Scout's Honor

Last week, two things I read reminded me of something that happened almost exactly 10 years ago. One was an old post I stumbled upon from October 2008 at More Than a Minivan Mom, a Mom-blog that I've been following. (Post is no longer available online; I was backreading through my subscription on my Google Reader page). Another was an article, a minor item, on the Huffington Post's site. The topic of both of these pieces was the Boy Scouts of America's ban on gays and atheists from membership and leadership in their organization. Ten years ago, the Supreme Court basically ruled that the BSA has the right to exclude people they don't want, such as a gays and atheists, because they are a private organization.

At the time of the Supreme Court ruling, I was a newly minted Girl Scout leader, still in training, and had yet to lead my first meeting. I remember feeling totally disgusted that the Boy Scouts organization was institutionalizing discrimination, and I have "officially" disliked the Boy Scouts ever since. This excerpt from More Than a Minivan Mom's post reminded me that the Boy Scout organization has unfortunately not changed their official tune, in almost exactly 10 years:

According to the poll on my blog over the past few days, 17% of you have no clue that the Boy Scouts actively and purposely discriminate against atheists and gays. According to the poll on my blog over the past few days, 22% of you know this and still think they are a wonderful organization.

Interesting.

At first glance, the Boy Scouts seem like a wonderful organization promoting family values (a phrase that involuntarily invokes my gag reflex) and charitable good deeds. According to the Boy Scouts of America National Council, the purpose of the Scouts is to "to provide an educational program for boys and young adults to build character, to train in the responsibilities of participating citizenship, and to develop personal fitness". The Boy Scout mission, "is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law". The Scouts are the largest male youth organization in the country, and as of 2007, nearly 3 million young boys were involved in Boy Scouts.

My two sons will never be one of those 3 million young boys, as long as my husband and I have anything to say about it.

As the Boy Scouts of America website proudly states, you cannot be an atheist or openly gay individual and join the Scouts or serve as a troop leader.

Quite frankly? There's no way in hell I will ever condone that type of mentality by allowing my sons to participate in an organization like that.

Don't get me wrong - I agree with the courts that the Boy Scouts, as a private organization, have the right to enforce those guidelines (it's their Constitutional right to be bigots, I suppose), and I can also agree that there are elements of Boy Scouts that are wonderful. But for me, and for my husband, all the leadership training, camping trips, and volunteerism in the world cannot excuse an organization that so openly and proudly flaunts their narrow mindedness.
Coincidentally, the BSA were in the news again, same topic, different twist: Many Scout groups receive free or discounted use of public, as well as private, meeting places around the country. But why should public government--your tax dollars--support an organization that discriminates against certain sectors of the public? Just because the Supreme Court said it was okay to discriminate if you're a private organization, the government is under no obligation to extend special benefits to your organization. It's interesting that the Boy Scouts' ban has held for so long, but I wonder if these kinds of local challenges will finally make them realize that just because it's legal to discriminate, it doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.

In theory, if I had a son, I'd say NO to him joining Boy Scouts. But I'll bet it would be hard to do so in the face of everyone else's kid being in it and also being known as that kind of parent. You know, the kind that values inclusion and diversity and sticking to what you believe in. I'm glad I only have a "hypothetical" son to consider.

But what about choices your friends make as parents of boys? Now that I'm a Mom and many of my friends are as well, I have since shifted from strong dislike to tolerating Boy Scouts because of my many friends who are Moms of Boy Scouts. Shockingly, I have even given them money for their ridiculously overpriced popcorn. The first time I bought their popcorn, I felt like I was giving money to the devil. But it was my friend's son, and he is a sweet, kind and loving boy, the total antithesis of what the BSA has institutionalized for a decade. Then the next year it was another very good friend' son, and the same thing--he is sweetest little boy ever. And these boys still are, despite being Boy Scouts.

It's interesting that the BSA are still officially focused on excluding people from their membership and leadership, while the Girl Scouts perspective on the same issue contrasts greatly. Ten years ago, the Girl Scouts of the USA Communications Director stated: "It's a non-issue for us. We don't ask people to declare X, Y, or Z. It's not in our makeup to have to define people like that. The Boy Scouts believes that to be gay is somehow immoral. That is not our feeling." Girl Scouts don't ask members or leaders if they're gay. They also don't expect everyone to believe in the same God, or any for that matter. Ten years later, I am so proud to be a part of an organization that continues to value inclusion and openness.

