Shocker!!! Fags in the Singapore Army!!!

My friend's going into the army later this month. Direct intake. Combat-fit. And he's gay.

According to him, the Medical Officer DID NOT ASK HIM IF HE WAS HOMOSEXUAL during the pre-enlistment medical check-up. They didn't get him to pull down his underpants and cough, either.

This was part of the old ritual, part of my and many other men's coming out experiences, for chrissakes. When I confessed I was gay, they made me wait in the clinic with all the other boys in their underwear and monitored me for signs of arousal (I was too full of angst to get a hard-on).

Now they don't even have a waiting-room full of boys in underwear. Guys are allowed to wear shorts. (Exposing the skin isn't just so doctors can check vital stats more easily, it's also to reveal gangster tattoos.)

My friend got checked up by the army first in 2005 (they asked him the gay question, and he denied everything), and is now being treated to a different standard operating procedure in 2008. So in between, something must have changed.

So are they okay with gay, lesbian and bisexual officers now then? Does the category 302 even exist anymore? Or is it reserved for pre-op transsexuals? (There was one in my camp, and she was gorgeous.)

And - for the sake of my categorising mind - when the hell did this change get made?

Very very clever of the government men, to do it so quietly, so the fundies wouldn't get pissed off. Still shocked. Still shocked.