Navy torpedoes ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ by honoring Harvey Milk

LGBT rights took another significant, albeit ironic step forward this week when the U.S. Navy bestowed one of its greatest honors on gay activist Harvey Milk, who had served as a closeted young naval officer during the Korean War.

Milk, the first openly gay elected official in California, was assassinated along with San Francisco Mayor George Moscone (D) in 1978 when he was serving on that city’s Board of Supervisors.

{mosads}Nearly four decades later and just five years after the repeal of the Department of Defense’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy — which prevented gay servicemen and servicewomen from revealing their sexual orientation — Milk became the first gay person to have a naval ship named in his honor.

Following construction, the USNS Harvey Milk will be one of six replenishment oilers built in honor of American civil rights champions including U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Calif.), Chief Justice Earl Warren, Attorney General Robert Kennedy, women’s rights activist Lucy Stone and abolitionist Sojourner Truth.

Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus was joined at the naming ceremony in San Francisco by U.S. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.); San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee (D); San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer (R); Stuart Milk, Milk’s nephew who co-founded the Harvey Milk Foundation; and this article’s co-author Brinker, who serves on the Milk Foundation’s Leadership and Advisor Board and received the Presidential Medal of Freedom the same year Stuart accepted the medal posthumously in his uncle’s honor.

Also present was Paula Neira, a naval academy graduate and a founding member of USNA Out, who was designated the ship’s co-sponsor with U.S. Sen. Diane Feinstein (D-Calif.).

Brinker noted at the ceremony that meeting Stuart Milk at the White House in 2009 changed her life and gave her a new cause to pursue in addition to her promise to her dying sister Susan G. Komen that she would do everything to end breast cancer, resulting in formation of the breast cancer charity bearing Susan’s name.

That new cause was achieving equal rights for the LGBT community both here and abroad, which was also of personal interest to Brinker, whose son, Eric Brinker, is an openly gay philanthropist and LGBT advocate. Both mother and son have been involved in numerous Milk Foundation events in the U.S. and overseas, including Hungary, where Nancy Brinker served as U.S. ambassador from 2001 to 2003.

Brinker also recalled that Susan was diagnosed with breast cancer the same year as Milk’s death, and that the two sisters watched news of his assassination with horror.

Milk served as an inspiration and role model for Brinker as she created a new model for breast cancer advocacy, and he still serves as a beacon in her son’s journey as a gay man in America.

And writing of beacons, it’s important to note that the famous quote often attributed to Confucius and used by Adlai Stevenson upon Eleanor Roosevelt’s death — “It is better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness” — resounds with added poignancy when remembered in conjunction with the final scene in director Gus Van Sant’s 2008 biofilm, “Milk,” when 30,000 people are depicted coming out to honor Milk at night with candles following his death.

“Harvey Milk’s legacy and story is an imperative tool that raises awareness about the LGBT community’s collective struggle, and it is a global struggle as I know firsthand from my diplomatic work. Today, we will all have the U.S. Navy as an educational partner, in spreading Harvey’s story and hope every time the USNS Harvey Milk enters a new port of call,” Brinker said at the ceremony.

Brinker, founder of Susan G. Komen, the world’s largest breast cancer charity, was previously a Goodwill Ambassador for Cancer Control to the U.N.’s World Health Organization; U.S. chief of protocol; and U.S. ambassador to Hungary. She is now continuing her work in media and consulting. Rosenthal is an independent journalist who covers issues, controversies and trends in oncology as special correspondent for MedPage Today. He is the founder of the National Cancer Institute Designated Cancer Centers Public Affairs Network and helped organize a number of national medicine-and-the-media conferences. The opinions expressed belong solely to the authors.

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