Term Paper on "Homosexuals Working in the Criminal Justice System"

Term Paper 10 pages (3709 words) Sources: 1+

[EXCERPT] . . . .

Homosexuals Working in the Criminal Justice System

There are nowadays no restrictions on homosexuals joining any activity as employees in United States and that includes the armed forces. Of course, the work in every area is varied. Yet there are some common features of the persons being recruited and for the armed forces it is that they are recruited from the poor or the middle income groups. This had taken place even during the times of conscription. Some of the upper income groups managed to find reasons why they should be exempt from conscription and then proceeded with a good education so that they were placed better. Thus the members of the working class and the poor were left with no option other than to serve in dangerous locations. Some politically inclined persons were also left out of the war as they refused to serve and were left to suffer punishment. In the meantime, the political power shifted to the Right and this started the recruitment of women and homosexuals to the armed forces. There is of course no reason why these individuals should end up as being cannon fodder. (the Socialization of State Authority) to a certain extent these are a result of the gay rights movement being pushed and thus remove the stigma of gays being viewed as criminals and this resulted in establishment of their civil rights. (Gay rights)

One of the first gays' organizations was the Mattachine Society of New York. This was one of the first such groups and founded by Harry Hay in Los Angeles with the first meeting on November 11, 1950. There were quite a few who attended, but the organization was not incorporated till 1961. Several other similar groups were then founded in New York, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Washington DC and Philadelphia. The main aim of this society was to change the opinion of the general society about homosexuals from mental deviants to a persecuted minority. The interesting point to note is that all founders of this society were Communists and the base was the same as the cell structure of the American Communist Party. Then came the activities against the communists and this frightened a lot of the members who left, and even the leadership changed. Some other members became unpopular and their positions were lost to conservatives in the group. The aim of the society was to liberate the homosexual persons who they felt were oppressed, and provide some common services like legal and counseling. They were also trying to get some of the laws that hurt the homosexuals repealed, and one of these was the Sodomy law. It was coming out with a magazine called 'The Mattachine Review'. In the period from 1961 to 1969 this group was probably the most important group of homosexuals in the country. In 1969 came the Stonewall Riots and this changed the opinion of this group as being stodgy and traditional. This led to loss of support and start of infighting. Ultimately the organization closed as it was facing bankruptcy. (Mattachine Society)

The Stonewall riots began from a police raid on a gay bar in New York City and this is viewed as being the start of the modern gay's rights movement. The attack was named after the Stonewall Inn which was raided by the police. This was a popular hang out for gays in Manhattan's Greenwich Village. These raids had been taking place for a long time, but this was different as the crowd assembled there fought back. The riots led to the formation of the organization Gay Liberation Front and also give rise to a new level of solidarity among the gays. The police method earlier was to record the identity of all persons present in the bars, when they were raided, and these were then ready for publication in the newspapers. The police van was then filled to the brim with persons found. The arrests were made generally on any charge of indecency like kissing, holding hands, wearing clothes of the opposite gender, or even for being in the bar. This had however led to complaints by the Mattachine group that police were just trying to trap gay men and charging them with indecency. This complaint made the then police Commissioner, Harold Leary pass on instructions to the police so that they do not make an arrest without a civilian witness or push the gays into breaking the law. This had nearly stopped all incidences of arrest of gay men in New York. This was broken by this incidence when a drag queen swung out at a police officer after he was prodded. The other story is that it started when a lesbian began a fight when the car carrying her came to the crowds. Whatever may have been the beginning, a big fight broke out from the crowd and the police were overcome to be compelled to retreat into the bar. There was the heterosexual folk singer, Dave Van Ronk passing through and the police caught him, pulled him into the bar and beat him up. The crowd fought for a long time and tried to set the bar on fire. There was the use of a parking meter as a ram to force the police out. The fight went on and spread rapidly due to the joining in of the customers in the other bars and residents joining in. (Stonewall Riot)

At present Human Rights Campaign is the biggest organization asking for equal rights for the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender groups. This organization is trying to build an America where these people are assured of their basic rights and can be open, honest and safe at home, at work and in the community. This group is important in politics, and it tries to gather support for bills that are positive to these people, try to build a Congress that is helpful for these people through support of suitable candidates, collect support among the people of this type and also ensure that they vote in every election. They have a website which helps the members select law makers at both the state and local level, select laws that are useful to this group, review the position of different lawmakers regarding the issues of these people, and even sending suitable letters to these people. This was established in 1980 by Steve Endean for raising money for congressional candidates supporting these people. Within three months the organization was registered as an independent political action committee. They have become a force in Presidential candidates and supported Bill Clinton in 1992. One of their important projects has become the National Coming out Day. The only criticism of this group is that they are very friendly with the Democrats. During the 2004 elections the group spent a lot of time, energy and money supporting John Kerry. (Human Rights Campaign)

At the same time the support had probably led President Clinton to order the Defense Dept. To permit homosexuals enters the army, though they were not supposed to carry out homosexual activities. This policy has been discussed a lot and was felt to be a 'don't ask, don't tell' policy of permitting the gays to serve the military, without being discharged or meet other penalties as long they do not start the activity within the army. Even at the turn of the century, it seems that the status of these people had hardly changed. In contrast, gays in other NATO nations are openly permitted to join the armed forces. Anyway, from 1995, the homosexuals in U.S. were not automatically barred. (Gay rights)

There has been the start of a number of groups for the repeal of laws that stop consensual homosexual conduct. They are trying to remove legislation barring discrimination that gays face in housing and employment, as also more acceptances of them against other people. There has been some progress and anti-sodomy laws have been removed in 2 states and in the other states except five, these laws have been extended to all persons. Even the Supreme Court has accepted this point-of-view and agreed that anti-sodomy laws were unconstitutional in 2003. It has also ruled that a law to this effect in Texas was illegal and accepted that their own decision of not extending privacy laws to consensual sexual acts were wrong. However there has been strong objection to these laws from conservative religious groups and this has led to the repeal of these laws in many cases. This led to the state of Colorado nullified the enacted civil rights protection for homosexuals by changing its constitution in 1992, and was the fist state to do so. This change was rejected at the level of the Supreme Court in 1996. A somewhat similar scene can be seen in Maine in 1998 where there was a statewide referendum and that led to the repeal of the protection of the gay's rights. (Gay rights) Thus one can see clearly that the protection of gay… READ MORE

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