Don't Ask, Don't Tell in Professional and Personal Relationships

For what's it's worth, I support the American Servicemembers Legal Defense Network in its effort to end "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" (DADT), the federal law that bans qualified men and women from serving openly in the military because of their sexual orientation, and I still can't get around the idea that more than 12,000 American service members have been dismissed since 1994 because it became known they were gay. Meanwhile, in at least 25 nations, including Australia, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, and Israel, gays can serve openly in the armed forces.

DADT seems almost like an insult to the collective of American soldiers, as U.S. Rep. Patrick Murphy, a Pennsylvania Democrat, said in a USA Today article, "I take it as a personal affront to our warriors. To say that other countries' soldiers are professional enough to handle this and American soldiers aren't is really a slap in the face."

On a personal level, I know gay people in open relationships who also have a "Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell" policy concerning their extra-relationship activities. Basically, it involves the implicit sentiment of "Deceive me" required from both parties. From my experience, and from those of the people I know, this kind of agreement has lead to conflict, misunderstanding, and suspicion, to say the least.

Doesn't it generally make good sense that in any relationship, professional or personal, having nothing to hide means having one less group of problems with which to deal?

I'm just saying.