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Blog – Out Military
Army Reserve Signal Officer, 2Lt.
Jonathan Roman , joined the Army ROTC program when he was a 20-year-old junior at Cornell University.
The decision was one that was met with feelings that one would expect – excitement, a sense of responsibility and courage.
However, as soon as Jonathan signed the dotted line he was also met with another choice and felt a feeling that he didn’t expect: unease.
“That was the first time I lead a dual life,” he told OutMilitary.com.
And like so many service members that served under DADT before him, living a “dual life” was something that he thought he would just have to accept once he received his commission as a U.S.
Army Officer.
But college life proved to be otherwise.
“Being a gay cadet at Cornell was too easy,” he said.
“I regularly attended and facilitated for a group called OutReach, which was comprised of GBTQ men.” Jonathan says he’d only “officially” told one friend (another cadet).
Previous to that, Jonathan admits that he’d been caught making out with another man, by other cadets.
“Luckily they liked me,” he said, “and they let me know that my secret was safe with them.” At the end of college he was sure everyone knew he was gay.
Still, he wasn’t “out” to his command.
One of the reasons, he says, is, “I’m a reservist.
It can be easy to keep your private and professional lives separate.” But then things got uncomfortable for the young officer.
“I went to the Signal Basic Officer Leadership (SBOLC) course and found myself in the company of 3 other guys,” he recalled.
“Two were older, married, religious men and the other was like me, fresh out of college but was more the shy reserved type.” On outings Jonathan says the older guys would “push me to get the waitresses phone number and say things like ‘oh did you see how she looked at you, she’s totally into you’ and what not.” “This got to a point where one night we were out and as I was being egged on I started to become stressed out to the point where my leg, in particular, was shaking uncontrollably under the table and my mind was racing on how to diffuse the situation,” he told OutMilitary.com.
“Needless to say I gave my number to that poor girl and luckily she never called.” Realizing that living a double life had become unhealthy and no longer wanting to live with the stress of keeping up appearances, Jonathan told his fellow officers during a car ride on the way to dinner.
Jonathan says his announcement was met with, “Shut the fuck up” and “No you’re not, you’re lying.” Looking back, he says, “it was really quite hilarious to see the shock and surprise on their faces.
They really couldn’t believe that I was gay.” After the initial shock wore off, luckily, his friends accepted him and then decided that he’d be a great wingman when they were trying to pick up girls.
“Because we all know gays are chick magnets,” he joked. Continue reading
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Board Endorses Effort to Name Navy Ship After Gay-Rights Icon
Navy Ship, the USS Harvey Milk, Tuesday.
The effort was spearheaded by San Diego Democratic Rep.
Bob Filner.
Milk was a naval officer stationed in San Diego in the early 1950s.
Though he was a critic of the Vietnam War, his family says he was proud of his military service.
There was division among supervisors here over whether it was a fitting honor.
Milk is one of the world’s most iconic gay-rights advocates and among the first openly gay elected officeholders.
He was elected a San Francisco supervisor in 1977 and assassinated a year later.
Milk also was an outspoken critic of the Vietnam War.
Supervisor Scott Wiener, who introduced the resolution, called it a “great honor” and said Milk was proud of his military service.
“Harvey Milk’s family supports doing this,” Wiener said.
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Board Endorses Effort Name Navy Ship After Gay-Rights Icon
Navy Ship, the USS Harvey Milk, Tuesday.
The effort was spearheaded by San Diego Democratic Rep.
Bob Filner.
Milk was a naval officer stationed in San Diego in the early 1950s.
Though he was a critic of the Vietnam War, his family says he was proud of his military service.
There was division among supervisors here over whether it was a fitting honor.
Milk is one of the world’s most iconic gay-rights advocates and among the first openly gay elected officeholders.
He was elected a San Francisco supervisor in 1977 and assassinated a year later.
Milk also was an outspoken critic of the Vietnam War.
Supervisor Scott Wiener, who introduced the resolution, called it a “great honor” and said Milk was proud of his military service.
“Harvey Milk’s family supports doing this,” Wiener said.
OutMilitary.com Blog: *News* Ravi Gets 30 Days in Jail For Illegally Filming His Gay Roommate
Ravi, who shared the webcam footage with friends in his dormitory at Rutgers University in New Jersey, had also faced possible deportation to India.
