Pretty much anyone reading this is gonna agree the DADT policy of the US armed forces is pretty retarded and outdated, in fact even the leading senior military figures in the Senate panel currently reviewing the policy are advocating its repeal. Most of the opposition is coming from the standard gays = sex manics (okay maybe partly true amongst the gay friends I have), could singlehandedly bring down an entire platoon by their very presence (if they weren't so anti-gays themselves, maybe terrorists could take down the us forces by having the queeniest bitches in all fagendom on their front lines), uber conservative senators and now retired military leaders from the Vietnam era.
But it hasn't been repealed yet, and there's some rather depressing reading out there about the soldiers who are still falling foul of this law. Especially those who the US want, such as foreign language speakers, but get rid of by their adherence to DADT. For those who don't pay close attention to these things, its important for you to know that whilst the policy is DADT, those outed by a third party can be 'investigated' and in some cases, some people have been outed due to reviews of personal, usually private, emails, that happen to show a squaddie emailing back home to their same-sex beau, so the application of the don't ask part of the policy is a little, sporadic (i can never hear that word without thinking "I hope not sporadically", Clueless was there before mean girls ever started the "fugly slut" quotes.) Below is a letter sent from a soldier, a week ago,, to the good President, Mr. Obama. It's rather heartbreaking really, and makes poignant points about the problems currently caused, by reviewing the DADT policy without putting a moratorium on its use during the review.
The world is currently condemning the recent actions of Malawi and Uganda against gay people, and yet, as the soldier points out, here is the United States, sending a soldier to war because its convenient for them, who if he's lucky enough to come back, already knows his return, unlike that of the rest of his unit -who will be publicly lauded and praised for their heroics, will be to the military casting him out as a degenerate and corrupting influence. But only during peace time.
May 14, 2010
President Barack H. Obama
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest
Washington, DC 20500
Dear Mr. President,
I am writing to you from a kitchen in the state of Washington. The love of my life is in the other room. It has been eight months since I saw him last and I cherish every moment we spend together. Next week, my mid-tour leave will be over and I will return to Iraq and finish my second deployment. I don’t know when I’ll see my partner again.
When serving in a war zone, you learn quite a bit about yourself and what’s important to you. I’ve had the chance to work on a close and personal level with the people of Iraq, and in doing so, I have realized more than ever that the freedoms we enjoy as Americans should not be taken for granted – we must protect them at all costs. These freedoms are essential to the very foundation of our society. Yet so many men and women who fight for these freedoms aren’t allotted their own. Our freedom to love and be loved by whomever we choose. The freedom to live of a life of truth and dignity.
Recently I was informed that the military was investigating me for violating the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” law. Another service member had apparently “outed” me. At first I felt free: I didn’t have to lie anymore. But after that initial sense of relief, I’m left knowing just how little the Pentagon and the United States government think of me.
Mr. President, my unit is extremely undermanned. We’re working around the clock in Baghdad. My commander informed me that the Army cannot afford to lose me. I was told that they would prepare my discharge paperwork, “stick it in a Manila envelope, and keep it in a desk -- for now.”
One moment they wanted to throw me out and the next they are hiding evidence to keep me in.
My comrades now know that I am gay, and they do not treat me any differently. Work runs as smoothly as ever, and frankly the only difference I see -- besides my pending job loss -- is that I am free of the burden of having to constantly watch my words and ensure my lies are believable.
Having this out in the open makes things a bit less stressful. But it’s also clear the Army is only keeping me around until they are done with me. After I have served my two deployments -- and only a year shy of separating from the military honorably -- I suspect they will kick me to the street.
It’s bad enough that there is a law that denies tens of thousands of service members from serving with integrity, but it’s even worse when such a law is carried out with such inconsistency, without any warning of when it might come down.
If my suspicions are true, my discharge will move forward after my deployment. I am good enough to serve in war, but not at peace? I will never be at peace until this law is repealed – and neither will my partner. In fact, he won’t even be informed if I am killed in action. That might be the hardest part for us both.
Mr. President, when you took office I remember watching your inauguration knowing that history was being made. I remember feeling like this weight was being lifted off of my shoulders. I truly believed in you, and I still do.
But, Mr. President, please keep your promise to me.
Please do everything in your power to help Congress repeal “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” this year. Our government called upon us to fight for our country. So many of us answered the call; we did not delay. We were sent world’s away to defend your freedoms. Mr. President, won’t you fight for mine?
With deep respect,
A soldier returning to Baghdad
(The writer is currently serving and unable to identify himself publicly.)
