A slightly modified version of this study appears in International Security, vol. 27, no. 2, (Fall, 2002), pp. 178-197. International Security is edited at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard University. “A Modest Proposal: Privacy as a Flawed Rationale for the Exclusion of Gays and Lesbians from the U.S. Military” by Aaron Belkin* and Melissa Sheridan Embser-Herbert** *Assistant Professor Department of Political Science University of California Santa Barbara, CA 93106-9420
[email protected]; (805) 893-5664 **Associate Professor Department of Sociology Hamline University Box 162, 1536 Hewitt Ave. St. Paul, MN 55104
[email protected]; (651) 523-2564 Statement of Authors’ Affiliations: Aaron Belkin is Assistant Professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of California, Santa Barbara and Director of the Center for the Study of Sexual Minorities in the Military. He is co-author and author of studies of gays and lesbians in the military including “Homosexuality and the Israel Defense Forces; Did Lifting the Gay Ban Undermine Military Performance?” in Armed Forces and Society. Melissa S. Embser-Herbert is Associate Professor of Sociology at Hamline University and author of Camouflage Isn’t Only for Combat: Gender, Sexuality, and Women in the Military, published by NYU Press in 1998. Abstract: The justification for excluding acknowledged homosexuals from the U.S. military is the unit cohesion rationale, the notion that lifting the gay ban would undermine combat performance. As a growing body of evidence has challenged the plausibility of this argument, the ban’s supporters increasingly have justified exclusion by the preservation of heterosexual privacy in the barracks and showers.