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Published: July 1, 2009
Already during the Obama administration 265 gay service personnel have been drummed out of the military because of the nation's don't-ask-don't-tell policy. Meanwhile, President Obama met with a gathering of gay men and lesbians on Monday urging them to exercise patience as they wait for him to overturn the policy.
Obama has pledged to end don't-ask-don't tell, which allows gays and lesbians to serve in the military if they keep their sexual orientation a secret. Once they are out, they are out.
Obama understands the history of the word patience as it relates to civil rights. Martin Luther King memorably addressed those who counseled blacks to exercise patience when he said blacks had been urged to be patient for generations; they would no longer wait for their rights.
"It's not for me to tell you to be patient any more than it was for others to counsel patience to African-Americans who were petitioning for equal rights a half-century ago," he told his audience on Monday.
He was hoping for a little more patience, nevertheless. He noted that he had been in office for only six months, and he suggested that gay Americans would be pleased with him by the time he was finished.
Obama campaigned on a promise to end don't-ask-don't-tell and also to repeal the Defense of Marriage Act, which forbids federal recognition of same-sex marriages and allows states to refuse to recognize same-sex marriages from other states. But in his remarks on Monday he said he would pursue these goals by working through Congress and the Pentagon.
The occasion of the gathering was the 40th anniversary of the Stonewall riots in New York City, which are seen as the spark that ignited the gay rights movement in America. Fred Sargeant, a retired police lieutenant who lives in Shrewsbury, was an activist who leafleted during the Stonewall protests, and he wrote recently in The New York Times that "older gays saw the path to equality as going through the power structure. We saw it as going around the power structure." Their purpose was to draw attention to the issue of gay rights in a way that had never happened before.
On Monday gay Americans were at the heart of the power structure — the White House. The event was evidence of the long journey the gay rights movement has traveled since Stonewall. Obama's demurral on the issue of don't-ask-don't-tell was further evidence of the difficulty of the journey.
Obama argued that he wanted to pursue the issue in a way that would eventually gain the support of the Pentagon and the Congress. "As commander in chief, I do have a responsibility to see that this change is administered in a practical way and a way that takes over the long term."
As one gay activist said, "This will buy him some time, but he'll have to deliver."
Gradually, the culture of the military will catch up to the larger culture. The last few decades have awakened Americans to the fact that gay and lesbian co-workers are likely to be in the next office cubicle — or the next foxhole. They are likely to be present in one's family — a brother, a cousin, a daughter, an in-law. As the struggle for gay marriage has occurred in numerous states across the country, Americans have learned to accept the reality of gay life. Militaries in Israel, Great Britain, and Denmark, among others, allow gays and lesbians to serve openly with no adverse effects.
Among the valuable service personnel who have been driven out of the military have been numerous Arabic translators. It is likely that lives have been lost in Iraq for want of a sufficient number of translators.
The history of the gay rights movement has shown that there are times for winning over legislators and the public in an evolutionary way. That happened in Vermont with civil unions. And there are times for revolutionary strokes. Obama may well find, when he finally abolishes don't-ask-don't tell, that his action is less revolutionary than he fears.
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