BSA #2

It's looks like the Boy Scouts of America have decided to punt -- that is, rather than making the decision to change their ban on gay scout members and leaders, they are going to leave it up to the sponsors of local groups.    That is, I suppose, a reasonable intermediate step.

The BSA has been bedeviled by its position for decades, winning a Supreme Court decision in 2000 that permitted them to continue their exclusionary policy.

Now, several factors seem to be bringing the change. 

(1) Bad publicity -- over several recent incidents, including the ousting of a lesbian mother as leader of her son's Cub Scout pact, the refusal of admission to a gay teen, and threatening to withdraw a Cub Scout group's affiliation for posting a non-discrimination statement on its web site.

(2)  Two powerful members of its national board, the CEOs of AT&T and Ernst & Young, have been working from the inside to change the policy to be in keeping with their own corporate policies on sexual orientation.

(3)  Prominent contributors have announced that their companies will not continue their support:   UPS and Merck pharmaceuticals.

Not surprisingly, the leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention announced their disapproval and said their churches may decide to support other boys' club organizations instead of the BSA.

My family church, Sandersville Methodist, sponsors a scout troop.  I'll be watching to see what they do.   My guess:   the easiest things is to do nothing;  just continue ignoring the issue, and it's unlikely anyone will push for change.

Change is hard, I know, especially when two values you hold clash.  But, from my perspective, one of those values just doesn't hold up in this case -- the ideas about homosexuality that are based in prejudice rather than fact.

It is not a choice;  gay men are no more predators on the young than are straight men;  there is no "gay agenda" to convert children to being gay.   I will concede that gay leaders might teach a broader view of acceptance of differentness than some prejudiced straight leaders would;  but I also know a lot of straight people who would teach just as broad a view of acceptance.   Role model?  What are your criteria for an acceptable role model?   Is who that person loves the most important?

Ralph