Posted on 02/26/2013 10:59:53 PM PST by MacNaughton
The Boy Scouts of America is committed to dialogue on its membership standards within the Scouting family at the local and national levels. To continue and expand this important discussion, the National Executive Board has authorized its committees, representative of Scouting’s members, to further engage representatives of Scouting’s membership and listen to their perspectives and concerns.
The committees will review a number of issues and how they will impact the BSA, including youth, chartered organizations, parents, and financial, fundraising, and legal concerns. The goals of the committee’s work will be to:
1. Provide a channel where every voice can be heard
2. Receive feedback from the field
3. Educate Scouting’s members
4. Define core values
5. Identify members’ concerns
The committee’s recommendations will inform the officers’ work on a resolution regarding membership standards. The voting members of the National Council will take action on the resolution at the National Annual Meeting in May 2013.
http://www.scouting.org/sitecore/content/MembershipStandards/KnowTheFacts.aspx
Know the Facts
http://www.scouting.org/sitecore/content/MembershipStandards/Timeline.aspx
Timeline
To develop and execute a comprehensive plan leading to a vote at the National Annual Meeting by the national voting members while minimizing any disruption in the delivery of the Scouting mission, the following are the phases the BSA will undertake, including a brief description and the timeline for their completion.
Time to tell these disgusting fudge packers to go F-off! If they don't like your standards, let them join another fag friendly outfit, or start their own. These faggots are the ones who are intolerant here. This has nothing to do with equality; it has everything to do with these deviants corrupting our young boys into their sick lifestyle.
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Romney was on the Boy Scout board, and supported homosexualizing them, he reaffirmed that support during the 2012 campaign.
OCT 1994 – While running for the U.S. Senate in MA, Republican Mitt Romney debated incumbent Sen. Ted Kennedy (D). Romney said that homosexuals “should be allowed” to serve as Boy Scout leaders. At the time he served on the national (volunteer) executive board of directors (NEB) of the BSA. His church, the Church of Jesus Christ and Latter Day Saints, adopted the BSA program as its official male youth program in 1913. LDS Church doctrine condemned homosexual activity as sinful. His 3 younger sons earned the Eagle Scout rank.
DEC 2000 – The 2002 Salt Lake Winter Olympic Committee, under Mitt Romney’s leadership, banned local Boy Scouts from helping at the Olympics games in FEB 2002. Romney’s spokesman, Caroline Shaw, justified the decision based upon Olympic rules which barred youth under the age of 18. This “rule” evidently was not in effect 4 years earlier at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta, GA, where scouts from the Atlanta Area Council were heavily involved in Olympic activities. Adult scouters could help at the Salt Lake Games but not while wearing their BSA uniforms. Romney declined to speak with all BSA representatives.
8/05/2012 - A spokeswoman for Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney, Andrea Saul, wrote in an e-mail to the press that Romney’s 1994 public support of homosexuals in scouitng remained his position today.
And now for a blast from past ...
http://newswithviews.com/baldwin/baldwin18.htm
BUSH IN BED WITH HOMOSEXUALS?
by Chuck Baldwin
April 23, 2002
By now, we have a clear record on the Bush administration in regard to homosexuality. The record reveals that President Bush is more than sympathetic to the homosexual agenda. One could even argue that Bush has become (or always was) a proud promoter of that agenda. Here is the record; you judge for yourself.
1. Candidate George W. Bush appointed four openly homosexual, gay-rights advocates to his presidential campaign steering committee. According to the homosexual group, Log Cabin Republicans, "scores" of Bush state steering committee members and campaign volunteers were homosexuals.
2. Perhaps this explains why hundreds of homosexuals gathered in Washington, D.C., last weekend to "celebrate the achievements and leadership of George W. Bush." It also helps to explain why Rich Tafel, executive director of Log Cabin Republicans, said, "We want the country to know that we are behind our president and administration."
