Touring To Protest ‘Don’t Ask’

When Harvard College LGBT Political Coalition administrative chair Clayton W. Brooks III ’10 was 16, he said he wanted to show support for his country by serving in the U.S. Naval Academy. But he said he would not enlist as anything other than a gay man, and so a military policy barring openly homosexual or bisexual recruits kept him away.

“I wouldn’t be able to be completely honest about such an important part of who I am,” he said. “I’m prevented from serving my country in the most open and sincere way.”

On May 24, Harvard students—regardless of sexual orientation or desire to serve in the military—will embark on a week-long coalition-sponsored trip around the east coast to protest the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy.

The tour, entitled “Right to Serve,” will begin in Boston and make stops in Portland, Maine, New York City, and Washington D.C. At these cities’ military recruiting centers, one openly gay or lesbian student will attempt to enlist for military service. If the student is turned away, volunteers from the group will refuse to leave the recruiting center.

The possibility of police arriving to press charges is not unlikely, according to Jacob P. Reitan, a Harvard Divinity School student who first conceived of the tour. Punishment for protesting an “immoral law” would be a badge of honor, he said.

Harvard College Democrats President Jarret A. Zafran said the bill is “rank hypocrisy” and a government sanction of discrimination. He added that the possibility of punishment did not dissuade him.

“It’s a small price to pay,” said Zafran, whose group is co-sponsoring the tour. “Not all laws are just laws.”

The “Right to Serve” tour’s method of protest is modeled after the sit-ins of the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.

“Jim Crow and ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ are equally morally reprehensible,” Reitan said. “The manner [in which] we confront them should be the same.”

The group hopes to encourage Republican Senator Susan M. Collins of Maine and Democratic Senator Edward M. Kennedy ’54-’56 of Massachusetts—who has said in the past that he needs a Republican co-sponsor—into working together to repeal the policy, according to Brooks.

By stopping in New York City and Washington D.C., Brooks said, the tour hopes to put pressure on presidential candidates Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and John McCain, and perhaps ask for meetings with legislators.

The military policy first came into effect as part of the 1993 Department of Defense budget. The earliest iteration also prohibited officers from investigating enlisted men solely to discover their sexual orientation.

Other than Turkey, the U.S. is currently the only country in NATO that prevents gays and lesbians from serving openly—despite the fact that other countries have proved the feasibility of open service, Brooks said.

“There’s no further excuse for inaction on this issue,” he added.

—Staff Writer Esther I. Yi can be reached at estheryi@fas.harvard.edu.