Joe Biden has moved to correct a “great injustice” by pardoning thousands of US veterans convicted over six decades under a military law that banned gay sex.
The presidential proclamation, which comes during Pride month and an election year, allows LGBTQ+ service members convicted of crimes based solely on their sexual orientation to apply for a certificate of pardon that will help them receive withheld benefits.
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It grants clemency to service members convicted under Uniform Code of Military Justice article 125 – which criminalised sodomy, including between consenting adults – between 1951 and 2013, when it was rewritten by Congress.
That includes victims of the 1950s “lavender scare”, a witch-hunt in which many LGBTQ+ people employed by the federal government were viewed as security risks amid fears their sexual orientation made them vulnerable to blackmail. Thousands were investigated and fired or denied employment.
“Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” was bigoted propaganda branded as a consideration, and the Lavender Scare was horrifically layered oppression. It was basically, “We’ve decided your sexuality is scandalous, forcing you to hide it, which makes you at risk of being blackmailed, so we’re charging you with a crime.” Fucking despicable.
These pardons are excellent. It’s such a shame thousands of veterans had to live so long with criminal records for who they are, not even what they did.
We’ve decided your sexuality is scandalous, forcing you to hide it, which makes you at risk of being blackmailed, so we’re charging you with a crime.” Fucking despicable.
While obviously not near the same level of criminalizing someone for part of their core identity, I’ve felt the same way about the US government’s treatment of pot smokers. Can’t get a security clearance if you’ve smoked pot within the past 7 years because it’s blackmail leverage ignoring the fact that it’s only blackmail material when the government considers it verboten
You can 100% get a clearance if you’ve smoked within 7 years of applying for one. Hell, you can get a clearance if you smoked within the last year. You just have to a) disclose the fact, b) be able to show mitigations as to why smoking weed won’t be an issue while you have a clearance, and then c) not do it while you have a clearance. It ends up being not so much about the fact that you smoke weed as it is that you’re not following the law, and that’s the real clearance risk (from their POV). Getting a clearance is really about proving you’re trustworthy to the investigator.
There are agencies, iirc mostly law enforcement, that consider it a strict bar. It also depends on the level of clearance, and how much they need you. An Army private getting a secret clearance to present weather to the general on the daily isn’t getting nearly as much scrutiny as a nuclear physicist. But nuclear physicists willing to work for the government are a finite resource. It’s all clear as mud and the fear of losing your career over some stupid persecution is real.
That change requires an act of Congress. They’ve been dragging their heels on it.
https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/house-bill/3617
It’s not so much the blackmail with pot, it’s the fact you can’t “follow the rules”. They will give a bye for previous smoking events (before you need the clearance, took a position etc.), it’s smoking with a clearance or NOT telling them that will get you wrapped up.
…it’s blackmail leverage ignoring the fact that it’s only blackmail material when the government considers it verboten…
…it’s smoking with a clearance…
Smoking with a clearance is only possible blackmail material because the government makes it verboten. Their point stands.
Considering that Nixon’s cabinet has openly talked about how they made it a federal offense so that they had justification to arrest the leaders of the war protesters (and the same thing with cocaine and the black community), I’d say it’s of a similar level but a different kind of evil.
I thought the concept of don’t ask don’t tell was a way to let gay people serve without getting congress to change the laws. Kind of like federal pot laws. It’s technically illegal, they’re just not supposed to enforce it.
I can’t speak for Bill Clinton’s thoughts but the military never engaged with it in good faith. They considered any discovery as “telling”. Some service members at the time even described unit members spying on their homes to see who they lived with. Even a letter from an old lover that someone took from your belongings would be considered telling. The function of the policy was that if they could “out” you, they would discharge you with bad papers.
Under this kind of atmosphere homophobia becomes ten times worse because the possibility of that guy being gay puts your career at risk too, in case you get too close and are swept up with them.
No, it was a step in the right direction. There may have been units and commanders that tried to seek out gays but there were also plenty of commanders that really didn’t want to know so never asked.
It was a way to not deal with the issue directly, and to give members of the LGBTQ+ community an option to hide who they are and not receive punishment. But it in no way protected them. It was sold as a “compromise”, but was actually a thinly veiled way to continue to suppress the community and enact harsh penalties and convictions for anyone who didn’t follow the protocol.
Yeah it was progressive at the time since it stopped the military from digging around and asking your family if you are gay, especially since there weren’t even civil unions in most states back then.
