Are you looking at my wee-wee?

News has just leaked out about the survey the Pentagon is doing, allegedly to see if the straight majority in the military will still kill the enemy in wartime if gays are allowed to serve openly. No kidding. $4,500,000 to ask people whether they think that we might lose a war because people are staring at their naughty parts.

The survey looks innocuous. If you read the whole thing slowly, it looks like just another survey. It’s not. (To get a pdf file of the whole 32 pages of the thing, click on this link.)

When you survey people about a prejudice they may have, and offer them the possibility of acting out on that prejudice as a valid response, you are endorsing that prejudice.

How many years now has this passed in the United States of America as a legitimate question - how would you feel showering next to a gay person? The question implies that if the answer is "uncomfortable," then we should remove the rights of that citizen to come and go freely, so that you will feel better.

How would you feel about sitting on a toilet a Negro had sat on?

Do you know anybody who has been circumcised?

Would you take your spouse to a social event at which Oriental people were present?

If you would, would your mother approve?

What are we going to do with the statistics we get showing a correlation between age or race and prejudice? We already know religious people are more prejudiced against gay people and younger people are less so. We already know that people who know gays are far more likely to articulate a view they should not suffer descrimination. We already know there are thousands of gay people in the military taking showers with thousands of nongay people in the military and that most gay people, like most straight people, like sex to be mutual, and there are pretty good regulations in place to take care of those who don't respect the rights of others. We already know that most modern countries do not give homophobia an honored place by passing laws like Don't Ask/Don't Tell, and do just fine. They don't need to ask each other about whether shower fears should determine civil rights, for chrissakes!

Damn this curse on America! Where does it come from!? What did we do in a previous life to be saddled with this infantile sexuality?

You're uncomfortable showering next to me because I'm 6 foot 6?

Well, I'm uncomfortable showering next to you because you're ugly.

What say we both get clean and go have lunch?