This letter, was published by a project called Stories from the Frontlines, by the Servicemembers Legal Defence Network. As the markup for the various reviews and bills related to it going through Congress approach, SFTF are posting a different letter every weekday. It's fairly intense reading. Make sure you've got an evening to sacrifice freely to your thoughts before sifting through some of the other examples.
Friday, 21 May 2010
Monday, 17 May 2010
Things to come
I have a big long list of 10 different posts I intend to make at some point. Stuff is in the works. It'll just take me time to write it out...
Sunday, 16 May 2010
Music Sharing
You should all listen to this song, cause it's fooking awesome:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gp881cxCOQ
There's a post partially related to this to come at some point when I write it up (I've got a big long list of things I've been meaning to write up)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4Gp881cxCOQ
There's a post partially related to this to come at some point when I write it up (I've got a big long list of things I've been meaning to write up)
Post Scriptum
Also, apparently writing 5 blog posts in one night makes you all panic about me. My phone has been buzzing with text messages checking up on me all day. Bless you all.
To Write Love On Her Arms
Today I helped spread the message of TWLOHA. For those of you who aren't interested or too lazy to click through to the website for the full story behind the idea, I'll summarise the whole deal here.
To Write Love On Her Arms was one guy's idea to help a friend who desperately needed it. A friend who needed treatment she couldn't pay for, and a creative fundraising effort by that girl's friends, and the people who cared for her. It grew. Into something much bigger. Something amazing. The idea is so simple. It doesn't require you to stop in the street, and answer a questionnaire, and surrender a load of personal information. It doesn't require you to field phone calls asking for £10 a month, for £5 a month, for £2 a month. It just asks, that if you believe in the concept you take a marker pen, and you write the word 'love' on your arm. Or that you wear one of their tshirts if having things written on your arm isn't an option for you for whatever reason.
The point of this, is people will then see that you have love written on your arm, and ask you about it, because its a relatively unusual thing, and this opens a dialogue. With random strangers. With people you wouldn't necessarily have deep conversations with. And you explain, that love, is part of TWLOHA, a charity that fights to raise awareness for people suffering from depression, for people suffering from addiction, for people who self harm, for people who are considering, or who have tried, to commit suicide. Because these conditions are all under-estimated, under-reported, under-diagnosed and under-treated. And they are serious. They are real problems. People suffering from depression or addiction need more than tough love a lot of the time to get them through it, they are not just being a drama queen about having a bad week or two. And even if they are, if someone's at the point of suicide, or self-annihilating behaviours, is "stop being so dramatic" really the best advice you can come up with, is that really the most helpful thing you can possibly think of to say to someone at that time. Whether you think it's real or not, they believe it's real, and anything the mind thinks is real, it will percieve as real, and it will respond accordingly. That's not me trying to persuade you, that's proven scientific medical fact.
I love TWLOHA because it is *so* simple. Anyone can get hold of a marker pen. Kids doodle on their hands all the time in school classes. People go for runs, or sit on a tube train wearing tshirts, or go shopping or anything. People don't need to change their life to do this. People can go about their lives perfectly normally, and you might meet someone new, you might get talking to a stranger and find you have more in common than you think. You'll find a new friend, a new lover, a new job offer. But you'll have spread this very simple and easy concept. And you'll have made someone stop and think about what depression is, and what it means, if only for 3 minutes. And those people will go home, and say "something really wierd happened to me on the way home from work today" to their families, and that will spread the message further. And if everyone did that about depression, about cancer, about global warming, about third world debt, about AIDS, everyone around the world, just once, that's around FOURTY THOUSAND years of thought. About six hundred human lifetimes. How's that for some fucking awareness?
Love, or something connected with TWLOHA is something I'd seriously consider getting as a tattoo on my arm so it was there everyday. In fact, I think the only reason I don't, is a tattoo is less likely to prompt conversation, people will assume, as it's a tattoo, that you obviosuly have it for some reason you care about, even if it is cliche/generic to have the word love as a tattoo. All it's missing a a heart with a sash on it. Or hate on the other arm. Granted that should be on the knuckles, but same idea. Conversely, if it's drawn on, in shitty marker, even if you've made it look pretty, it's very obviously drawn on. In which case, why on earth did you do that? I might, whilst I'm in the US this summer, where it'll be warm and I'll have little use for warm clothes (except when I hit San Francisco of course, damned Bay Area mornings), try and spend the entire time with it written on my arm. It's a cause I believe in that much.