What i don’t understand is why Obama didn’t pardon them all since DADT was overtirned in 2010
It stopped official investigations before an accusation. It did not stop your chain of command from spying on their soldiers to find LGBTQ people. The function of the policy was that no matter how you got outed you were in violation of the policy. So they treated someone grabbing a letter from home and reading it aloud the same as you telling your commander you were going to a gay bar to look for a date.
We’ve decided your sexuality is scandalous, forcing you to hide it, which makes you at risk of being blackmailed, so we’re charging you with a crime.” Fucking despicable.
part of me wants to forgive biden’s votes & support of those laws (eg dont ask dont tell; defense of marriage; executive order 10450); but seeing as how the everyone on social media (especially the lemmyverse) already refuse to believe he did those things makes me feel like i have a duty to remember since they fucked with my life and so many other’s lives’ so severely; along with the other fucked up things he did that social media has already chosen to forget about.
He also had racist views the 70s. This is simply proof of growth.
Also, the line you quoted was regarding the Lavender Scare. That was 20 years before his time.
he also switched sides back then on that topic too when it was no longer politically popular.
he’s not a leader nor is it growth (he was proud of appeasing segregationists during his campaign and kamala had to put him in his place); he’s a politician that does whatever it takes to get votes.
I like the part of the election cycle when some good things are allowed to happen.
I don’t even blame Biden for waiting. Americans have such short memories that getting elected means having to hold some things in reserve, and getting reelected or passing the office on are genuinely important factors. It just sucks that people had to wait.
Congrats to everyone helped by this!
If only there were a way to enact policies that would provide long term tangible impact to people’s lives such that they could wake up every day and say, “yeah the president is doing a good job…”
Im not discounting what he’s doing, I’m just saying that there’s a reason why FDR got elected three times and would have been elected more if term limits weren’t instituted.
There have been good things throughout Biden’s entire term. They just get overshadowed by the barrage of news about the bad.
Biden rejoined the Paris Climate Agreement, revoked the Keystone Pipeline permit, created a 13 million acre federal petroleum reserve for Alaskan wildlife, greatly increased oil site lease cost, signed $7B in solar subsidies, enacted the Inflation Reduction act to support clean energy, leveraged the NLRB for an FTC ruling that eliminated non-compete agreements, capped credit card late fees, reduced or outlawed junk fees in several industries, forgave billions in student debt from predatory loans, created the CHIPS Act to improve reliance on domestic technology, reenacted Net Neutrality, repealed Title 42, ended the Muslim Ban, reinstated the law prohibiting Israeli settlement on Palestinian territory, signed the Equality Act for LGBTQ+ rights, restored gay rights to beneficiaries, reenacted trans care anti-discrimination law, signed the Respect for Marriage Act, enabled unspecified gender on US Passports, pardoned thousands of gay veterans from being convicted based on their sexual orientation, rejoined WHO, rescheduled marijuana, banned medical debt from credit reports, actively reducing drug costs with the American Rescue Plan Act…
It seems Biden likes to make things happen withiut making a big deal about it, because in a perfect world that sounds like a good thing. Just get stuff done!
But the Dems as a whole need to get better at messaging their victories so they get the credit, which I understand is hard when rage bait sells, but if nobody knows they can’t counter the conservative lies.
Good work shouldnt have to be shouted about, but well the hearts and minds of men are of questionable capacity for reason.
He tried to take victory laps. The problem is he tried to take one on the economy for several months in a row which led to people seeing him as disconnected and only working for the finance sector. His messaging has been absolute garbage this election cycle and if any one other than Trump was running we’d already be getting ready for the next Republican president.
Thanks for sharing these. There has really been a bunch of good to come out of this administration. Much of it isn’t flashy stuff that gets talked about, but there is a lot that really should be important to a lot of people.
I think Biden has exceeded most expectations many of us had for him. There are always going to be things presidents do that we won’t agree with. Obama was also pretty crappy with immigrants, drone strikes, and a number of other things, but it seems we’re able to look back at his terms as a net positive. If Biden didn’t have to clean up after Trump and Covid, I think he could have been a very memorable president.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very pissed about Gaza and the border, but Gaza is a result of almost 100 years of bad policy of many parties, and the number of regular people still bitching about false immigration stories is pressuring all representatives to be harsh on that. We can only expect a president to do so much if a large swath of Congress and the people themselves are against something.
