Military Gay Marriage

[BLUEHAWK]

:cd:

I do not prefer suggesting this thread on this particular Forum, but maybe it could be for the best if the conversation can be kept to the point and not allowed to become invective again. The point is worth discussing, calmly.

In the Family Forum, which seemed correct at the time, I posted a thread (and poll) titled "Military Gay Marriage"... it rightly had to get locked off because things got personal, which is a shame since that was not the intent of the thread. From July - December 2003 it ran pretty steadily, gaining 48 posts and 807 reads on four PF pages with a 5 star rating. The question was then and is now, ever more sharply (due to recent legal developments in San Francisco, Austin, Vermont and now Massachusetts):

WHAT IS THE LIKELY EFFECT OF GAY MARRIAGE UPON THE MILITARY?

Just that much, not whether gay people should or should not marry, nor whether their marriages or civil unions are to be recognized state by state or federally, nor whether there should or should not be a Constitutional Amendment, nor whether it is or is not against or within God's Will, etc etc etc.

Simply, what do people think will be the effect of the now all but inevitable presence of married persons of the same gender on military life, garrisons, DoD policy, combat readiness, Judge Advocates and the like... please.

If the Moderator will let this run for awhile, just to see whether we can focus on the military consequences of the apparently inevitable, and should readers see fit to honor the post with their thoughts, we might be better prepared as patriots for what is to come.

My own opinions have been stated about as well as can be on the original Family Forum thread, so do not need repetition... and are still there with other ones for review.