The Christian conservative group
American Family Association (AFA) is spinning repeal of “Don't Ask,
Don't Tell” as a loss for would-be gay soldiers.
In
a blog post published Thursday on the group's website, Bryan
Fischer, director of issue analysis at the AFA, argued that gay
troops have just lost their “get out of jail free card.”
Fischer opines that 85 percent of
soldiers discharged under the policy outed themselves to escape their
military commitment.
“In other words, homosexuals – or
people who suddenly discovered latent homosexual tendencies when they
could use it to parachute out of the military – signed up for the
all-volunteer army, got a few weeks into basic and said, forget this
noise. I'm outtahere. All they had to do was admit they were gay –
whether they were or not – and they got their walking papers along
with an honorable discharge.”
“So, who's sorry now?”
“This may be the silver lining in
this whole mess,” Fischer adds. “Conservative groups, simply as
a public service, may want to sound this message far and wide out of
simple, straightforward compassion, just in order to protect
potential homosexual soldiers from themselves and from the
distressing discovery that they just kissed off a handy exit option
that nobody else had.”
Fischer, whose
group was just added to the Southern Poverty Law Center's (SPLC) list
of known hate groups, went on to suggest that sexual exploits
drive gay men to a military career.
“The more this message resounds, the
fewer homosexuals will want to enlist. It's one thing to be gay, and
say, hey, I'll give it a few weeks and then bail if I don't like the
food, can't get enough action in the barracks, or thought I'd enjoy
ogling male soldiers in the shower more than I did.”
“Bottom line: be careful what you ask
for. You just may get it.”