Trangenders And Military Service - And Response (4)

  • Thursday, July 27, 2017

I am sickened by the tweet concerning transgender people in the military. I served honorably and took an early retirement. I got out in April "96.

It took me numerous years to come to the conclusion that yes I am a transgender woman. President Obama gave me hope that I would be able to medically transition with the help of the VA and my Tricare insurance.

I feel like the rug has been pulled out from under my feet and I got a huge kick to the crotch and  slapped as well. Is this how we treat a military retiree and disabled vet?

My mental health is not doing well at the moment. No matter how much scientific proof there is regarding transgender and gays people do not want to accept it. Sad.

Darlene Rochelle

* * *

Barry Goldwater, the late senator from Arizona and an old-school conservative, when asked in 1993 about gays being allowed to be in the military said, "You don't need to be 'straight' to fight and die for your country. You just need to shoot straight."
 
The same applies to transgendered people. If they want to serve in the military, all I care about it that they are qualified to do the job. Like so many other politically regressive ideas, you don't have to look very far to see where this is originating. This is mainlined from the radicalized religious right.
 
Senator Goldwater also had this to say about the religious right. "I don't have any respect for the Religious Right.  There is no place in this country for practicing religion in politics.  That goes for Falwell, Robertson and all the rest of these political preachers.  They are a detriment to the country. By maintaining the separation of church and state, the United States has avoided the intolerance which has so divided the rest of the world with religious wars . . .  Can any of us refute the wisdom of Madison and the other framers?  Can anyone look at the carnage in Iran, the bloodshed in Northern Ireland, or the bombs bursting in Lebanon and yet question the dangers of injecting religious issues into the affairs of state?"
 
Trump, who has exhibited the ethics and morals of a dying cockroach, is pandering to these religious zealots.
 
If children wanted to take the elevator to the top of the Empire State building, for safety's sake I'd rather they ride with a group of transgendered military personnel than Catholic priests, right-wing politicians and preachers, and any religious fundamentalists featured on The Learning Channel.
 
Stephen Greenfield
Cleveland, Tn. 

* * * 

Good grief! Could we go just one day or one week without political correctness sticking its ugly head into our homes, our moral underpinnings, our government, and now our military.  Enough is enough. 

I proudly served in the U.S. Air Force in the 340th Bomb Wing of The Strategic Air Command in the late 50's and early 60's.  I beam with pride to say that our commanding general was U.S. Air Force Chief Of Staff "cigar smoking, kick butt, General Curtis LeMay. What a leader. 

I remember being below ground in the "alert shack" that fateful day, Oct. 22, 1962 with our air crews when everyone on base, on the alert pad, and across the nation, sat glued to their TV's as President John F. Kennedy addressed the nation on The Cuban Missile Crisis and Embargo.  

A few hundred yards above us were our B-47 bombers fully fueled, loaded with ordinance, and strapped with "JATO" racks, ready to bomb the heck out of Russian missile targets in Cuba (and other targets elsewhere) at a moments notice if the President gave the order. General LeMay would not have wanted to have any of his pilots sitting in the cockpit of a fully loaded bomber dealing with personal emotional issues like whether we should refer to them as Mark or Mary with their finger on the trigger of destiny.    

I can assure you that using his Air Force as a playground for liberal left leaning politicians and civilians to infect his fighting forces with "political correctness" (a term we never even heard of back then) would not have even remotely been on General LeMay's mind, or those of his flag officers. If it had existed back then, he would have fought with his last breath to keep it out of their only objective which was always to defend our nation, period.  

The general once said of the North Vietnamese, "My solution to the problem would be to tell them frankly that they've got to draw in their horns and stop their aggression or we're going to bomb them back into the Stone Ages."  Boy, does that sound as "politically incorrect" as someone else we on the right admire as our current commander-in-chief and the only one with the guts (and blunt enough like General LeMay) to say no to transgenders serving in our military.  

President Trump is correct.  Opening the military up to the costs and problems of transsexuals in the service such as: do we pay for their surgery if requested, what about bathrooms, showers, and barracks, resentment and backlash by our fighting troops, etc.  

I can tell you with total confidence that just like the the men and women that served our country in the military "in my day", including military generals like Marine Lt General "Chesty" Puller, General George Patton 3rd Army Commander, and General Curtis LeMay Chief Of Staff of The U.S. Air Force, and a vast majority of the fighting military men and women that serve today would as a majority say keep your civilian projects out of our units and off our posts and bases.  I don't care if it is nature or nurture, just deal with it somewhere else, and don't shove it down our throats. Like any other touchy social issue, no one should be attacked, publicly ridiculed, or humiliated. Let psychiatrists, doctors, and clergy deal with this issue, just leave our military alone.  

I have a granddaughter struggling with this issue and I see the pain and confusion it causes, so don't tell me I don't understand.   

Bill Reesor
Ooltewah 

* * *

Mr. Reesor, 

Transgendered people are not experiments, projects, "political correctness", or burdens. They are people. Anyone with he conviction, courage, and ability to serve should be allowed to do so. 

Incidentally, the idea that our soldiers have to be hypermasculine and violent like the men you so admire is the sort of thing that get us into conflicts like Vietnam, and protract them to the point where thousands of soldiers, doing what they believe is the right thing, are needlessly killed. 

Put the safety of my country, my family, and myself in the hands of a level-headed transgendered soldier instead of a warmongering straight person any day. 

I hope for the sake of your granddaughter they get the love and support of those around them to help them find their best self. You certainly aren't offering the same dignity and respect to the 15,000 transgendered soldiers already serving in the armed forces. 

Ray Ingraham

* * *

If this administration can so easily demolish the rights of Transgenders serving and have served in the military, who's next? What's in store for the original beneficiaries of the Title VII Civil Rights Act of 1964? Discrimination is discrimination no matter who's on the receiving end.

When discrimination is allowed against one person or group, it's only a matter of time before any and all present and past oppressed peoples and groups will feel the brunt of discrimination.  

The attack on today's Transgender serving in the military, gays and lesbians should be considered a dry run of what's to come for others. "First they came"

Brenda Washington

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