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A review by aimiller
Coming Out Under Fire: The History of Gay Men and Women in World War Two by Allan Bérubé
3.0
Hoo boy. I want to start this off by first acknowledging the important work Berube did in this book; this book was definitely groundbreaking when it was published, and importantly, legitimized the service of gay and lesbian veterans of World War II. Berube's work here also served a materially political purpose, which is something that many academics cannot say.
That being said, if you, like me, are suspicious at best of the citizen-soldier construct, this book can be difficult to get through. I found myself drowning in homo-nationalism so frequently that I had to put the book aside for weeks at a time. (You'll notice it took me ~six months to finish it, and that wasn't just because grad school got in the way.) The introduction to Berube's My Desire for History gives some context for his need to honor these veterans this way, but it still was difficult to grapple with as a reader who might have appreciated a little more nuanced look into the service of these individuals.
The best parts of the book for me were those centering around lesbian women in the military--they were mostly free from the horrifying culture of masculinity that Berube described with gay men serving, and so I enjoyed them much more. I will, as always in books like this, point out that though Berube pays lip service to bisexual and transgender people in the text, their actual appearances are minimal at best (which is to say that some of the folks interviewed or talked about might have identified as bisexual, though Berube is not explicit in identifying any,) and, in the case of transgender people in particular, are wholly absent (which is really interesting, given the rich history of particularly transgender people serving in the military.) Though I understand that wasn't Berube's intention per se, I am going to note it for potential readers.
That being said, if you, like me, are suspicious at best of the citizen-soldier construct, this book can be difficult to get through. I found myself drowning in homo-nationalism so frequently that I had to put the book aside for weeks at a time. (You'll notice it took me ~six months to finish it, and that wasn't just because grad school got in the way.) The introduction to Berube's My Desire for History gives some context for his need to honor these veterans this way, but it still was difficult to grapple with as a reader who might have appreciated a little more nuanced look into the service of these individuals.
The best parts of the book for me were those centering around lesbian women in the military--they were mostly free from the horrifying culture of masculinity that Berube described with gay men serving, and so I enjoyed them much more. I will, as always in books like this, point out that though Berube pays lip service to bisexual and transgender people in the text, their actual appearances are minimal at best (which is to say that some of the folks interviewed or talked about might have identified as bisexual, though Berube is not explicit in identifying any,) and, in the case of transgender people in particular, are wholly absent (which is really interesting, given the rich history of particularly transgender people serving in the military.) Though I understand that wasn't Berube's intention per se, I am going to note it for potential readers.