(contemplative music)
- There was this war going on in Vietnam
and people could get drafted
and go to Vietnam and I thought, oh,
I could go to the Naval Academy,
get a free education, don't have to get a summer job
and I don't have to worry about getting drafted
to go to Vietnam.
- Every guy in my family since the Civil War
has been in the military.
You know, it wasn't a requirement.
It was something that I wanted to do.
It was a way that I thought
I could give back to my community.
- It was partly to do with my mother,
she did 20 years in the military
as well as a single parent.
And also for personal reasons,
was kind of looking for something
a little bit more above myself.
- Say 25 percent of the reason I got into the military
was based on the fact that I had grandfathers
that were in the military.
The real bulk of it, and this is silly,
the sort of immature, naive younger version of myself
joined because I genuinely thought that if I joined this
seemingly hyper masculine institution
that I would come out straight at the end.
- It was something I didn't figure out for awhile.
In fact, it was gonna go away
as soon as I met the right girl, right.
- I have to say that I did know I was gay,
but I hadn't fully come to terms with it.
- Nobody knew, I tried so absolutely hard
to hide that fact.
- I sorta knew I was gay, but I had definitely
not come out yet at all.
- Before don't ask don't tell, there were no rules.
The road rules were you didn't park your car
anywhere near a gay bar.
If you wanted to go to a gay bar
you got in your car and your drove
from San Diego to L.A. so nobody else would see you there.
- Nobody was asking and I didn't have to tell
what my feelings, what my sexuality was at the time.
So that worked really well for me.
- I may not be the most effeminate gay out there
or have all of the mannerisms associated with being gay,
but I certainly have enough that people would question me.
- But there was no way for it to work together.
So, I created two people.
I mean, I had Steve Clark, the gay guy.
Steve Hall, the straight guy.
- As I matured and became comfortable
in my own skin and where I was in life
becoming an adult it became really difficult
because I was in a long term relationship
with somebody who was also in the military.
- Talking to someone else in the ROTC department
and I remember speaking about my significant other
at the time and I believe I used the pronoun he
instead of she and they definitely picked up on that
pretty quickly and like, halted the whole conversation.
- Even though I was in the closet, I was a vocal advocate
for repeal and a lot of people said that that was wrong.
A lot of people actually took me aside
and told me that I was going to get myself in trouble
by advocating for repeal because even the thought
of advocating for equality was evidence enough
that you were gay to some people.
- When it went away I felt so good
for the kids that I know who were in the military.
That they no longer had to live under this,
which had at this point, really become a joke of a law.
- It was definitely refreshing to know
that once it was repealed, that's one less thing
I had to worry about.
I could continue doing what I love
in serving my country without the fear
of being kicked out for something I have no control over.
- But, truthfully, I still put on the uniform the next day
and it was like a normal work day.
- I still was scared that something would happen.
Even though it was signed into law.
- I think the day that it went away,
people who were veterans were cheering
much more than the active duty people.
Because the active duty people, like,
I go to work tomorrow just like I did yesterday.
You absolutely adore the work you're doing.
You're working with really, really good people.
And you have to make a choice.
Do I leave all of that because I'm tired
of my personal life sucking?
Or am I going to continue trying to build myself
into a more important position that maybe
someday I can do something about this?
- Whatever you wanna call it,
there's a greater good that we should all be striving for.
Some people would ask me why I joined the military
in the first place if I knew it was somewhere
that didn't accept people like me.
So, to me, in this case, doing what was right
was really just being myself and not being afraid
to be a part of an organization
which initially wouldn't accept me.
Because it would never accept people like me
if there weren't examples and people there
at the beginning to lead the way.