Regarding the Dec. 21 letter “No bigoted policy should stand”: I would like to address the rabbi’s concern about bigoted policy.

We live and work in an environment where discriminatory policy already exists. It is discriminatory to send smokers outside to smoke. It is discriminatory to tell people they cannot display sexually titillating material in the workplace. It is discriminatory to tell white supremacists or gang members that they cannot “be who they are.” We have these “discriminatory” policies because smokers, porn addicts, supremacists and gang members don’t live in their own world. Their words and actions affect others and we have determined as a military and as a society that those effects are detrimental to the good of individuals and society.

The question isn’t whether we can discriminate against those with same-sex attraction, it’s whether we can justly discriminate against them. Do their words and actions have a detrimental effect on others and the good order and discipline of our military community? Based on the media coverage, the letters to the editor, and anecdotal evidence from many concerned faithful in my pastoral care, I conclude there is evidence the change in policy will have detrimental effects.

What those effects will be remains to be seen. I suspect we are just moving from a society and culture that has said we can justly discriminate against those with same-sex attraction to saying we can now justly discriminate against those who espouse the value of marital love in a one-man, one-woman union.

This policy shift is part of a larger social juggernaut to promote, teach and normalize in our society a behavior that biology, history and faith traditions have found to be contrary to the good of individuals and society. When the day comes that a commander, supervisor, chaplain or any military member is punished or loses his career for addressing this issue in a critical manner or desires not to expose his family to this newly imposed publicly proclaimed value, will there be an outcry over that “bigoted” policy?