What are opponents of DADT repeal thinking?

By Greg Sargent

One thing that's been oddly missing from the debate in the Senate over repealing Don't Ask Don't Tell is any discussion of the moral and human dimensions of this story, at least as it concerns the gay service-members themselves. The discussion has mostly focused on how straight troops will be impacted, and has otherwise been bone dry: It's all about what the statistics in the Pentagon report actually reveal and whether Robert Gates will implement repeal on a sufficiently flexible timetable.

Indeed, when Senator James Webb today asked the Service Chiefs a simple question about the gay human beings impacted by this discriminatory policy, everyone at the hearing acted a bit startled. Webb asked: What should we do with gay patriotic Americans who have already served our country for years, and want to lead free and open lives? Everyone looked uncomfortable, as if Webb had gone way off topic.

Matthew Yglesias today wonders what on earth opponents of DADT repeal are thinking. As he says, at bottom this debate is really about whether we are going to treat gays as "free and equal citizens of the country," or whether they're "some kind of subordinate class." Opponents of DADT repeal will deny this up and down, saying this is nothing like the debate over whether to racially integrate the armed forces.

So here's my question: Is it possible that one of the things holding up repeal is that many people simply haven't had an up-close view of the ugliness of anti-gay bigotry, and aren't willing to believe the push for equality for gays is on a moral par with other major civil rights battles?

I have seen anti-gay bigotry up close. I grew up in Greenwich Village in the 1970s, back when it was in many ways a gay ghetto and was also torn by serious class tensions, as working class catholics were getting slowly priced out of the neighborhood. Violent gay bashing incidents were routine.

One thing I distinctly remember from my childhood is seeing bands of thuggish-looking young men from outside the neighborhood cruising around in cars and vans, shouting "f*ggot" out the windows and even occasionally hunting for lone gay men to jump. I lived a few blocks away from a notorious gay bar that was the scene of a string of violent assaults. When the AIDS crisis hit -- and government looked the other way for far too long -- it directly impacted people close to my parents. Cops mounting raids on underground gay clubs was a common occurence, and the open abuse of gays on the streets persisted for years, if not decades.

I'm not saying this legacy necessarily means we shouldn't be debating the impact repeal would have on the armed forces. Of course we should. But it seems to me that the broader discussion has been largely antiseptic and lacking in moral urgency and historical depth. I wonder whether it's because people have mostly been insulated from the ugliness of anti-gay bigotry. I'd be very interested to hear from others on this.

