The "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" Closet

Jack Drescher, M.D., is a member of the LGBT Committee of the Group for Advancement of Psychiatry and has long been an advocate for ending homophobia and life in the closet. He has a good piece at Huffington Post that looks at the toll DADT takes on closeted members of the military. His analysis likewise describes the phenomenon that many in the LGBT community have taken for varying periods of time in their lives: denial of who they are and strenuous efforts to adopt a life/persona that will be deemed acceptable by family members, church and the larger society. I for one am guilty of this inasmuch as I went through mental gymnastics for years trying to convince myself that I really wasn't attracted to other males that fit the parameters of "my type," got married and had children, and continued in this illusion of authentic life until I simply could no longer do it. The irony, of course, is that many of the opponents of DADT repeal both in the military and in Congress are likely doing the same thing I did for decades by deluding themselves as to their true self. The hostility is a mere transference of their own self-hate. Unlike these people, however, I never allowed my efforts of denial to lead me to actively harm members of the LGBT community or to opposed equality under the civil laws. Here are some highlights from Dresher's piece:
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While repeal would cause little harm, numerous critics have detailed both the financial and security costs of continuing DADT. There are psychological costs as well. . . . To avoid discharge under DADT, these young people engage in a series of mental and behavioral gymnastics. One cadet admits he learned "how to be a good actor." Another, tired of "hiding" her sexual identity, publicly resigned after two years at the Academy.
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"Acting" and "hiding," common ways of describing life in the closet, and are surface manifestations of the underlying psychology of maintaining secret identities for long periods of time. While gay people are not the only ones who hide secrets, the gay closet has unique features.
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Gay people often spend long periods of their lives unable to acknowledge their own homosexuality to themselves or to others. Beginning in childhood and throughout adolescence, being "tagged" as gay can lead to teasing, ridicule, family rejection and even violence. For aspiring young cadets, being gay means giving up dreams of a life of service to one's country. So they, like many gay people, treat their same-sex feelings as an unpleasant fact they would rather not know about themselves or admit to others. They keep those feelings out of awareness and separated from their public personas.
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The solution to one problem, however, creates others. Constant hiding takes its toll. It is painful to continuously hide important parts of the self or to always keep parts of the self separated from each other. As a way of hiding, they may choose to adopt public, heterosexual identities. This leads some closeted gay people to heterosexually marry yet lead secret homosexual lives.
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However, the mental effort needed to maintain a double life sometimes leads to errors in judgment and engaging in compromising situations, which may explain the parade of married, anti-gay public figures who have been arrested for public lewdness or outed by indiscreet male prostitutes.
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When hiding becomes too painful, some people come out. They do so even though the benefit of being a whole person risks exposure to the social stigma attached to homosexuality.
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Why come out? One ex-cadet who did said, "I have lied to my classmates and compromised my integrity and my identity by adhering to existing military policy. I am unwilling to suppress an entire portion of my identity any longer." The case for repealing "don't ask, don't tell" and choosing psychological unity could not be expressed any better.