2012 was a tough year for the National Organization for Marriage. Will they react by pulling back to moderate their goals, or will they thrash about, careening desperately into greater and greater extremism?
Now we know.
NOM does not want the Boy Scouts of America to allow gay scoutmasters. What this has to do with promoting a healthy marriage culture, I can’t say. But NOM prez Brian Brown is emphatic:
…the Scouts are considering a proposal to abandon their longstanding national policy, and instead leaving the decision of allowing homosexual scout leaders to each individual council.
As we know from the marriage battle, capitulation is not a strategy for preserving our cherished values. When homosexual activists demanded “rights” and “benefits” many well-meaning policymakers responded with “civil unions” and “domestic partnerships,” believing that this “compromise” would preserve marriage while providing tangible benefits for same-sex couples. Though many in the gay community lobbied for these changes, once enacted they quickly adopted a strategy of condemning them as “second class” and used them to successfully file lawsuits redefining marriage.
Even though their supporters have relentlessly pressured the Boy Scouts to admit openly homosexual men as scoutmasters with the responsibility of mentoring America’s youth, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) now says the “compromise” the Boy Scouts are considering does not go nearly far enough.
They will settle for nothing short of capitulation – homosexuality-affirming troops in every locale across America, tolerating no exceptions, period. Any parent or young man who holds a traditional Judeo-Christian view of sexual morality will be attacked as bigoted and accused of discriminatory conduct. You can imagine the lawsuits that will follow.
The BSA Board of Directors will be voting very soon on this new policy proposal — perhaps as early as Monday — and they are seeking public input into their decision. We need to make it clear that compromising honorable values is no path to organizational victory.
Actually, I can’t imagine the lawsuits that will follow. Despite NOM’s victim project, it’s never shown us a lawsuit in the U.S. based simply on someone holding a traditional Judeo-Christian view of sexual morality. This is their great fundraising fiction. Perhaps that explains why they have such money problems.
Let’s be clear on why Brian’s all a-flutter.
The Boy Scouts are not being required by law to stop discriminating.
They are not instituting a national non-discrimination policy.
They are not recommending that any local council stop discriminating.
They are merely pondering whether to let local councils decide for themselves.
And Brian Brown is freaking out. He’s drawing a battle line here and we should note it. I’ve searched for anything that would make Brian’s argument unique to the Boy Scouts, and I can’t find it. He’s made a case, right or wrong, that it’s a threat to religious liberty for private organizations to have no official policy on anti-gay discrimination. Brian’s reasoning — and correct me if I’m wrong — implies there is only way to protect religious freedom: make sure everybody out there implements and enforces a mandatory policy of discrimination against gay and lesbian people.
This is Dark Ages stuff. In Brian Brown’s utopia, no one will dare sue for anti-gay discrimination because no one will dare reveal themselves as gay. No one will come out to their friends. No one will acknowledge their partner. Because every group, every charity, every employer will have a mandatory no-gay policy. Anything less is “compromising honorable values” and opening good people up to lawsuits just for holding a belief.
And he wonders why we worry about second-class status.