimination. Hagel should do what he can to make sure that never happens.
(4) He should begin the process of addressing transgender troops who are already serving with distinction and honor, but whose readiness and morale are compromised by a host of discriminatory Pentagon policies.
(5) He should take concrete steps to prevent anti-gay harassment by insisting that commanders hold perpetrators accountable and then holding those who fail to do so accountable.
It is too late for Hagel to undo the damage he caused to gay and lesbian people during his Senate career. But he now has an opportunity to make sure that the Pentagon keeps making progress on the route to full inclusion.
Gay and lesbian Americans have been able to serve openly in the military ever since President Obama repealed ”Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” in September 2011. But online, some Pentagon computers appear to force the LGBT military community behind closed doors, blocking military users’ access to LGBT advocates’ and other progressives’ websites, while conservative sites remain fully accessible, according to John Aravosis of AMERICAblog. The military now blames faulty computer software for the de facto censorship, but gay activists say the Department of Defense has known about the problem for over a year—and still hasn’t fixed it.Aravosis—a journalist and activist who defended a US Navy sailor for challenging DADT in 1998—learned from a military contact that his website was blocked on the Pentagon’s official computer system. He then had several other contacts take screenshots of websites that were blocked on Pentagon computers. Aravosis discovered that LGBT websites like the Human Rights Campaign blog and OutServe-SLDN, a website co-founded by Air Force officer Josh Seefried that supports gay members of the military, were blocked. Progressive sites like Daily Kos made the blocked list as well.
But the conservative websites of Andrew Breitbart, Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, as well as anti-gay rights groups like the National Organization for Marriage and the Family Research Council, were accessible:
Zeke Stokes, a spokesman for OutServe, told Mother Jones that the organization and its 6,000 affiliated LGBT service members have been notifying the Pentagon and local commanders of this issue since the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in 2011, but the Pentagon failed to adequately respond until this past weekend, when Aravosis pointed out the problem.
The Department of Defense issued a statement on Facebook on Friday that said it “does not block LGBT websites” deliberately. Rather, the pages “were denied access based on web filters blocking the Blog/Personal Pages” category. (Military officials have long blocked workers’ access to websites they consider non-secure, personal timewasters, or otherwise unfit for consumption in office hours.) Aravosis tells Mother Jones he found this initial statement “disturbing,” because websites like Ann Coulter’s blog and Red State, a conservative news blog, both appear to fall in this category, but were not blocked. “They didn’t seem to recognize the possibility of a problem, and appeared to have no intent to investigate,” he says.
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Thought Rep. Todd “Legitimate Rape” Akin was done putting his foot in his mouth? You were wrong. In one of his last moves of Congress, Akin is attempting to reintroduce a bill that would essentially give protections (nicknamed a “license to bully”) to people in the military who don’t tolerate homosexuality.
Akin’s “conscience clause” would purportedly protect the religious liberties of military personnel who disagree with homosexuality. Under the bill, the U.S. military must “accommodate the conscience and sincerely held moral principles and religious beliefs of the members of the Armed Forces concerning the appropriate and inappropriate expression of human sexuality,” according to the Washington Blade.
The Senate passed another version of the bill in December, without Akin’s anti-gay proposal, according to Mother Jones. Now, the Missouri representative is pushing for its final approval, along with Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Rep. Howard McKeon (R-Calif.). “They’re pushing pretty hard,” a House Democrat told the website.
Go away, Todd Akin. Just go away.
The U.S. Senate passed the next year’s defense budget without some of the proposed harmful language that would limit the use of military facilities for same-sex couples.
The bill passed with full bipartissan support, with a 98-0 vote. The House version of the bill, which was passed in May, included an amendment to give “conscience protections” to chaplains and other service personnel who do not want to minister or work with gay, lesbian, or bisexual service members. Another amendment in the House version would also bar same-sex couples from using military bases or any other defense facilities for wedding ceremonies.
Allyson Robinson, the new executive director of OutServe-SLDN, praised the bipartisan passage of the law Tuesday, and said her organization would work with Congress to make sure the final version of the bill is stripped of the antigay provisions.
“The Department of Defense has already made it clear—and appropriately so—that decisions about the use of facilities should be made on a sexual orientation neutral basis,” Robinson said in a statement Tuesday. “Anything else is discrimination, pure and simple.”
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