Friends of Scouting

[The Folk Prophet]

All camping canceled!

 

Problem solved!

[MarginOfError]

All camping canceled!

 

Problem solved!

I want you to know that I laughed.  But I can't bring myself to like a comment about ending all camping. 

[Capitalist_Oinker]

Like people who openly proclaim their kleptomania, or substance/porn addictions?

 

Presumably not.

I imagine the pool of kleptomaniacs and substance/porn addicts who celebrate their particular vices is quite small. On the other hand, the number of homosexuals who celebrate theirs is sizable and growing.

 

"It's one thing to quietly acknowledge a personality trait that gives challenges; but when I hear terms like "openly proclaim"--that, to me, connotes a situation where the person doesn't see the trait as a challenge at all."

 

You and me both.

And I believe that is precisely what we (the Church and BSA) are going to be dealing with. It may generally start out with those who "quietly acknowledge" their homosexuality, but the "gay community" will spread like a cancer inside BSA and will eventually be dominated by  militant homosexuals whose real aim is the destruction of the organization right down to its foundational principles.

If you like the modern-day Girl Scouts, you should love the BSA in about 10 years.

[Guest]

No, Anatess, that's not my position either.  If you're making a rhetorical argument that I should treat the relationship between straight Gospel-observing boys and gay Gospel-observing boys the way I'd treat the relationship between straight Gospel-observing boys and straight Gospel-observing girls--no, I would not do that; and I've tried to explain my reasoning for that in this thread already. 

 

I agree with a general rule that we try not to put youths who may be sexually attracted to each other, together.  I think a partial exception to that general rule may exist where one youth is gay, but nevertheless committed to living the Gospel; and another youth of the same gender is straight and similarly committed to living the Gospel while understanding the situation and being especially resistant to temptations of that sort.  I think that's preferable to a policy of "identify the gay kid, isolate him, and make darned sure everyone knows he's different and not to be trusted, regardless of his track record of Gospel obedience".

 

Making fifty young men camp one hundred feet away from fifty young women, humiliates no one.  But making a gay kid set up camp a hundred feet away from the rest of the kids, or telling him he can't go at all--that's gonna leave a psychological mark; and I don't think we should do that to good kids who happen to be gay.  (Yeah, we sort of do the same thing with the adult males who attend YW Girls' Camp as "priesthood leadership", knowing that every other person at the camp is watching them like a hawk for the first sign of misconduct--but these are grown men, and they can take the awkwardness.)

 

As for "practicing homosexuality"--that is not at all what I've been saying.  I have tried (apparently, not very lucidly; and for that I apologize) to make it clear that my position applies to youths with same-sex attraction who acknowledge that attraction but are nevertheless committed to the gospel generally, to the law of chastity in particular, and have an established history of adhering to those standards.

Okay, now I'm really confused. I don't understand your position again.

So, let me try this again... from reading and re-reading this post, I'm starting to think that you don't think that hetero-attracted boys and homo-attracted boys deserve different treatment... but that boys and girls deserve different treatment... and, your reasoning is you don't want to separate gays because they might become outcasts.

I don't understand this. I thought that is EXACTLY what homosexual lobby wants - they want to "come out" so they can be recognized. With that recognition comes different rules - same rules that apply to girls versus boys. But then you're saying that you want them to "come out" but then you don't want them to be treated as homosexuals, you want them treated as boys. If that's the case, then why bother coming out at all? Because, with the recognition of their sexuality, then their being in a different tent is not making them outcasts - it's recognizing their differences in the same manner that we recognize boys are different from girls, normalizing the difference.

And the practicing homosexuals part - I didn't attribute that to anything you said. That was merely a statement of MY position.

Edited March 6, 2015 by anatess

[Just_A_Guy]

Anatess, I love ya like a sister, but I really don't know how I can rephrase that post so as to be any more clear than I already have been.  I don't know if it's my own inability to be articulate, or whether it's a language barrier thing--but either way, no; your restatement as I understand it does not accurately reflect my views.

 

General rule:  Kids do not bunk with other kids to whom they are, or might reasonably become, sexually attracted.

 

Partial exception:  Gay kids can bunk with straight kids to whom they might conceivably be attracted, IF and ONLY IF a) gay kid has a history of living the law of chastity and is generally committed to gospel, b) straight kid is himself committed to living the law of chastity, c) straight kid understands the situation, and d) straight kid is sufficiently physically, emotionally, and spiritually mature to resist any unwanted (and, thanks to the other criteria, highly unlikely) advances.

 

I'm not talking about treating anyone "like a homosexual" or "like a heterosexual".  I'm saying that you take homosexuals and, on a case-by-case scenario, evaluate to what degree they may be a sexual threat to those they bunk around; and then you weigh the risk posed by the individual against the damage you inflict by isolating that individual from the community.

 

Is that more clear?

Edited March 6, 2015 by Just_A_Guy