The judge said he would not recommend it.
The case sparked a national debate over cyber bullying and gay bashing when the 18-year-old roommate (apparently distraught in part over the embarrassment of the broadcasting of his gay sexual encounter) committed suicide.
Ravi, now 20, was not charged with the death.
Judge Glenn Berman in New Brunswick, New Jersey, said Ravi showed "colossal insensitivity" when he filmed Tyler Clementi in September 2010.
"I heard this jury say guilty 288 times -- 24 questions, 12 jurors," Berman said.
"I haven't heard you apologize once." Berman said Ravi would never "expunge the conduct or the pain you caused." The jury found Ravi guilty of invading privacy, on some charges of anti-gay bias, and trying to impede investigators by deleting or doctoring text messages and tweets that he'd sent.
His lawyer had argued that Ravi was guilty only of a prank gone wrong when he filmed roommate Clementi in a kiss with a man, then Tweeted friends about what he'd seen and invited them to watch a live webcam video.
Though prosecutors painted Ravi as a mean-spirited bully, Berman noted several times that the young immigrant was not accused of causing Clementi's death.
In a speech before sentencing on Monday, Ravi's mother recalled how they had arrived in the United States with just two suitcases and "a lot of hopes." Her son, she said, had been a dedicated student who "doesn't have any...
or harbor hatred in his heart to anybody." "What my son Dharun is going through there is no word for me to explain.
The smile and the bright eyes are gone from his face," she said.
Addressing Clementi's family, she said, "It is so sad he chose to end his life early.
My heart goes to his family." When the unexpected sentence was passed, Ravi appeared not to react immediately, looking as stunned and near tears as he had throughout the hearing.
A New Jersey gay rights group, Garden State Equality, lambasted what it called the "stunning" sentence.
"It is a slap on the wrist and an insult to bullied students." Continue reading
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Happy Birthday Harvey Milk
He would have been 82.
The Harvey Milk Foundation celebrates the third annual Harvey Milk Day, marked with events around the globe commemorating the legaacy left by America's first elected openly gay official. Continue reading
Jonathan Roman on being gay, an officer, and no longer living a double life
Army Reserve Signal Officer, 2Lt.
Jonathan Roman , joined the Army ROTC program when he was a 20-year-old junior at Cornell University.
The decision was one that was met with feelings that one would expect – excitement, a sense of responsibility and courage.
However, as soon as Jonathan signed the dotted line he was also met with another choice and felt a feeling that he didn’t expect: unease.
“That was the first time I lead a dual life,” he told OutMilitary.com.
And like so many service members that served under DADT before him, living a “dual life” was something that he thought he would just have to accept once he received his commission as a U.S.
Army Officer.
But college life proved to be otherwise.
“Being a gay cadet at Cornell was too easy,” he said.
“I regularly attended and facilitated for a group called OutReach, which was comprised of GBTQ men.” Jonathan says he’d only “officially” told one friend (another cadet).
Previous to that, Jonathan admits that he’d been caught making out with another man, by other cadets.
“Luckily they liked me,” he said, “and they let me know that my secret was safe with them.” At the end of college he was sure everyone knew he was gay.
Still, he wasn’t “out” to his command.
One of the reasons, he says, is, “I’m a reservist.
It can be easy to keep your private and professional lives separate.” But then things got uncomfortable for the young officer.
“I went to the Signal Basic Officer Leadership (SBOLC) course and found myself in the company of 3 other guys,” he recalled.
“Two were older, married, religious men and the other was like me, fresh out of college but was more the shy reserved type.” On outings Jonathan says the older guys would “push me to get the waitresses phone number and say things like ‘oh did you see how she looked at you, she’s totally into you’ and what not.” “This got to a point where one night we were out and as I was being egged on I started to become stressed out to the point where my leg, in particular, was shaking uncontrollably under the table and my mind was racing on how to diffuse the situation,” he told OutMilitary.com.
“Needless to say I gave my number to that poor girl and luckily she never called.” Realizing that living a double life had become unhealthy and no longer wanting to live with the stress of keeping up appearances, Jonathan told his fellow officers during a car ride on the way to dinner.