For more links to TWLOHA, please see:
http://www.twloha.com/facts/
http://twitter.com/twloha
http://www.myspace.com/towriteloveonherarms
http://www.facebook.com/towriteloveonherarms
http://www.twloha.com/vision/story/
Also, TWLOHA recently won a twitter campaign for a FREE, full page advert in the USA Today, which I am immensely happy for them about. These ads cost about $200,000 and the paper circulates to 4,000,000 readers a day. Even if only half the readers think about it for 1 minute, that's still 4 years worth of thought, around 1400 days of awareness, just for one minute of a person's time.
Mood: Sad for a friend. The friend, and the reason for the sadness will likely feature in a post sometime over the next 10 days.
Music: http://open.spotify.com/user/jorgamond/playlist/63JRzHmjizElFDBTsoH9sL
To Write Love On Her Arms was one guy's idea to help a friend who desperately needed it. A friend who needed treatment she couldn't pay for, and a creative fundraising effort by that girl's friends, and the people who cared for her. It grew. Into something much bigger. Something amazing. The idea is so simple. It doesn't require you to stop in the street, and answer a questionnaire, and surrender a load of personal information. It doesn't require you to field phone calls asking for £10 a month, for £5 a month, for £2 a month. It just asks, that if you believe in the concept you take a marker pen, and you write the word 'love' on your arm. Or that you wear one of their tshirts if having things written on your arm isn't an option for you for whatever reason.
The point of this, is people will then see that you have love written on your arm, and ask you about it, because its a relatively unusual thing, and this opens a dialogue. With random strangers. With people you wouldn't necessarily have deep conversations with. And you explain, that love, is part of TWLOHA, a charity that fights to raise awareness for people suffering from depression, for people suffering from addiction, for people who self harm, for people who are considering, or who have tried, to commit suicide. Because these conditions are all under-estimated, under-reported, under-diagnosed and under-treated. And they are serious. They are real problems. People suffering from depression or addiction need more than tough love a lot of the time to get them through it, they are not just being a drama queen about having a bad week or two. And even if they are, if someone's at the point of suicide, or self-annihilating behaviours, is "stop being so dramatic" really the best advice you can come up with, is that really the most helpful thing you can possibly think of to say to someone at that time. Whether you think it's real or not, they believe it's real, and anything the mind thinks is real, it will percieve as real, and it will respond accordingly. That's not me trying to persuade you, that's proven scientific medical fact.
I love TWLOHA because it is *so* simple. Anyone can get hold of a marker pen. Kids doodle on their hands all the time in school classes. People go for runs, or sit on a tube train wearing tshirts, or go shopping or anything. People don't need to change their life to do this. People can go about their lives perfectly normally, and you might meet someone new, you might get talking to a stranger and find you have more in common than you think. You'll find a new friend, a new lover, a new job offer. But you'll have spread this very simple and easy concept. And you'll have made someone stop and think about what depression is, and what it means, if only for 3 minutes. And those people will go home, and say "something really wierd happened to me on the way home from work today" to their families, and that will spread the message further. And if everyone did that about depression, about cancer, about global warming, about third world debt, about AIDS, everyone around the world, just once, that's around FOURTY THOUSAND years of thought. About six hundred human lifetimes. How's that for some fucking awareness?
Love, or something connected with TWLOHA is something I'd seriously consider getting as a tattoo on my arm so it was there everyday. In fact, I think the only reason I don't, is a tattoo is less likely to prompt conversation, people will assume, as it's a tattoo, that you obviosuly have it for some reason you care about, even if it is cliche/generic to have the word love as a tattoo. All it's missing a a heart with a sash on it. Or hate on the other arm. Granted that should be on the knuckles, but same idea. Conversely, if it's drawn on, in shitty marker, even if you've made it look pretty, it's very obviously drawn on. In which case, why on earth did you do that? I might, whilst I'm in the US this summer, where it'll be warm and I'll have little use for warm clothes (except when I hit San Francisco of course, damned Bay Area mornings), try and spend the entire time with it written on my arm. It's a cause I believe in that much.
For more links to TWLOHA, please see:
http://www.twloha.com/facts/
http://twitter.com/twloha
http://www.myspace.com/towriteloveonherarms
http://www.facebook.com/towriteloveonherarms
http://www.twloha.com/vision/story/
Also, TWLOHA recently won a twitter campaign for a FREE, full page advert in the USA Today, which I am immensely happy for them about. These ads cost about $200,000 and the paper circulates to 4,000,000 readers a day. Even if only half the readers think about it for 1 minute, that's still 4 years worth of thought, around 1400 days of awareness, just for one minute of a person's time.
Mood: Sad for a friend. The friend, and the reason for the sadness will likely feature in a post sometime over the next 10 days.
Music: http://open.spotify.com/user/jorgamond/playlist/63JRzHmjizElFDBTsoH9sL
Saturday, 15 May 2010
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