# Military Polls Soldiers on DADT **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [July 14, 2010, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673 "2010-07-14T16:33:19Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Camus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ba8739/32.png) [@Camus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Camus)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 10:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/41 "2010-07-15T10:14:39Z")
> [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](#): > > It’s one thing to talk about following orders, it’s another thing to talk about the reality of the situation. Oh, people will follow orders until the very day that they can get out, and they’re gone. That’s the absolute reality of it. While that’s not a bad thing, it will definitely reduce the military for years to come until people like me who don’t care start to enlist. [It’ll also make the military much more white, as it were, because African-Americans, from every poll I’ve seen, absolutely hate homosexuals](http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2008/11/70-of-african-a.html). Given that there are quite a few (though of course we don’t know exactly how few) gays serving in the US military now, whose orientation is an open secret in many cases among members of their unit, the situation is likely more complex than the politicians and flag officers portray. Much the same with racism, I suspect in the near future (if not already) that the more diehard homophobes would still cling to their generalized views but would make personalized exceptions for those they know such as, “I wouldn’t want to be in the same building as a gay guy, but as fags go, Jerry’s okay.” The most difficult issue about openly homosexual service members in the military is not how straight troops will react, but how to deal administratively with homosexual marriage and military benefits. Unmarried homosexual couples would (and are) lose out on a lot of benefits that go along with being recognized as a service member’s spouse, in particular base privileges, access to special programs or activities, keeping the state residence of their choosing, and of course medical coverage. The federal government will be forced to recognize gay marriage nationwide and would also have to deal with the attendant issues with recognizing a homosexual marriage on a base that is located in a state that has banned or otherwise refused to recognize gay marriages. ---
**Author:** ![Nancarrow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c37758/32.png) [@Nancarrow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nancarrow)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 11:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/42 "2010-07-15T11:41:05Z")
> [@Cat\_Whisperer](#): > > I knew that article would show up here. Right on the money as usual. 😃 So did I, but I was rather hoping it would have already shown up by the time I opened the thread. The SDMB just ain’t what it used to be. Gotta keep up standards… ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 11:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/43 "2010-07-15T11:54:30Z")
> [@Buck\_Godot](#): > > Now of course bigots are just going to answer all the questions negatively across the board, to try to make the poll look bad, but those answers can be picked out fairly easily as outliers when analyzing the results. That’s what I was thinking… it seems like a pretty fair poll, priming the respondent to think first about their real past experiences w/r/t homosexuals and competency, which I would expect to be mostly positive, before moving on to the more (potentially) irrational beliefs. I agree the military is an order-taking organization, but the fact is that this is a major policy shift, and DADT is like dropping a cultural bomb whose effects nobody really knows for sure. If it’s a small blast radius that only takes out bigots, then good, but if there is widespread signalling that people are going to cause trouble, then leadership has some problems to think about and plan for. Do we need more chaplains, showers, training programs, etc? Need to prepare for mass resignations/recruiting problems? It’s better than going into the situation blind. Also it provides some cover against the complaint that this was shoved on the military without asking anyone’s opinion. Not that there’s any legal or professional reason that they ought to be asked, but the reality is that disrespect of the military is a politically potent charge. ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 12:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/44 "2010-07-15T12:18:08Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > They wouldn’t. > > No it doesn’t. Funny, they already did. If the military is controlled by civilians, and the military is handing out surveys, then it’s painfully obvious that the civilians wanted one. And if the military did not do it, then it had to be from civilians. The only way it could not come form civilians is if the military was a separate organization, running by it’s own rules. This is why I don’t make pronouncements unless I have all the facts in front of me. And I have no self-appointed title to live up to. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/45 "2010-07-15T12:35:23Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > OK, retards, so what would you do if Reagan/Clinton told you to take a survey? Would you tell him to shove off, because your opinion doesn’t matter? Or would you do your duty and take the survey? Yeah, that’s what I thought. > > You’re saying “Who cares what the military thinks?” when it’s painfully obvious that THE CIVILIAN GOVERNMENT DOES. The fact that you two glue sniffers can’t see that is an impressive display of stupidity. LOL. I’m not going to slam on fellow vets, but this was pretty funny. Anyway, the thrust of your post is correct. Yes guys, the military and civilian leadership _does_ give a rats ass about things that affect the morale of their soldiers/airmen/sailors. I recall when I was in the US Army artillery, and the MRE’s were mostly bad. Just awful stuff. We had shit like dehydrated pork patties (with bone chips!), nasty ass chicken ala king and so forth. After awhile, the grumblings must have reached upper echelons (or a high ranking general finally had to eat one and was probably like “what the fuck is this shit?”) because before long, we were all given surveys asking us which MRE’s we liked, which ones we didn’t like and what we would like to see instead. The point being (an army travelling on its stomach on all that) is that our opinion _was_ solicited, our voice _was_ heard, and we got better food to eat for out in the field as a result. Obviously this DADT issue is quite a bit more important, but if the military really didn’t give a shit, it wouldn’t ask in the first place, and they would have told us to eat whatever the fuck they were serving and for us to shut the hell up about it. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/46 "2010-07-15T15:02:42Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > Funny, they already did. If the military is controlled by civilians, and the military is handing out surveys, then it’s painfully obvious that the civilians wanted one. And if the military did not do it, then it had to be from civilians. The only way it could not come form civilians is if the military was a separate organization, running by it’s own rules. It was a privately conducted survey. Neither the military nor the civilian leadership had anything to do with it. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/47 "2010-07-15T15:13:30Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > It was a privately conducted survey. Neither the military nor the civilian leadership had anything to do with it. Even so, it would have to have been conducted at the behest of civilian and/or military leadership. ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/48 "2010-07-15T15:29:31Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > The military is making no decision. The politicians are making a decision. When they make it, soldiers will do as they are told. And which decision is that? To repeal it or to keep it? Which decision are they making? That’s right, you don’t know. Neither do they. That’s why they’re gathering information from servicemembers- to make a better decision. So please clarify your stance- how is issuing a survey going to hurt the civilian government’s decision-making ability? Do you not see how it’s improved by the survey? > [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > They wouldn’t. > No it doesn’t. How can you say that when a poll, issued by the civilian government to servicemembers, is staring you in the face? It’s right there in the OP. The government DID ask for the opinions of servicemembers and they WILL be provided. You can argue till you’re blue in the face about if the government “can”, “should”, or “would” solicit opinions, but the simple fact is that they did. “Reagan wouldn’t ask my opinion”? Huh? He just did! Hopefully you can rub your two brain cells together and realize that I’m not suggesting that _literally_ Reagan asked _you_…I mean, that’s obvious, right? > [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](#): > > Believe what you want. > > Of course, I AM there, and I actually deal with these people. But hey, as always you know better than I do. > > We’ll see. For my part, I have no doubt whatsoever that my numbers will hold up where I’m at. None whatsoever. I disagree with you. I’ve said before that it will have no effect on the military. The biggest uniting factor among bigots is not race, religion, or gender. It’s age. Old people are bigots, not young people, ESPECIALLY regarding homosexuality. The military stays forever young. There are even less bigots in it now than there were a few years ago. Tomorrow, there will be even less. I don’t think there are as many bigots as you seem to think there are. And before you go pulling rank on me with “I’m here and you’re not”, I’d just like to remind you that you and I were in the same room, watching the Steeler playoff game, during the Obama inaugeration mission. So not only do I “deal with these people”, but I deal/dealt with the exact same people you did. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/49 "2010-07-15T15:34:55Z")
Regarding the projected attrition rate – I think it has to be taken into account that things aren’t going to change much _visibly_. The guys in your unit today will be the same guys who are in your unit the day after DADT gets repealed. It’s not like homos are suddenly going to start swarming out of closets and flaming all over the bases. Formal witch hunts will stop, but it’s unlikely that many currently closeted homosexuals in the military will suddenly feel comfortable enough to announce anything. They will stay discrete, and the job will go on like it always did. It’s not like gay soldiers are going to come flooding in from the outside, or just magically popping into existence. It’s the same guys that the homophobes have already been working with for months or years, and the homos will already know who it’s wise to come out to and who not. Basically, the repeal will happen, but _visibly_ everything will be exactly the same for at least the first few years. There won’t be any dudden, radical changes in day to day lives, personel or routines. Bigots aren’t going to feel compelled to quit if they don’t see anything different going on in their own units. The law may change, but the majority of closets aren’t going to open. That’s going to take years and be a very gradual process. **Airman** says he knows he won’t lose anyone from his own unit and I think if you polled unit by unit, you’d find similar expectations. For all the noise about th reapeal, I think the actual, visible results are going to be very anti-climactic. It’s different from integration in that you can’t see who the homos are just by looking at them, and they aren’t all going to turn blue when the law changes. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/50 "2010-07-15T15:35:35Z")
> [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](#): > > I do not care about the political opinions of anyone in uniform. You do know they vote, right? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/51 "2010-07-15T15:36:58Z")
> [@FoieGrasIsEvil](#): > > Even so, it would have to have been conducted at the behest of civilian and/or military leadership. No it wouldn’t. You don’t need the military’s permission or the civilian leadership’s permission to ask soldiers their opinions, especially for anonymous surveys. ---