Jonathan says his announcement was met with, “Shut the fuck up” and “No you’re not, you’re lying.” Looking back, he says, “it was really quite hilarious to see the shock and surprise on their faces.
They really couldn’t believe that I was gay.” After the initial shock wore off, luckily, his friends accepted him and then decided that he’d be a great wingman when they were trying to pick up girls.
“Because we all know gays are chick magnets,” he joked. Continue reading
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Donna Summer Dead at 63
She was 63.
Her family released a statement today, saying Summer died this morning and that they "are at peace celebrating her extraordinary life and her continued legacy." "Words truly can’t express how much we appreciate your prayers and love for our family at this sensitive time," the statement read.
Summer came to prominence just as disco was burgeoning, defining the era with a string of No.
1 hits and lusted after for her beauty queen looks.
Unlike some other stars of disco who faded as the music became less popular, she was able to grow beyond it and later segued to a pop-rock sound, recording one of her biggest hits in the 1980s with "She Works Hard For The Money." (which became an anthem for women’s rights).
Soon after, Summer became a born-again Christian and faced controversy when she was accused of making anti-gay comments in relation to the AIDS epidemic.
Summer denied making the comments, but was the target of a boycott.
Still, even as disco went out of fashion she remained a fixture in gay dance clubs, endlessly sampled and remixed into contemporary dance hits.
"Love to Love You Baby" was her U.S.
chart debut and the first of 19 No.
1 dance hits between 1975 and 2008 - second only to Madonna.
She released a number of albums that have reach gold or platinum status, including the multiplatinum "Bad Girls" and "On the Radio, Volume I & II." She had a number of top 10 Billboard hits, including "Hot Stuff," ’’She Works Hard for the Money" and "MacArthur Park." Continue reading
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Newsweek’s Andrew Sullivan Names Barack Obama ‘First Gay President’
Newsweek's Andrew Sullivan recently said that U.S.
President Barack Obama is the nation's first gay president.
This is, of course, a play on words (in no way does Sullivan suggest that Obama is gay) that packs a powerful truth: Love him or hate him, Obama has been a friend to the LGBT community in ways no other sitting president ever has.
Here is what Sullivan had to say: It was the spring of 2007, back when Barack Obama’s bid for the presidency seemed quixotic at best.
I’d seen Obama speak to a crowd and was impressed but wanted to see if what I’d seen from afar held up under closer scrutiny.
So I asked to attend a private fundraiser in a tony apartment in Georgetown.
I promised not to write anything.
I just wanted to see the man up close and get a better sense of him and his character.
At one point in the question-and-answer session, a woman looked him square in the eyes with what can only be called maternal grit.
“My son is gay,” she said, and the room went suddenly quiet.
“I don’t understand why you don’t support his right to marry the person he loves.
It’s so disappointing to me.” Obama, without losing eye contact for a second, told her: “I want full equality for your son—all the rights and benefits that marriage brings.
I really do.
But the word ‘marriage’ stirs up so much religious feeling.
I think civil unions are the way to go.
As long as they are equal.” My heart sank.
Was this obviously humane African-American actually advocating a “separate but equal” solution—a form of marital segregation like the one that made his own parents’ marriage a felony in many states when he was born? Hadn’t he already declared he supported marriage equality when he was running for the Illinois Senate in 1996? (The administration now claims that the questionnaire from the gay Chicago paper Outlines had been answered in type—not Obama’s writing—by somebody else.) Hadn’t Jeremiah Wright’s church actually been a rare supporter of marriage equality among black churches? The sudden equivocation made no sense—except as pure political calculation.
And yet it also felt strained, as if he knew it didn’t quite fit.
He wanted equality but not marriage—but you cannot have one without the other.
On this issue, Obama’s excruciating nonposition was essentially “Yes we can’t.” And yet somehow, simply by the way he answered that mother’s question, I didn’t believe it.
I thought he was struggling between political calculation and his core belief in civil rights.
And it was then that I realized he was both: a cold, steely, ruthless, calculating politician who nonetheless wanted to do the right thing in the end.
Last week he did it -- in a move whose consequences are simply impossible to judge.
White House sources told me that after the interview with ABC News, the president felt as if a weight had been lifted off him.
Yes, he was bounced into it by Joe Biden, the lovable Irish-Catholic rogue who couldn’t help but tell the truth about his own views on TV (only to be immediately knocked down by David Axelrod on Twitter).