Gaza is absolutely indefensible. Immigration is very limited. He doesn’t have to power to allocate funding for immigrants. He left the border open for over a year while pressing Congress to do their job and pass immigration reform. Now sanctuary cities are over capacity, leaving many migrants homeless. The state funding has run out, and all Biden can control is law and border policy.
why? no one’s on the fence so parroting this doesn’t convince anyone; so it only serves to alienate other leftists voters.
if your approval for biden’s track record only spans the last 3 years instead of all 51, then you’re going to vote for him anyways; meanwhile people who have been watching him for decades are reminded of his true colors in these parroting the transparently feels-good/does-nothing actions.
it’s toxic positivity.
Just one thing. He only technically ended title 42 immigration restrictions. Effectively he continued Trump’s policies with his own, slightly different policy.
He repealed the Muslim ban on March 6, 2021. He overturned Title 42 on May 11, 2023. There were no Presidential border restrictions in place until recently. He spent that time pressing Congress to pass immigration reform and they failed. With sanctuary cities over capacity, and no federal funding, he needed to begin to restrict entry again.
I’m just aware that Trump would be worse for Palestinians, so the intelligent decision would come from weighing the other factors.
Trump repealed 112 climate regulations, left the Paris Climate Agreement, disbanded the pandemic response team stalling national pandemic response, left the WHO, repealed trans care anti-discrimination law, repealed gay rights to beneficiaries, enacted Title 42 and the Muslim ban, repealed the law prohibiting Israeli settlements on Palestinian territory, repealed Net Neutrality, provided tax cuts to the wealthy that further widened our already exploitative wealth inequality, increased tariffs on goods costing the consumers, seated the conservatives in SCOTUS that repealed Roe v. Wade…
But bothsidesaame? (/s)
lol at the 6 (at the time of writing this) trump supporters that downvoted you and are cool with trump pardoning convicted killers, his own sycophants that were convicted of federal crimes, and people that gave him bribes for his presidential pardons at the 11th hour; but not cool with pardoning people wrongfully convicted of a bigoted piece of propaganda turned law with “Don’t ask, Don’t Tell”.
I’d all but guarantee those 6 people are well-known “anti-genocide” bots here on lemmy.
I wonder if the bots realize they’re really not helping their cause, at all.
My boss was talking about wanting them all investigated for sex crimes. Just like… How is that a good use of tax money? More funny is the fact that he doesn’t believe taxation should be a thing…
He’d prefer to just form an orderly mob, I guess? Much cheaper and so traditional.
Have you ever joined a British mob? They are quite orderly. The British will line up in a queue to take turns with goals of the mob.
A British mob in my eyes would be the sort that forms after a football game and smashes shit up. There would be an alternative name for the fancier kind.
How insane is that that they’d make a person’s personal love life illegal? Like America just boggles my mind.
The whole thing was stupid circular logic…
many LGBTQ+ people employed by the federal government were viewed as security risks amid fears their sexual orientation made them vulnerable to blackmail.
LGBTQ people weren’t allowed in the government/military, so if you were LGBTQ, they kicked you out because someone could blackmail you for being LGBTQ…
You’re confusing them thinking it made sense, and not just an excuse.
But they stopped about a decade ago, it just took an election that Biden might not win for him to pardon the people who got fucked over for it.
And I’m sure someone is about to explain to me while waiting 4 years for Biden to do this is “smart”…
Because they don’t understand voters want politicians who try to help 24/7 and not just throwing out bread crumbs in the months before an election
People take LGBT rights for granted. Especially gay marriage. I remember when it wasn’t legal. And it only became legal because of the courts.
When people act like SCOTUS and the GOP would never come after established rights, they’re either ignorant or liars.
i feel like it’s worse if you do remember it or don’t take it for granted; because those who never got experience it refuse to believe it ever happened. (and i’ve run into a few on lemmyverse in the last few days who are old enough to remember but still refuse to believe it).
biden et. al voted for doma which ended up with the person i built a life with being deported and also they also voted for non-dischargable student load debt; that combined with don’t-ask/don’t-tell; forced me to take on permanent-for-life debt.
seeing him touted as the most pro-lgbt or progressive president ever on social media (especially the lemmyverse) feels like a slap every time i see it and seeing him take these token actions only serves to reinforce it.
Just wait until you learn about Alan Turing, the guy who made the Turing Machine (considered the first computer).
He committed suicide by eating an apple laced with cyanide because the US government chemically castrated gay men like him - forced them to take drugs so that they couldn’t “get it up” to prevent them from committing “deviant behavior”.
And that wasn’t outside the norm 100 years ago for governments to do.
Just a correction, it isn’t entirely certain whether he killed himself or not. The apple wasn’t tested for cyanide and the chances he just inhaled too much while working are considerable.
Well, not that it changes anything about the horrible treatment he received because of his orientation though.
