So, I had this conversation with a dear friend the other day—a man whose military training seemed to come with a “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy on, well, just about everything.
He casually dropped that LGBTQ people should be “silenced.”
Silenced? I blinked a few times.
Silenced? As in—what?
A gentle, “shush-shush, could you keep it down, please”?
Or more like the kind of silencing where people are erased from society altogether, like that time we all pretended our high school crush wasn’t sitting right next to us in the cafeteria?
But… seriously, silence?
Naturally, being the glutton for punishment that I am, I asked the obvious question:
“Who am I to tell anyone who to love, how to love?”
Like, I don’t even tell my dog how to love—she loves with a level of wild abandon that often involves licking my face when I’m half-sleeping.
But somehow, when it comes to humans, we’ve decided that love has a blueprint? That we can mark the “acceptable” kind with a little check box?
Anyway, I digress.
So, my buddy clammed up, of course.
And then he hit me with the old standby:
“Don’t ask, don’t tell,” because, y’know, military training.
Like that’s the universal answer for everything.
If a tree falls in the forest, don’t ask, don’t tell.
If someone’s living their truth, but it makes you feel a little funny inside, don’t ask, don’t tell.
I’m waiting for the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy to apply to whether or not I have pineapple on my pizza—except, wait, that’s a topic I’m happy to ask about.
But then, because the universe was like, let’s keep this party going, I hit him with a classic: “But… wait. You’re all about going to strip clubs and hootin’ and hollerin’, right?
But—IF your daughter was a stripper or a call-girl, you’d be mortified, huh?”
He went silent.
And by silent, I mean the kind of silence where you hear your own thoughts echo like you’re on the moon. Crickets.
Oh, the beauty of that silence.
It speaks volumes.
What’s that about?
I’ll tell you what it’s about: it’s about this deeply-rooted sense of entitlement most men have.
You know, the one where they think they get to decide who deserves dignity, love, and respect.
But only when it’s in a very specific, acceptable package: not too “loud,” not too “different,” and definitely not too honest about how much of their own lives and choices are based on outdated ideals about women, sex, and control.
It’s a big ol’ buffet of cognitive dissonance where everyone else gets a plate but they’re too busy refusing to eat.
But here’s the real twist, my friend: Women, LGBTQ people, and everyone who doesn’t fit into the neat little boxes of traditional patriarchy—we are living our truths anyway.
And no matter how loud or silent anyone thinks they need to be, it doesn’t change the fact that love is love, dignity is dignity, and respect is earned, not demanded.
As for my friend?
I think we’re gonna need a little more than “don’t ask, don’t tell” to work through all that internalized nonsense.
Maybe some deep breaths, a few laughs, and a willingness to really see the world beyond the narrow lane of outdated norms.
In fact, I’m pretty sure he can start by asking himself this: Who am I to tell anyone how to love?
And then maybe he’ll get a peek at the massive world outside his comfort zone—where people can live and love as they are.
Wouldn’t that be wild?