Some notes on the organization of Do Ask Do Tell: A Gay Conservative Lashes Back

 

The book is organized in six chapters, rather like movements of a symphony or string quarter, with an “arch” format (Bartok style) with the weightiest movement—the long development of the problem of gays in the military—in the middle at Chapter 4.  In some sense, the chapter track historical trends.  Chapter 1 covers the McCarthyism of the 50’s (up into the Kennedy years), Chapter 2 covers the draft and the Vietnam era (contraposed to the civil rights movement), Chapter 3 covers the “breaking loose” period of the 70’s, troubled by inflation and oil shocks, with the more “libertarian” 80’s, rocked by AIDS. The 90’s pick up in Chapter 4 with a modern interpretation of the military (gay issues), and both discrimination and prosperity in what “really matters”—the civilian economy, and Chapter 6 looks to the next millennium with the proposed “Bill of Rights 2.”   Arguably. Chapter 3 could have been divided into two chapters. The first four chapters are heavily autobiographical in approach, to be supplanted by an increasing support from detailed research in the later chapters.

 

There were earlier forms of the book..  At one time, the manuscript was to be bifurcated into tow parts: the autobiographical account of the military issues (3 chapters) and then four topical essays on moral values, family values, the workplace and discrimination, and the rise of individualism crossed with social justice.  In this format, the Bill of Rights 2 proposal was regarded as an appendix.

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