The Boy Scouts’ proposal on gay participation goes the wrong way
By Editorial Board,
Published: April 27
WHEN THEY take the Scout Oath,
boys pledge to be “morally straight.” But as they figure out how
finally to remove their ban on openly gay Scouts, the Boy Scouts of
America’s national leaders have become morally incoherent.
Last week the organization’s executive committee proposed changing the membership rules to allow openly gay youth
— but not openly gay adults who would be Scout leaders — to
participate. The committee is in a tough spot, attempting to find a
compromise policy on a polarizing issue without rending a community that
does a great deal of good. Some Scouting sponsors still maintain a deep
religious conviction that homosexuality is immoral; many others, who
accept that gay boys don’t choose to be gay, are eager to end the
discrimination.
But this is a bad way to deal with that challenging reality.
The
executive committee earlier considered leaving the question up to
individual troop sponsors. There was at least an argument for that as a
pragmatic intermediate step. Openly gay boys and adults could
participate in enlightened troops; those who object would still have
troops that continued to discriminate available to them. The proposal
was silent on the evils of discrimination.
The latest plan is
worse than silent. Excluding openly gay adults suggests that they are
dangerous, potential child abusers or brainwashers of such threat that
they should be denied any place in the Boy Scouts of America.
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