Pentagon calls Netflix's hit gay Marines show Boots 'woke garbage'; Out, October 16, 2025

Mey Rude, Out ; Pentagon calls Netflix's hit gay Marines show Boots 'woke garbage'

[Kip Currier: As the head of the Department of Defense-cum-War, Pete Hegseth's statements, reported in this article and other news stories, are disrespectful to the thousands of LGBT service members who have selflessly served and sacrificed for their country.

All people are entitled to dignity and respect. The divisiveness of Hegseth and others who denounce people and groups must not be normalized.

Thank you to all military service members, living and deceased, who have given so much for democracy, our nation, and the world.]

[Excerpt]

"Netflix's new show Boots is topping the streamers' viewing charts, but the U.S. military isn't as enthusiastic about the show as fans are.

The Pentagon now says in a statement that it does not endorse the new show, which stars Miles Heizeras a closeted young man who joins the Marines in a time when it was forbidden for gay recruits to serve.

"Under President Trump and Secretary Hegseth, the U.S. military is getting back to restoring the warrior ethos. Our standards across the board are elite, uniform, and sex neutral because the weight of a rucksack or a human being doesn't care if you're a man, a woman, gay, or straight," a statement from Pentagon Press Secretary Kingsley Wilson to Entertainment Weekly says.

In the statement, Wilson says that officials "will not compromise our standards to satisfy an ideological agenda, unlike Netflix whose leadership consistently produces and feeds woke garbage to their audience and children."

Netflix has yet to respond.

Since becoming Secretary of Defense, Pete Hegseth has made several moves to erase LGBTQ+ people from the military. In June, he announced that a Navy ship named for gay rights leader Harvey Milk would be renamed. Hegseth also supports Trump's Executive Order 14183, which mandates the discharge of all trans service members and prevents new trans troops from enlisting."

Pete Hegseth Would Hate Netflix’s New Show. That’s Why I Loved It.; Slate, October 9, 2025

DAVID MACK, Slate ; Pete Hegseth Would Hate Netflix’s New Show. That’s Why I Loved It.

"“Becoming a man? What does that actually mean?” That’s the question posed at the start of Boots, Netflix’s new queer coming-of-age series set in a Marine Corps training program, but also one essentially posed by our new so-called Secretary of War Pete Hegseth just last week. Yet while Hegseth, onstage before the nation’s top military brass, tried to answer the question with chest-beating machismo, insisting on “the highest male standard” and decrying “beardos” and “males who think they’re females,” only Boots arrives at a coherent answer.

In an incredible bit of timing, Boots is also set in 1990—the year to which Hegseth said he wants to wind back military training and standards, declaring current guidelines “woke garbage.”"