Recently, the Boy Scouts of America voted to end its decades-long ban on gay youth members. Long a point of bitter contention and lawsuits, they have fought bitterly to be able to retain the right to discriminate in BSA Scouting, even taking their case to the nation’s highest court. They have justified their position citing the Boy Scout oath to “be morally straight.”
If you can’t live the Boy Scout oath, you can’t be a member.
While the recent decision has caused many to cheer, many of us have found reason to not applaud too loudly. Shouldn’t we be jumping for joy? It would be a rather momentous occasion for homosexual children to finally be able to enjoy the benefits of Scout membership, but there’s a bit of a problem.
The ban will only be lifted for youth membership. The BSA will continue to discriminate against gay adult leaders.
Not only is this sad for us adults with fond memories of our Scouting days, but what does it tell the children? You’re only okay as long as you’re a minor. Once you turn the magic age of 18, you are no longer welcome in the organization that you participated in possibly since you were 8 years old.
What a tragic waste for those youth, the organization, and for future Scouts.
I first joined Scouts in the 3rd grade. I advanced from Cub Scouts to Webelos and earned the coveted Arrow of Light award. I remained an active Scout in my teens. Living at home as an only child with an abusive mother and no healthy father figure, my troop and its leaders were often my proverbial saving grace.
After Explorer Scouts, I became an adult leader and served as a Scoutmaster, committee chairperson, and eventually served as a District Commissioner. I was also active in the Youth Protection Program and became a Youth Protection Trainer.
I was finally forced to leave Scouting when our local council issued a memo affirming their decision to follow the national BSA policies of banning gays as leaders after the SCOTUS decision ruling in their favor.
I was devastated. While the ban had been in place all along, it was an environment of don’t ask, don’t tell. I patiently waited for the courts to rule and hoped that a greater level of understanding would prevail. I sat in the district commissioner meeting feeling numb as the memo was read.
I tried to decide if I would remain under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” existence, but my fellow commissioners helped me make my decision as they spoke of how homos are perverts and how they wouldn’t want their kids camping with a gay man.
The notion that a gay Scoutmaster is a danger to the youth is absolutely ridiculous. For starters, the BSA’s Youth Protection program has several safeguards in it. Children are never allowed to be alone with an adult leader. Scouts may not share a tent with a leader unless that leader is (a) their child, or (b) another Scout is in the tent at all times. Showers at camps may not be shared by adults and youth. The same restriction applies to any changing areas.
Aside from the Youth Protection program rules, it also ignores the fact that the vast majority of child molesters are heterosexual (who typically are also married). Almost half of the perpetrators of child molestation cases were related to the victim, and nearly 70% of all convicted molesters are Caucasian.
If the BSA policy is truly aimed at protecting the youth, then the ban should actually be applied to white, heterosexual adults who are related to someone in the pack or troop.
Statistically speaking, children are safer with gay male leaders than straight ones.
What is reality is that the Boy Scouts of America, like so many other organizations and individuals, hide behind nonsense to mask their discriminatory beliefs. The BSA should practice the Oath it claims to hold in such reverence and be morally straight by either eradicating intolerance from within its ranks or stopping the lies and just admitting its homophobia.
I’m glad gay youth will now have Scouting opportunities, but I look forward to the day when the organization is actually living its own BSA Scouting principles.
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