Word: homophobia
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...light of recent debates about ROTC presence on campus, we feel that it is important to examine homophobia, heterosexism and their role in the military. Let's begin with a comparison, two differing views on the worth of sexual minorities. Harvard University holds that "it is unacceptable to harass or discriminate against students because of sexual orientation." The U.S. military and its campus manifestation, ROTC, contend that gays and lesbians present a security risk and such "sexual deviance" (their vocabulary) is actively discouraged. Individuals proven to have homosexual tendencies are either forced to resign or given medical discharges. Here there...
Basic training speaks through a language of homophobia--destructive epithets about gays articulated for motivational or provocative ends, as well as a sexist and often racist rhetoric. The terror of being perceived as homosexual is used to scapegoat weaker members, and to instruct the rest as nonconformant with the desired image of power. And thus are reinscribed sexist machismo, racist intolerance, and hereterosexist assumption of the dominator--to excel in the military you must dominate the other side, conquer them. Misogyny persists with assertion of superiority and necessary justification of violence. Contrast this to the ambience of Robert Coles' "Literature...
...were invited by the Vatican. Frustrated by the council's tight control of the agenda, some 50 dissidents accused it of hindering open discussions, then set up their own lunch-hour conference. On the sidelines, some medical professionals defended the use of condoms; others accused the church of homophobia. John White, a priest who contracted the virus while in Kenya and now runs an AIDS treatment center in London, was ejected from one conference session for wearing a sandwich board that read THE CHURCH HAS AIDS. Declared one participant from the U.S.: "This is the worst conference I've ever...
...lesbians or bisexuals. Members of a sexual minority who are out of the closet and proud would not pose a security risk, but we are still barred from serving our country if we feel a duty to do this through the military. This is because the military plays on homophobia and pejorative stereotypes of gays in its dehumanizing process. The terror of being perceived as homosexual is used to scapegoat weaker members of a unit and to build esprit de corps in the rest. A scapegoat is necessary to militarism; the scapegoat is blamed for a bad situation and then...
...Homophobia is only one manifestation of the need to scapegoat. Xenophobia and racism are also used to dehumanize, and thus to scapegoat the enemy. Misogyny, with its unmitigated assertion of superiority and justification of violence, is widespread--witness the incidence of rape as an act of war, the harassment of servicewomen within the forces, and the exclusion of women from combat positions that give access to higher rank and higher pay. Classism is blatant in the rank system and in the economic backgrounds of people who fill those ranks. Homophobia is only one example of oppressive forces that...