Thread: 'Don't Ask Don't Tell' to end?

Originally Posted by vaughn

Dujring my "War" which was called WW ll, I didn't get in until July 1943. There was not "Qweers" in any Navy ships I sailed on. The only Blacks and Orentals I happened across waswas assigned as Stewards to Offficers aboard the US Navy ships.
After the war I signed up for a 3-year hitch with the Armt Air Corps and I never heard of or ran across any "Qweers" during my 3 year hitch. I was recalled for one year when Korea popped up and assigned to Keesler Field Training Command in Biloxi, MS, Never ran across or heard of any "Queers" then either.
Don't know when they started getting in the Military and now I guess the term for "Qweers" is "Gays"!
Things sure change as the world progresses.
Vaughn
USS LCI (L) & (G) 450
WW ll Gator Navy

Apparently , Gay , stands for

G ood

A s

Y ou

Originally Posted by Gun Grape

The Army issued approx 5 thousand discharges, the Navy around 4 thousand, to homosexuals during WW2.

They were there, just quiet about it.

Interesting figures. I think the article I originally posted said something like 12,000 had been discharged under DADT. Given the numbers involved in WW2 the discharge rate seems lower. I suspect a combination of fewer 'out' homosexuals & a more than occasional 'blind eye' being turned in a time of war.

Originally Posted by Bigfella

Interesting figures. I think the article I originally posted said something like 12,000 had been discharged under DADT. Given the numbers involved in WW2 the discharge rate seems lower. I suspect a combination of fewer 'out' homosexuals & a more than occasional 'blind eye' being turned in a time of war.

Pete,
I doubt that in WW2 that a blind eye would have been turned as much as one is now. Gay unions weren't accepted and it was framed as a moral issue much more. Heck, the services weren't even fully integrated along racial lines. American society has progressed over the decades, and it's only been within the past 1-2 decades that you've seen more acceptance of homosexuals.

Originally Posted by Shek

Pete,
I doubt that in WW2 that a blind eye would have been turned as much as one is now. Gay unions weren't accepted and it was framed as a moral issue much more. Heck, the services weren't even fully integrated along racial lines. American society has progressed over the decades, and it's only been within the past 1-2 decades that you've seen more acceptance of homosexuals.

Shek,

I wasn't thinking along lines of the sort of tolerance or acceptance that we think of now, but simply a preparedness by some (and only some) to overlook even these sort of breaches of established moral/sexual rules.

I saw a documentary a while back involving interviews with a number of gay WW2 vets (sorry, can't remember title) from UK (& poss. US). A few said that it was know or at least suspected by their colleagues. This may have been the doco (can't be sure). It makes interesting reading.

People were put in the army regardless of whether they were gay or not", according to Cave's recollections. "It didn't seem to bother the military authorities. There was none of the later homophobic uproar about gays undermining military discipline and effectiveness. With Britain seriously threatened by the Nazis, the forces weren't fussy about who they accepted".

Cave's experience was typical of the sudden relaxed attitude towards lesbians and gays in the services. Faced with the danger of German invasion and the need to maximise combat strength, military chiefs unofficially waived their objections to homosexuals in uniform. Even soldiers caught having gay sex rarely suffered severe punishment. A few got off with a reprimand and warning from their commanding officer. Some were hastily transferred to a new unit. Others were assigned to hard labour for a few weeks to 'knock the queerness out of them' and turn them into 'real men'.

Cave recalls that neither the top brass nor fellow soldiers showed any concern about gay enlistees.

BBC - WW2 People's War - A Gay Soldier's Story

I struggle with the idea that the figures Sam presented could really represent all or perhaps even most of the homosexuals who were known about or suspected in the wartime US military. Even if you accept a figure of 1% homosexuality in the general population (the lowest estimate) that still puts somewhere like 100,000 in the wartime military in WW2. I can't believe that 90% of them went undetected.

This article also mentions the experience of gay men & women in the services in WW2.

http://www.oberlinlgbt.org/behind-the-masks/veterans-1/

Long before DADT there was a guy in my Hospital Corps School company who was, forgive me, queer as a football bat. He was well liked, did well in school & as far as I ever knew was never hassled about it. I've never understood the anti-gay prejudice floating around. A little sexual insecurity, maybe?

Personally, I'm grateful. My wife of nearly 40 years was a Theater Major at B'ham Southern College in '67 when I met her. I went to Theater Department Hallowe'en parties that year because all of the guys in the department were "known" to be gay & all the gals, uh, unconventional.

Worked out OK for me.

The Prof