President Barack Obama nominated Eric Fanning, a civilian adviser to Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, to become the next Secretary of the Army on Sept. 18. If the nomination is confirmed, Fanning would be the first openly gay person to lead the United States Army.

The Daily Orange spoke to David Rubin, professor of communications in the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications, and Kristi Andersen, a political science professor in the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, in an email.

The Daily Orange: What do you make of President Obama’s decision to name the first openly gay U.S. Secretary of the Army?

David Rubin: It fits with his commitment to diversity in his administration; his support for gay, lesbian, transgender people; his decision that the Justice Department would not defend the Defense of Marriage Act at the Supreme Court. It fits the military’s experiments to see whether women can be in the Special Forces and if they can be fit enough to be involved in the ground combat. It fits with the appointments that he has made that he has an African-American woman as his national security advisor, Susan Rice, and he has an African-American attorney general and he has many other African-Americans in the cabinet. So I would say this was not surprising at all.

Kristi Andersen: Interesting — but in many ways a conventional appointment. Eric Fanning has worked his way up in the Pentagon bureaucracy and this appointment thus makes sense.

The D.O.: Are you surprised it has taken a long time for an openly gay person to be selected for this position? Why or why not?

D.R.: No. You know these particular jobs, they don’t come around all that often. … They sometimes serve for quite a while, so it isn’t as if there have been a lot of openings that he could have filled them with. Then you have to find the right person who is the right fit.

K.A.: There are not that many openly gay people who have the right qualifications and/or political connection to be appointed Secretary of the Army.

The D.O.: What kind of message does President Obama’s decision send to the U.S. military?

D.R.: I think the message it sends is that we are moving a long way from “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,” that there shouldn’t be any discrimination against gay people in the military, that there is no reason that gay people can’t lead the military. And it is another step in the direction of inclusiveness.

K.A.: A very positive one about his administration’s commitment to appointing people based on qualifications, without regard to their sexual orientation.

The D.O.: The military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy was repealed in 2011. Do you think the decision would symbolize the military’s commitment to becoming more inclusive?

D.R.: The military has always been viewed as male-preserved, that fighting is a particularly male trait, that the notion of gay people or gay men in the military can be very threatening to masculinity — if you define your masculinity in those terms. And it is the same reason that there has been such discrimination against women in the military.

K.A.: Yes. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” put all the burden on the individual serviceman or woman. Openly gay people were still banned from the military — but if they just kept it a secret they were (maybe) okay. Rescinding that policy was a big step toward inclusivity.

The D.O.: Do you think more openly gay people will start to hold military positions after this decision? Why or why not?

D.R.: I think what really depends is who is the next president. If the next president shares Obama’s views on diversity and embracing the gay community, then I would say, “Yes, this will proceed.” But if we get a different president, this could all stop.

K.A.: Fanning wasn’t in the military, so this probably won’t have much of an impact on people choosing to join the military. There are probably lots of gay people serving in civilian positions in the Pentagon (like Fanning did).

Published on September 28, 2015 at 9:15 pm

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