CROSSING THE LINE AT THE FRONT

While I was hanging out with my buddy Gerry the other day, Gerry was kind enough to let me read an email he got from one of his friends who is an Army sergeant deployed in Afghanistan. (I’ll call him “Sergeant X.”) His friend had asked that Gerry not forward the letter to anyone, but it made such an impression on me that I asked Gerry to check with Sgt. X about sending me a copy. Sgt. X was very gracious and gave Ger the okay to send me the letter with certain provisos about my own dissemination of the missive. I believe I’ve met them. So, without further ado, here’s the latest on Army duties in Afghanistan – and an enthusiastic “Thank you!” to Sgt. X!

I was “asked”, by my site commander, to serve as the EO representative to my FOB. On paper, that means it’s my job to handle all complaints and grievances between soldiers when someone gets their feelings hurt or is offended by anything in any way at all and to attempt to handle it before it moved up the chain of command and to be kind, understanding and to hand out hugs to whiney pussies. It reality, it means that when some douche up on high comes up with a new policy or revision and sends it down to us minions I have to read it and make sure everyone in my area of responsibility is updated. Clearly, I am the most sensitive person around here so that was a good choice.

Today I had to give a brief reiterating and updating the Army’s policy on Harassment/ Dignity and Respect. It was given to me as a 15 minute power point demonstration. I found it to be dull and lengthy – and I hate power point. So, I tightened it up a bit and paraphrased a shade. This is the brief I gave verbatim.

– It is everyone’s job to make sure that all soldiers are treated with dignity and respect no matter how fucked up they are.
– Fag bashing is an all time high in the Army – this is unacceptable to our higher authority and their boyfriends.
– Title X, US code 654 prohibits homosexual conduct – defined as: statements (admissions), acts and marriage or attempted marriage to another fag.
– Soldiers are allowed to be gay – they just can’t act gay. It is against the rules to ask them about their gayness unless you catch them knowingly doing something gay. For example – if you were at the back room of the adult video store on Aberdeen Rd just outside of North Fort Hood located 200 yards behind the Pizza Hut right off of Lancaster Ave just after 1830 and happen to accidentally step up to the “glory hole” because you thought it was for medical exam purposes and discovered, afterwards when you went to pay your $20 copay, that on the other side it wasn’t a certified doctor but a fellow soldier (we’ll call him Not-Smith) – then that soldier (Not-Smith) can be asked about his gayness because he knowingly entered into a gay act but the other soldier (Not-Me) can’t be asked about his gayness because he didn’t know he was being gay when the gayness was happening.
– Harassment or mistreatment, for any reason, will not be tolerated – harassment is defined as anything funny or true.
– In accordance with time honored military tradition – male on male gayness is always bad. Female on female gayness is good, assumed of all female soldiers and openly encouraged in a positive way – unless one of the females is trying to get a promotion, job or award that a male soldier wants – at which point she will be maligned as a bull dyke bitch with negative connotations.
– If you ever feel you’ve been harassed, alert your chain of command and I’m certain they will come talk to me and tell me to stop.
– Or, you just have to say EO or IG complaint out loud, then sit back and watch everyone jump through hoops to make you happy so they don’t have to do paperwork. Then they will talk about you behind your back.
– Bottom line – get the job done. Mission first. Respect each other. Don’t sweat the small stuff. Don’t make a big deal out of things that don’t matter. Jokes are a necessary and healthy part of a deployment…. unless you hurt someone’s feelings, then you’re fucked. Just kidding!

I bet I don’t get asked to do another stupid fucking EO briefing!

365 Comments

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.

Comments RSS