Today’s blacklist story illustrates a growing trend I am finding in these stories of the modern leftist effort to silence and blackball anyone who criticizes or opposes it. Increasingly, the victims of this intolerance are fighting back, both in public and in the courts. How successful that resistance has been however remains unclear.

In today’s story, a decorated Army chaplin had posted in January on Facebook strong criticism of the incoming Biden administration’s decision to allow men who claim they are women (and vice versa) to serve in the military, and was immediately sanctioned by his superiors for doing so.

[U.S. Army Chaplain (Major) Andrew Calvert] objected to the anticipated government policy change. “How is rejecting reality (biology) not evidence that a person is mentally unfit (ill), and thus making that person unqualified to serve. There is little difference in this than over those who believe and argue for a ‘flat earth,’ despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary,” Calvert wrote in his comment, according to Army Times.

“The motivation is different, but the argument is the same. This person is a MedBoard for Mental Wellness waiting to happen. What a waste of military resources and funding!” he concluded.

Following an investigation, Calvert was issued a General Officer Memorandum of Reprimand (GOMOR) on April 22 by Lieutenant General Robert P. White.

In May Calvert obtained legal support and sued. Less than a month later, the Army backed down, ending its persecution of Calvert, clearing his record.

That Calvert fought the effort by the military to reprimand him for his opinions is commendable. Nonetheless, in this case the victory appears somewhat hollow.

To win, his lawyers had argued that Calvert’s original comments had been written and posted on Facebook while Trump was still in office, and thus matched the policy of that administration. Calvert was thus not publicly criticizing the orders of his superiors.

Calvert has since deleted his Facebook post, and appears to have accepted as part of the deal that he will no longer publicly express such opinions.

In other words, he has been effectively silenced, despite this win.

Are those who agree with Biden’s policy equally silenced? They are not. In fighting for him, his legal team had made the argument that the military seemed to have no problem with military officers demonstrating publicly against Trump’s policy, during Trump’s administration.

[T]he First Liberty attorney highlighted the hypocrisy evident at a lack of concern over an incident in 2019 when active duty members of the armed services, in uniform, marched in a political parade “to show opposition to the Trump Administration’s ban on transgender troops.”

“Clearly, if uniformed, active duty service members are permitted to express political opposition to their commander-in-chief’s policy, an active duty chaplain may express support for that same policy,” Berry wrote.

Note that none of those officers protesting Trump ever faced any punishment. And should they protest again if and when a conservative becomes president I doubt they will be reprimanded then either.

In other words, the military’s long standing policy that no one in the military should publicly criticize the policies of their superiors applies only to conservatives, a double standard that now exists across our entire society. Support leftist or Marxist or Democratic Party policies, and you will be free to do as you wish. Oppose those policies publicly in any way, no matter how trivial, and the full force of the government will be used to silence you.

The blacklists continue to gain force, as they are succeeding even in cases where they lose in court.