According To Private Justin Rea The Repeal Of The Military Policy Prohibiting Openly Gay Personal Will Not Be Totally Accepted By Marines Because “Being Gay Means You Are Kind Of Girly,” Pending Lawsuits Brought Against Gay Ban Will Remain In Place Until Repeal Is Complete, Honoring Fallen Gay Soldier Major Alan Rogers, Believing Corporal Dennis Engelhard A Hero Missouri Names Highway In Honor Of Late Highway Patrol Officer While Denying His Partner Survivor Benefits

The New York Times canvasses a cross-section of Marines in the wake of Congress passing landmark legislation Saturday lifting a 17 year old ban on openly gay service members, Private first-class Daniel Carias, an 18 year old native of New York City about to graduate from Marine Corps infantry training at Camp Geiger in North Carolina, saying he believes that the repeal was the right thing to do, but adds that gay men should not be allowed to serve in front-line combat units, saying “They won’t hold well.” According to the Times, “Most of the approximately two dozen Marines interviewed said they personally did not object to gay men or lesbians serving openly in the military. But many said that introducing the possibility of sexual tension into combat forces would be disruptive, an argument made by the commandant of the Marine Corps a week before the historic repeal was passed by the Senate on Saturday and sent to President Obama for his signature.” Corporal Trevor Colbath, a 22 year old who saw duty in Afghanistan, returning state-side in August, expressed a slightly nuanced version of the same argument, saying “Coming from a combat unit, I know that in Afghanistan we’re packed in a sardine can. There’s no doubt in my mind that openly gay Marines can serve, it’s just different in a combat unit. Maybe they should just take the same route they take with females and stick them to non-combat units.” Those opinions, of course, parrot popular and unfair stereotypes, since gay men already serve honorably and with distinction in front-line units, albeit not openly, having had to adhere to the ban. The oddest statements contained in the article comes courtesy of two teens, 19 year old Private Justin Rea, who says gays “won’t be totally accepted” in the Marines because “Being gay means you are kind of girly. The Marines are, you know, macho.”

The Associated Press reports that pending lawsuits against the American military ban on openly gay service members will remain, for now, even though the Senate voted Saturday to repeal the policy known as “don’t ask, don’t tell.” The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network said Monday that it will not remove a lawsuit filed last week on behalf of three officers honorably discharged under the ban until they are re-instated. The Ninth United States Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco is also considering the government’s appeal of a decision made in Riverside, California in September that struck down the law as being unconstitutional, the Log Cabin Republicans, who brought the suit, saying it will not move to end the case until the Pentagon certifies the repeal and ceases any and all investigations of service personal for being gay.

The New York Daily News reports that the late Major Alan Rogers, a gay soldier, a native of the Bronx, who fought for repeal of the military policy prohibiting openly gay service personal, and who was killed in action in Iraq, was honored Saturday by friends shortly after the Senate voted to repeal the ban. Rogers was 40 when he killed in January, 2008, his Humvee struck by an IED while on patrol. He was adopted at age 3 – his father having denied being his father as well as being incarcerated; his mother was unable to care for him. The couple who adopted him both died in 2000. When he died, because of the circumstances surround the policy known as “don’t ask, don’t tell,” he was unable to list a same sex partner as the person to be notified in case of an emergency. His cousin, Cathy Long, was presented with the folded American flag at his funeral in Arlington National Ceremony, and she, along with the rest of his family, were asked by the Army not discuss his homosexuality. It seems that Rogers hid (or at least did not call attention) his sexual orientation, likely because he wanted to serve his country, Cathy later saying “We really didn’t know about this until after his death. It was in the back of our minds, but we didn’t discuss it.”

Monday, the state of Missouri dedicated a stretch of Interstate 44 in Franklin County for Corporal Dennis Engelhard, killed in the line of duty Christmas Day, 2009, reports the St. Louis Dispatch. Engelhard was attempting to aid a stranded motorist on 1-44 at Highway 100 when another vehicle lost control and killed him. The bill renaming the stretch of highway – called Corporal Dennis E. Engelhard Memorial Highway – was signed into law by Governor Jay Nixon July 12th. He was the 28th officer of the Missouri Highway Patrol to lose his life in the line of the duty. Engelhard was gay, and his partner, Kelly Glossip, has been denied surviving benefits by the state, which does not recognize domestic partners. He recently announced he was filing a lawsuit against the pension system for the Highway Patrol.