Oh I'm a youngin’. I was 8 in '93 and in Germany so I received very little U.S. News or Pop-Culture. I still remember my Mom not letting me watch The Birdcage on the flight home in '96; while it was R it probably would merit a PG-13 if rated today.Darth Wong wrote:How old are you? If you're old enough to have been politically aware in the 1990s, you would know that Clinton faced nearly as much intensity of hatred as Obama does now. Moreover, you would know that public attitudes toward homosexuality were much harsher at the time. The 1990s came just after the 1980s, and in the 1980s, people were still so backward that they failed to pass the ERA, for fuck's sake. I mean come on, how difficult is it to say that men and women should have equal rights in the Constitution? You should not underestimate how far we've come as a society in the last 20 years. Hell, I still remember Sunday closing laws and school prayer when I was a kid.
Anyway, yes we have come an unbelievably long way. But that is why it should be so surprising that Clinton took the direct path back then, rather than a more indirect and behind-the-scenes method which Obama seems to be doing. It is far better to take 2 years to do something and accomplish it fully than 1 year and to do so ineffectually. If Clinton had called for a comprehensive, yearlong study of homosexuals in the military, similar to the Crittenden Report of 1957 and then used that evidence in his fight he might have had more success. As it was he simply directed the Secretary of Defense to prepare a draft policy, earning him the distrust and rancor of the Joint Chiefs and Congress.
Discharges under Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell
1994__617
1995__772
1996__870
1997__1,007
1998__1,163
1999__1,046
2000__1,241
2001__1,273
If American society was becoming more accepting, why did the discharge rates under DADT continue to rise? Yes, the military leadership is often much more conservative than society at large, but it is led by civilians for a reason. Clinton never took up the fight again after his lose, even after he declared the policy a "failure" after the Barry Winchell murder.
The drop after 2001 did not represent a massive liberalization of the Military, but simply a practical response to the need for service-members during Afghanistan & Gulf War II. So the Defense Dept. seems to have no problem with GLB service-members dying during wartime, but only with them serving during peacetime.
There's also an argument to be made that had Clinton accomplished something sweeping it would have given him momentum for the 1994 elections. He was forced to compromise on gay service in the military and lost on Health Care. America, above all political ideologies, loves a winner. Just look at the bump in the approval of Health Care reform following its passage.
Maybe I am too young to understand exactly how much America has changed, but the fact that gay soldiers are chaining themselves to the White House fence and that we’re still (as in right now, today) discharging able-bodied, willing and competent service-members during a time of war says to me that there hasn’t been a fundamental change in those 20 years.
) But with time you'll come to appreciate how understanding really does change with age (note I said "change", not "gets better" - I'm not sure it's better in all cases, just different).
