DON’T BE AFRAID TO ASK
Johnny Symons pursues gay rights in the military with his most provocative film to date
By Michelle Michael
Director Johnny Symons doesn’t resist being characterized as a gay filmmaker. In fact, he says, “There are really not enough people doing it and I will as long as there is a need to tell a story.” For the creator of Ask Not, it may be a while for that need to run out. His third major documentary expounds on the dilemma of being both pro-gay and pro-military. It also continues a trend for Symons.
“I feel like it started with Daddy and Papa [his first film], being involved in something considered off-limits to most people,” he says. Through film, Symons creates a visible stage for people to interact with the tougher issues in the gay and lesbian community. In Ask Not he adds a narrative dimension to his film with the use of several surprising statistics. For example, in 2006, 70% of military service members said they would be comfortable serving with gay and lesbian people—as opposed to 16% in 1993. Meshing together statistics and personal accounts from military service members, Symons aims to deconstruct the wall of civil rights issues surrounding the gay community.
“Any gay documentary is going to be fairly political,” he says. The film follows disenfranchised service members, activist groups, and one soldier bound for Iraq, “Perry,” through their attempts to challenge a military policy. The 15 year-old ban’s full name is “don’t ask, don’t tell, don’t harass, or pursue,” prohibiting gay enlistees from being open about their sexuality.
In order to examine the law’s implications on screen, Symons begins by looking to its source, Bill Clinton’s 1992 inaugural speech. It was then that the optimistic president declared an end to the previous “no exception” rule. The following scene introduces Representative Tom DeLay (R, TX), who replies to Clinton’s promise by saying, “I just don’t think he realized just how conservative the military really is.”
And the dilemma ensues as Symons explains, “Any time we allow moral gatekeepers to be in control of our laws it sets a dangerous precedent.” Symons incorporates multiple views in his in-depth analysis of don’t ask-don’t tell, including that of its creator, retired Professor Emeritus of sociology Dr. Charles Moskos. In the film, Moskos argues it was the only viable compromise in light of Clinton’s proposal for a segregate gay army.
Aside from its politics, Symons illustrates the true cost of the policy for gays in a number of personal true stories. A telling account is the story of former Staff Sergeant Fred Fox, who says being forced to remain closeted to his peers was like “talking about your back without being able to talk about your spine.”
Throughout the film, Symons convinces us we are resisting lifting the ban merely out of habit. As he continually points out, we are already there. However, every year 4,000 service members choose not to re-enlist because they are unable to be honest about their sexuality.
Still, some proponents of the ban in the film maintain that if gay service members were to be open about their sexual preference, it would undermine unit cohesion because their straight counterparts wouldn’t trust them. But Symons couldn’t disagree with this more. He insists, “If they can’t tell the truth, they have to lie, and create machinations to create this false persona. As a result of that, the unit will be less cohesive.”
An activist at heart, Symons began his career in community organization and HIV prevention, before earning a Master’s degree from Stanford in filmmaking. “I am very attracted to real people’s stories, witnessing what real people are going through,” he says. Even so, “Filmmaking is tough business,” he says. “I only spend about 2% of my time doing creative work.”
While the director is encouraged by the overall increased visibility of gays, as a parent he sees “so much presumption of heterosexuality in media,” which is troublesome.
Ask Not was shot with a Panasonic DVX, and edited on Final Cut Pro. For Symons, personal connections are the most important and compelling part of the medium. With only two and a half years and completion funding of $360,000 from the International Television Service, he was able to track social change across the states.
Symons follows retired Real Admiral Al Steinman closely in the film, who is the highest-ranking military member ever to come out. Steinman reveals to the group and to the audience the sacrifices he made in order to serve.
“I didn’t do anything gay in the military, therefore I had no personal life,” says Steinman. He remembers that prior to his retirement in 2003, he “couldn’t do all the things that straight people take for granted.”
Still equipped with military bearing, Steinman accompanied a group of dismissed soldiers on the Call To Duty tour. The campaign of half a dozen linguists and infantrymen spoke at college campuses and to staunch opponents in their efforts to challenge the system.
Steinman, who came out on the tenth anniversary of the ban, becomes not only a representative for his campaign, but a key figure for Symons, who thinks of the movement as an integral “part of the larger struggle for equal rights.”
Now a prominent figure in the gay military conflict, Steinman believes the Call To Duty tour was “chipping away at the stereotypical image of gays” most recognizable in the character Jack on TV’s Will and Grace. But like Symons, Steinman feels that this is a political issue that probably won’t be discussed in this election year.
Another compelling facet to the movement is introduced by Symons’ coverage of the Right to Serve campaign, co-founded by activists Haven Herrin and Jacob Reitan in 2005.
Symons chooses this multi-city campaign for his opening scene. The camera’s narrowed field of vision accentuates the quiet rioters engulfing recruiting stations in protest of the law. After disclosing their sexual orientation, the campaigners were denied the opportunity of volunteering. The camera follows the youth as they are arrested.
Co-organizer Herrin doesn’t consider the film an aesthetic piece. She says, “Every film, sit-in, or book has the potential for radical change. I hope for just such an effect from Ask Not.”
The subjects of Ask Not all have one thing in common with Symons. As Herrin says, and everyone agrees, “Social change is not easy, it has a toll.” Yet despite Symons’ exhaustive search for why the don’t ask-don’t tell policy still exists, just what the price of this toll is may still be unclear.
Nevertheless, Johnny Symons believes now more than ever, “There is a whole generation growing up that believes being gay is totally legit. And some of them are joining the military. The tide is turning and the military is finding itself behind its civilians.”
Director Johnny Symons