Carmen Poulin & Lynne Gouliquer
Over the last 3 to 4 years, we have been working with a Canadian network of researchers, activists, and former military members (We Demand an Apology Network) in an attempt to pressure the Federal Government to apologize for the discriminatory treatment it inflicted on LGBTQI2+ individuals in the military, RCMP, and public service. Our research on "The impact of the Canadian Forces policies on homosexual members and their partners" formed the basis for much of the evidence that was submitted to the Government to convince it to come forward with an apology. Our findings documented the impact of the Canadian Forces Administrative Order 19-20 (CFAO 19-20), which rendered homosexuality incompatible with serving in the Canadian military. Despite the decriminalisation of homosexuality in 1969 in Canadian civil society, under CFAO 19-20, the military conducted over 22 years of widespread witch hunts to identify "suspected" and "self-admitted" "homosexuals" and to terminate their careers. To do so, the military utilised various approaches such as spying, interrogating, tracking, stalking, and wire-tapping (Gouliquer, 2000; Poulin, 2001; Poulin, Gouliquer, & Moore, 2009). Our findings revealed how devastating the effects of CFAO19-20 were for LGBTQI2+ soldiers, ranging from living with constant fear, being traumatised for life, losing their livelihood, suffering from mental health difficulties, and even committing suicide. The impact of this work is far reaching but not in the usual way. We will share our adventure of learning new ways of knowledge mobilisation and revisit old ones.