Author Topic: A gay soldier gets married...  (Read 2652 times)

Offline belbbmfan

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A gay soldier gets married...
« on: October 07, 2006, 03:32:47 am »
I live in Belgium where gay marriage has been made legal a couple of years ago. And when i read the newspaper this morning my heart leapt.  :)

The newspaper carried an article about a 49 year old paratrooper who got married to a welsh man. Apparently his marriage was also his coming out. Unfortunately the day after the wedding, he discovered that some of his colleagues were very critical about him, claiming that a gay man in the army is contradictory to the image of 'the virile man' that a soldier represents.  :(

His superiors were very supportive however, so was the representative of the soldier's union who claimed that 'because paratroopers have a special task to do, they shouldn't think of themselves as special people who think they're somehow better than others.' He further stated that 'people who react so negatively have not understood anything of the policy of diversity that the belgian army has been implementing over the last couple of years.' He added that further diversity training was needed and that he knew of other gay men and women soldiers, some of them in combat units, who have experienced no problems in being accepted by their colleagues.

Here's a nice picture of the happy couple. I wish them lots of happy years together.
http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m312/Belbbmfan/para.jpg



Fabienne
'We're supposed to guard the sheep, not eat 'em'

Offline MaineWriter

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Re: A gay soldier gets married...
« Reply #1 on: October 07, 2006, 07:36:37 am »
Thanks for posting that, Fabienne. For us in the US, it will be a long time before our military ever gets to the point of acceptance of gays. And we have only one state where same-sex marriage is legal. Sigh....

L
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Offline Penthesilea

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Re: A gay soldier gets married...
« Reply #2 on: October 07, 2006, 11:10:33 am »
As good as it is, but...
Why is it still so rarely that it is newsworthy? Shouldn't be, should it?
Should be just as regular as any marriage/relationship.

And on a sidenote: Why is this guy in a kilt, when he's Welsh, not Scottish?

Offline delalluvia

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Re: A gay soldier gets married...
« Reply #3 on: October 07, 2006, 12:56:02 pm »
As good as it is, but...
Why is it still so rarely that it is newsworthy? Shouldn't be, should it?
Should be just as regular as any marriage/relationship.

And on a sidenote: Why is this guy in a kilt, when he's Welsh, not Scottish?

I think the part that was newsworthy was the reaction of the guy's fellow soldiers.  Him getting married in a country where it is perfectly normal and legal shouldn't be news.

Several people wear kilts, don't they?  Scottish and Irish both?  Don't know about Welsh though.

Offline jura86

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Re: A gay soldier gets married...
« Reply #4 on: October 09, 2006, 08:08:38 pm »

Several people wear kilts, don't they?  Scottish and Irish both?  Don't know about Welsh though.

I live in Wales, and no, Welsh people do not wear kilts. However at weddings I have seen many non-Scottish people wear kilts for some reason, and I've never asked why. My English uncles wear kilts at weddings. Perhaps they have some Scottish ancestry I don't know about, same may be for this guy.