But Obama had been planning to endorse gay marriage before his reelection for a while.
White House sources say that if Obama had been a state senator in New York last year when the Albany legislature legalized gay marriage, he’d have voted in favor.
But no one asked.
The “make news” reveal was scheduled for The View .
In the end, scrambling to catch up with his veep, he turned to his fellow ESPN fan, Robin Roberts, a Christian African-American from Mississippi, to quell the sudden kerfuffle.
Even this was calculated: to have this moment occur between two African-Americans would help Obama calm opposition within parts of the black community.
Read the full story here: http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/13/andrew-sullivan-on-barack-obama-s-gay-marriage-evolution.html Continue reading
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* President Obama Announces His Support For Marriage Equality
Really, really big! For the first time in our nation's history, a sitting president has announced support for same-sex marriage.
From ABC News: In an interview with ABC News’ Robin Roberts, the president described his thought process as an “evolution” that led him to this place, based on conversations with his own staff members, openly gay and lesbian service members, and conversations with his wife and own daughters.
"I have to tell you that over the course of several years as I have talked to friends and family and neighbors when I think about members of my own staff who are in incredibly committed monogamous relationships, same-sex relationships, who are raising kids together, when I think about those soldiers or airmen or marines or sailors who are out there fighting on my behalf and yet feel constrained, even now that Don't Ask Don't Tell is gone, because they are not able to commit themselves in a marriage, at a certain point I’ve just concluded that for me personally it is important for me to go ahead and affirm that I think same sex couples should be able to get married,” Obama told Roberts, in an interview to appear on ABC’s “Good Morning America” Thursday.
Excerpts of the interview will air tonight on ABC’s “World News with Diane Sawyer.” The president stressed that this is a personal position, and that he still supports the concept of states deciding the issue on their own.
But he said he’s confident that more Americans will grow comfortable with gays and lesbians getting married, citing his own daughters’ comfort with the concept.
“It’s interesting, some of this is also generational,” the president continued.
“You know when I go to college campuses, sometimes I talk to college Republicans who think that I have terrible policies on the economy, on foreign policy, but are very clear that when it comes to same sex equality or, you know, sexual orientation that they believe in equality.
They are much more comfortable with it.
You know, Malia and Sasha, they have friends whose parents are same-sex couples.
There have been times where Michelle and I have been sitting around the dinner table and we’re talking about their friends and their parents and Malia and Sasha, it wouldn’t dawn on them that somehow their friends’ parents would be treated differently.
It doesn’t make sense to them and frankly, that’s the kind of thing that prompts a change in perspective.” Roberts asked the president if First Lady Michelle Obama was involved in this decision.
Obama said she was, and he talked specifically about his own faith in responding.
“This is something that, you know, we’ve talked about over the years and she, you know, she feels the same way, she feels the same way that I do.
And that is that, in the end the values that I care most deeply about and she cares most deeply about is how we treat other people and, you know, I, you know, we are both practicing Christians and obviously this position may be considered to put us at odds with the views of others but, you know, when we think about our faith, the thing at root that we think about is, not only Christ sacrificing himself on our behalf, but it’s also the Golden Rule, you know, treat others the way you would want to be treated.
And I think that’s what we try to impart to our kids and that’s what motivates me as president and I figure the most consistent I can be in being true to those precepts, the better I’ll be as a as a dad and a husband and hopefully the better I’ll be as president.” Previously, Obama has moved in the direction of supporting same-sex marriage but has consistently stopped short of outright backing it.
OutMilitary.com Blog: *NEWS* Missouri Lawmaker Says He is Gay, Denounces School Bill
According to KFVS 12, a local CBS affiliate, "Rep.
Zachary Wyatt held a Capitol news conference Wednesday at which he said he was disclosing his sexual orientation for the first time." Wyatt and several other lawmakers denounced a bill that would prohibit teaching, extracurricular activities or materials that discuss sexual orientation unless they relate to the scientific facts about human reproduction.
"The bill appears unlikely to pass before the session ends, but has generated attention.
Comedian Stephen Colbert mocked the Missouri proposal on his television show," reports KFVS 12.
Republican Rep.
Steve Cookson sponsored the bill and says he won't withdraw it.