I still "officially" dislike what the Boy Scouts say they stand for. I don't hate any little boys though. I wish more parents of Boy Scouts would stop thinking it's okay for an organization that has such an impact on so many young boys to exclude anyone they don't like and demand change. Life is too short to systematically dislike/exclude/hate someone because they're not who you want them to be.

Putting It All Out There

A little "what if?" game to play in your head. What if your spouse of over a decade tells you that he no longer is in love with you/has had an affair with someone else/is ready to move on? No, it's not my spouse. Or even a close friend or relative's.

What if the people involved in this situation are people you read about in a blog? I've been following a Mom-blog by a friend of a friend, not religiously, but now and again because I liked reading about her life as a working Mom of 3 kids in Austin, and then later in a Dallas suburb, and because her stories were funny and clever. She has a way with words and is a truly gifted writer. But what can you say when her words become too uncomfortable and heartbreakingly sad to read? And you don't even know this person? You go from innocently catching up on Mom-stories to knowing waaaay too much about this woman's marriage, and even worse, it's like an accident on the side of the road-- you can't not look.

She wrote, at first, that her husband said that "maybe this isn't working for him." That was Valentine's Day. Then she wrote that she could not elaborate more about her marriage, except that she did exactly that--about their couples' therapy, her feelings, frustrations, insecurities. And then the other shoe fell--her husband's confession of infidelity--and even more of her intimate thoughts came out on her blog. Until the day she decided not to write anymore, that "my marriage means more to me than my blog." However, only a week later, her marriage had pretty much ended, and the blogging started once again. That was this past Monday.

I feel so much sadness for this woman who I've never even met, because she was blindsided, and her life was already full and challenging enough. When you read a person's blog, you get to know them a little bit, and only 7 days before everything started to fall apart for her in February, she wrote of her marriage:

So far, perhaps the greatest accomplishment of my life. More than my degrees, my career, even my three children... I am proud of our relationship.

It felt more than a little voyeuristic to continue reading this woman's blog after it went from being a thoughtful, funny snapshot of modern family life to a one-sided view of the unraveling of a relationship. But I was hooked, I'll admit it. It was like a real-life suburban soap opera unfolding before my very eyes. I cried through several of her posts. What would I do in her shoes? How would I feel or react?

All the while I was catching up on her posts, I also cringed for her and her family's privacy. At this point, it's almost non-existent. She had upwards of a thousand hits per day on her blog sometimes when her life was "normal." And while there is an awesome online community of strangers who are supporting her through this, it's unnerving to think about the sheer numbers. I send prayers her way, that she will get through this and be stronger, not broken, from the experience. I also pray for her precious children. She and her family have been in my thoughts very much this week. But I also wish, despite how much I admire her ability to put into words exactly what she going through, that she would not write about it at all. So much is out there about her and her family, and these are children whose ages are the same as my kids', whom we now know more about than just what their Halloween costumes looked like or that they love Chuck E. Cheese. I write this a little bit hypocritically of course, as I am still keeping up with this woman's posts. But if her blog finally goes dark, I will respect her silence all the more.

Blogs are such strange creatures in the online world. Kind of like your own personal diary broadcast to everyone and anyone. A tribute to one's own healthy bit of narcissism, in a totally different way than updated-every-second social media sites are. Perhaps that's why my own blogs have never quite moved beyond the merely-out-there-occasionally-updated-rarely-read status: I can't bring myself to write about anything particularly private or intimate from my own life or those of my family members. And sometimes I think that has a stultifying effect on my blogs overall. I don't own my family's thoughts, actions, feelings, words, even as they affect me. They each exist apart from me and our collective "family." They deserve their own private lives.

So my posts are as random as the thoughts and ideas I feel comfortable sharing with the wider world (whoever you are!). I wish I could write everything in my life, maybe my life would make more sense to me(!), but I just can't give up my family and my privacy for that.