**Author:** ![Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e36b37/32.png) [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Airman_Doors_USAF)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/52 "2010-07-15T15:37:16Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > I disagree with you. I’ve said before that it will have no effect on the military. The biggest uniting factor among bigots is not race, religion, or gender. It’s age. Old people are bigots, not young people, ESPECIALLY regarding homosexuality. The military stays forever young. There are even less bigots in it now than there were a few years ago. Tomorrow, there will be even less. I don’t think there are as many bigots as you seem to think there are. > > And before you go pulling rank on me with “I’m here and you’re not”, I’d just like to remind you that you and I were in the same room, watching the Steeler playoff game, during the Obama inaugeration mission. So not only do I “deal with these people”, but I deal/dealt with the exact same people you did. I know that, but I will say that my unit is not exactly, shall we say, young. Having been there for almost 10 years, I think I am safe in commenting on what I’ve observed and what they will do in response to a repeal of DADT. And I don’t think that my unit is all that dissimilar in attitudes to other units, which is what I’m basing things on. Note that I did not say that they will resign immediately. They will serve out what’s left of their commitment and run. It’s a question of retention, and I think that retention will be way down, which in turn will lead to a shortfall in recruiting and an overall shrinking in the force. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/53 "2010-07-15T15:43:49Z")
> [@Odesio](#): > > You do know they vote, right? Not on military policy, they don’t. ---
**Author:** ![FoieGrasIsEvil](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foiegrasisevil/32/16638_2.png) [@FoieGrasIsEvil](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FoieGrasIsEvil)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/54 "2010-07-15T15:45:44Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > No it wouldn’t. You don’t need the military’s permission or the civilian leadership’s permission to ask soldiers their opinions, especially for anonymous surveys. If it was (and granted, I didn’t read the article) service-wide they would need it. How else are you going to access the databases of all the addresses of all the people in every unit across the world? > [@Airman\_Doors\_USAF](#): > > It’s a question of retention, and I think that retention will be way down, which in turn will lead to a shortfall in recruiting and an overall shrinking in the force. Well, I happen to think that continuing to fight unpopular wars has and will continue to more effectively reduce not only retention but initial enlistment than repealing DADT ever will. And career guys trying to get their 20 or 30 years in aren’t going to bail just because suddenly gay people are “allowed”…especially not in the Navy, because, well, they’re all gay anyway! ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/55 "2010-07-15T15:48:19Z")
I missed that the survey was commissioned by the DoD. I stand corrected. In that case it’s a mistake. From what I’ve read, Obama is obsessively meticulous about gathering information and doing research before he makes decisions, so it doesn’t surprise me that he would do this, but ultimately these opinions are irrelevant. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/56 "2010-07-15T15:51:22Z")
[Repeal Of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Paves Way For Gay Sex Right On Battlefield, Opponents Fantasize.](http://www.theonion.com/articles/repeal-of-dont-ask-dont-tell-paves-way-for-gay-sex,17698/) ---
**Author:** ![Chessic\_Sense](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/7c8e57/32.png) [@Chessic\_Sense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chessic_Sense)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/57 "2010-07-15T15:54:54Z")
> [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](#): > > ultimately these opinions are irrelevant. Irrelevant to _what_, exactly? Irrelevant to the DoD? Can’t be, or they wouldn’t have commissioned the survey. Irrelevant to decision-making? Can’t be. It gives the decision-makers more information on which to base their decision. Irrelevant to the service member? Hardly. It directly affects them, and thus, retention. Irrelevant to the possible options of the decision makers? Yeah, no shit. They can do what they want. That’s why they’re the decision makers. So? ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/58 "2010-07-15T15:56:48Z")
> [@Chessic\_Sense](#): > > Irrelevant to _what_, exactly? To any aspect of or decision about military policy. ---
**Author:** ![Inigo\_Montoya](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/inigo_montoya/32/124_2.png) [@Inigo\_Montoya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Inigo_Montoya)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/59 "2010-07-15T16:27:24Z")
**Dio** , I understand your position because it’s the same approach I accepted as part of my enlistment. “Nobody asked you if you _wanted_ to do XYZ, XYZ was deemed necessary by The Brain and you are to do it. You agreed to do XYZ the moment you put on the uniform.” But as has been stated upthread, the poll seems more geared toward understanding how many soldiers are going to get out of line than whether or not it’s ok with them if gays are allowed to be ‘out’ and serving. 15 years ago I saw very uneven handling of the issue. One commander booted a non-closeted gay (he wasn’t flaming, and he adhered to the same public display of affection standards the rest of us were held to, but he also didn’t lie to any of us when discussions of preference came up in casual conversation) because he didn’t like gays and he had an opportunity to discharge an otherwise highly competent linguist. Another commander, same unit, found a way to punish a soldier who outed another. Commander told the homo to stay professional and asexual when in uniform, like the rest of us, while on duty and everything would be fine for him. The 'phobe on the other hand, got shit duty for the rest of his short-lived enlistment because his actions threatened unit morale & mission readiness. It wouldn’t surprise me if the poll results could be focused to at least the company level so the appropriate commanders would have a heads-up and be allowed to pre-empt or prepare a response to “backlash.” I know I’d appreciate having an idea what % of my troops were going to be potential problem children. ---
**Author:** ![Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e99b99/32.png) [@Diogenes\_the\_Cynic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diogenes_the_Cynic)\ **Post date:** [July 15, 2010, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673/60 "2010-07-15T16:47:03Z")
Trying to get a gauge of how many people will be problems makes sense, as long as they’re not soliciting advice or counsel on what decision to make. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/military-polls-soldiers-on-dadt/546673.md?page=4)