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In my last Editor’s Note (“Perry, Huckabee and the piss-me-off meter,” 3/8/2008), I wrote briefly about Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s new book, “On My Honor: Why the American Values of the Boy Scouts Are Worth Fighting For,” in which he outlines his argument for why the Scouting organization should be able to continue their discrimination against gay members and leaders.
I noted that Gov. Perry and other defenders of the Boy Scouts of America’s (BSA) anti-gay membership and leadership policies often downplay the Scouts’ discrimination against gay youth members. Sometimes, they take their obfuscation a step further.
In an interview with New York Times reporter Deborah Solomon, Gov. Perry said, “Well, the ban in scouting applies to scout leaders.” While his statement isn’t a lie — the policy does, indeed, apply to Scout leaders — it does imply a fallacy. Namely, that the BSA policies apply only to adult leaders.
Hans Zeiger, a 23-year-old Pepperdine University grad student and author of “Get off My Honor: The Assault on the Boy Scouts of America,” continues the shell game in a guest column in the Mar. 10 issue of The Waco Tribune in which he commends Perry’s book.
Not once does Zeiger — whom I had the pleasure of debating when we were younger — mention directly the affect of the BSA’s policy on youth members. He does, however, claim that the Boy Scouts are “under attack by the secular left, particularly by the American Civil Liberties Union.” He also boldly claims that “to change or delude the Scout Oath and Law would be to part ways with a century of successes in Scouting.”
Really? I’ve always considered my life successful. And I feel the same about the lives of other gay, former Scouts I know. We are accomplished, educated, civic-minded men who support the American ideals of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. We vote. We are engaged. We care about our families and communities. If allowed, we’d be happily contributing to the Scouting organization and movement that taught us these virtues.
It’s sadly ironic that the Boy Scouts of America teaches boys and young men to be “trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent” while they force members to turn their backs on a whole segment of fellow Scouts. They shred the very ideals upon which they are founded.
Even though the BSA’s actions are the very definition of hypocrisy, self-righteousness and contradiction, Zeiger and others claim that Scouting must follow this path to remain strong. “To give in to liberal demands and abandon ‘the virtues of liberty’ would destroy Scouting instead of preserving it for a new age,” he claims.
Zeiger fails to understand that when Scouts abandon their peers, the organization cannot be preserved. In fact, when the ideals of Scouting are twisted to hurt and exclude within the family, the organization begins to rot from the inside out.
I respect Zeiger immensely as a fellow Scout and a young man who is politically aware and civically engaged. However, I steadfastly refute his insistence that Gov. Perry’s book is a “call to celebrate Scouting.”
It is the opposite. It is a reminder of what is wrong with the current leadership of the Boy Scouts of America. It is a reminder of just how far people fueled by religion-based bigotry will go in harming children and youth. It is a sad, stark reminder that this cherished American institution doesn’t honor its own principles.
In his piece Zeiger exclaims, “Don’t mess with the Boy Scouts.” I’m not “messing” with them, Hans. I simply want what is best for an organization and movement that I love as deeply as you do.
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