@hawkeye10,
History does not show us starting from "gays are just like us." Instead, they have been treated as mental patients with sociopathic disorders, and obscured to a level of social leprosy. So, after decades and centuries of them being treated as inequals, we have learned this is wrong.
If your concern is with society being able to decide, then they most certainly have, and we are lagging behind other nations in this regard.
The idea that gays harm the military is a myth. We see no such harm. So even if I could not convince you that gays are equal to you and me, there is no compelling reason to ban them from serving their country. Certainly there are gay men and women who are more fit to serve than some straight men in the service.
The wholesale banning of gays in the military is playing politics with the military, not the reverse. It's not some liberal line item.
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