A member of my platoon was Youtubing it up the other day. It’s not my preferred medium for entertainment, but whatever. The point is that he was, for whatever reason or another, looking up the “squeal like a piggy!” scene from Deliverance. I can’t imagine what kind of hair he had up his ass to watch this of all things, but that’s neither here nor there.
The thing about the internet we have over here is that it sucks. So when you try to watch a five minute video clip, it takes ten minutes to get it loaded. Now if I were to want to watch a video clip, I’d pause it the moment it started to load and wait for it to finish before I watched it. I can’t stand getting through half a video and it stopping.
My platoon mate, however, just let it play till it got to the point it had loaded, and then he would start it over, slowly getting more and more of the video every time he started it. So instead of watching debatably the most homo-erotic five minute movie scene one time through, he saw a majority of it about two dozen times. Personally, I couldn’t watch some obese, whitey tighty clad man get thrown around the woods by gay hillbillies much more than five times.
Which brings me to news I’d be remiss if I didn’t address. That’s right, the repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell in our United States Military.
This is of course a big deal. Even myself, one of the more passive individuals in this fine world, had to take part in the discussions.
Not everyone in the military is homophobic, intolerant, or generally douchy. I’ll concede that the average soldier, more or less, is kind of a dick. But speaking for my platoon and company, they are almost all good people, kind people, tolerant people. This issue is extremely touchy though. If you took a poll of this company, and asked questions like “Do you have a problem with gay men or women?” or “Have you or would you behave aggressively and violently if introduced to a homosexual?” you would get resounding no’s. Like most sensible human beings, what other people do with there lives, with the obvious exceptions of murder, rape, robbery, etcetera, is of no worry to them.
Yet a majority of them are upset about this repeal. It just adds to the mounting excuses as to why Obama is a “terrible president”.
If you know me, you know I could care less about this. If a person gay or straight wants to serve the country, more power to them. But I’m going to go ahead and play devil’s advocate for a minute, because I do care about my fellow soldiers, regardless of these particular views, and I don’t want people to think too ill of them because of this.
Military members are typically “manly” men (at least Combat Engineers are, a MOS that is strictly male). They are testosterone filled, they love beer, sports, and shooting guns. They aren’t all unintelligent, but maybe you could say they’re simple.
Coupled with religious beliefs, and the social mores that they grew up with, they’re just crept out by dude on dude action, to use their language. It makes them uncomfortable, hell I’m as open and tolerant as anybody and I don’t particular enjoying seeing men display affection with other men. It doesn’t mean I disapprove the behavior. Frankly I respect most gay men and women more than straight ones.
Contrary to what most of these Army guys would say, they are bashful people. We’re all a little uncomfortable with showering and changing together. We see a lot more of each other than we would like. Seriously. Taking showers with homosexuals to these people, it’s like unisex showers. I can tell you, regardless of everyone‘s big talk, these people would abhor showering with female members of the military. They’d be walking around junk cupped and red faced. Intimacy take a lot of time to establish, unless of course you’re drunk. Straight men don’t get intimate with other straight men in the military, they get intimate with women. So they worry about homosexual men attempting to get intimate with them (self flattery, I know) , it freaks them out.
Looking back, my attempt to defend my friends might have turned you against them. My argument is flimsy, I am more confident then ever that I would make a terrible attorney. Again, I don’t share these beliefs, I just don’t hold them against my battle buddies. People can think what they want, who am I to say I’m always right. You don’t have to forgive them, or like them. Just remember that good people can have some bad opinions and ideas. I’m sure I do… damn Jews…
I’m very happy for the gay community, and really for sensible people everywhere, that this policy has been repealed. It’s of course just the first step, there’s a lot of work to be done yet. Hell, oral sex and sodomy are still considered illegal within military law (much to the chagrin of gay and straight men alike).
Let’s hope this is the first step in diversifying the nation as well as the military.
Mozzoltov! And keep on keeping on.
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