“Without justice, there can be no peace.” —Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.
The good news is now well known: last month, approximately 61 percent of the fourteen hundred members representing the Boy Scouts of America’s (BSA) National Council of delegates from across the country meet in Grapevine, Texas and voted to lift its century-old ban against gay and bisexual scouts. The decision will go into effect January 1, 2014.
According to its past position on homosexuality: “Boy Scouts of America believes that homosexual conduct is inconsistent with the obligations in the Scout Oath and Scout Law to be morally straight and clean in thought, word, and deed….”
So why, after its reiteration of the ban just last year, did the National Executive Board even consider a reversal? Quite simply, the Board’s policies have placed the Boy Scouts of America on the endangered organizations list. Since its reaffirmation of its ban last year, major corporate donors have either pulled out completely or have severely reduced financial support. Such corporations include the Intel Foundation, UPS, United Way, and Merck Company Foundation. Over 70,000 people signed a petition asking BSA’s National Executive Board to drop its discriminatory policy. In addition, around 65,000 scouts turned in their uniforms during the last two years in reaction to the ban, bringing down the total membership below 2.7 million. Since 2000, the organization has lost approximately 21% of its membership.
On the other side of the coin, the bad news is that these same BSA delegates failed to take a vote on lifting its long-standing prohibition of gay and bisexual scout leaders, thereby leaving the ban firmly in place.
Just last year, for example, the BSA demanded that Jennifer Tyrrill, lesbian mom and scout leader of her son Cruz’s den, leave her post because as reported, she did not “meet the high standards of membership that the Boy Scouts of America seeks.”
What “high standards” has Tyrrill not met? While serving as den leader, the cubs in her den volunteered at a local soup kitchen, collected canned goods for neighboring churches to distribute in food baskets, and performed a conservation project at a state park.
The Girl Scouts of America and the Boys & Girls Clubs of America organizations proudly welcome and appreciate members and leaders of all sexual and gender identities. The Girl Scouts, for example, has, indeed, fulfilled its own written promises and laws “to be Honest and Fair, Friendly and Helpful, Considerate and Caring, Courageous and Strong, and Responsible.”
But how can a boy scout or scout leader truly adhere to the Boy Scout Law of being “trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent” when the BSA still clings to its blatantly prejudicial, discriminatory, and quite frankly, offensive inherent policy on issues of sexual identity?
In addition to potential gay and bisexual scout leaders, no atheist or agnostic still need apply either since the Boy Scouts of America “Anthem” proclaims: “The Boy Scouts of America maintains that no member can grow into the best kind of citizen without recognizing an obligation to God….The recognition of God as the ruling and leading power in the universe and the grateful acknowledgment of His favors and blessings are necessary to the best type of citizenship and are wholesome precepts in the education of the growing members.”
No one is advocating same-sex sexual conduct between scouts or between scout leaders and scouts. BSA’s continuing ban on gay and bisexual leaders, however, confuses conduct with identity since the organization continues to reject leaders in terms of identity. The BSA policy could be considered as its “Tell, because we will ask, and if you don’t tell, we will pursue” policy.
See More in Social Justice
–Photo: Fort Meade/Flickr