3. On Dec. 21, 2001, President Bush signed a historic bill, which "for the first time allows the District of Columbia government to fund a program that will give domestic partners of city employees access to health benefits." Remember, Bush insisted that openly homosexual Congressman Jim Kolbe of Arizona be given a prominent speaking role at the Republican National Convention. It was Kolbe who introduced the amendment lifting the ban on gay partner benefits in D.C.
4. Bush named Scot Evertz, a prominent homosexual activist, to head the White House AIDS office even though he had absolutely no experience dealing with public health issues.
5. Bush appointed another homosexual activist, Donald Cappoccia, to the U.S. Commission on Fine Arts.
6. Bush appointed openly homosexual, Michael Guest, as Ambassador to Romania. Since then, Bush has decided to leave in place a Clinton policy that calls for supporting the "unmarried partners" of U.S. Foreign Service workers. This allows Guest's live-in lover to live in the U.S. Embassy in Bucharest and allows him to join Guest at official embassy functions.
7. Bush presided over the appointment of homosexual activist, Stephen Herbits, to oversee the choice of civilian personnel at the Pentagon.
8. Bush has not reversed a single pro-homosexual policy instituted by former president Bill Clinton. Not even one!
9. The Bush administration posted a job for what is called a "gay and lesbian program specialist" at the Department of Agriculture.
10. Bush appointed the ardently pro-homosexual Governor of Massachussetts, Paul Cellucci, as U.S. Ambassador to Canada.
11. Bush appointed Lewis Eisenberg to become the new GOP chief fundraiser. Eisenberg has a long history of supporting pro-homosexual and pro-abortion candidates.
12. Just yesterday, The Washington Times reported, "The Bush administration has joined European delegates to an upcoming U.N. summit on children in moving to recognize families 'in various forms,' including unmarried cohabiting couples and homosexual partners."
Concerned Women for America http://www.cwfa.org/ is so concerned that it recently released a statement saying, "President George Bush is just another Bill Clinton on the homosexual-rights issue." Perhaps Log Cabin spokesman, Rich Tafel, best summarized the situation. He said, "He [Bush] has a vision of a different Republican Party." If homosexual activists such as Tafel can see the real George W. Bush, why cannot Christian conservatives?
And since this column by Chuck Baldwin ...
2005-2006 – Ken Mehlman served as the chairman of the Republican National Committee.
8/26/2010 - Mehlman came out as homosexual, making him 1 of the most prominent openly homosexual figures in the Republican Party. Mehlman says he "beat back efforts to attack same-sex marriage" in private discussions with GOP officials — knowing, of course, that Bush strategist Karl Rove "had been working with Republicans to make sure that anti-gay initiatives and referenda would appear on November ballots in 2004 and 2006" to help the party. Mehlman adds that he "'really wished' he had come to terms with his sexual orientation earlier, 'so I could have worked against [the Federal Marriage Amendment]' and 'reached out to the gay community in the way I reached out to African Americans.'"
Excellent post and source, thanks.
It looks to me as though the "committee" is just buying time to further develop and justify its corrupt pro-homosexual agenda at the national level. They have already made up their minds and are in a damage control mode in my opinion.
We shall see in May.
Actually, it's a little more than 1%: Queers: "We are the 3.4%."
Still, the idea that such a small minority of the population could deliberately destroy an organization that has been so influential in so many boy's lives for many decades is disgusting.
The BSA is screwed and so is the USA.
I believe the number is growing every day thanks to an agressive campaign by the perverts.
They are recruiting actively in our High schools and colleges. I would like to see a figure on how many kids in college have experimented with it.
The first thing I thought of when reading this article was a Hillary Clinton “listening tour” of the sort she took before deciding if the people of NY wanted her to run for the senate. She’ll probably take another listening tour before running for president. Or maybe this will be like a Blue Ribbon Commission that always seems to come to the conclusion those who formed the BRC desired. - Hope I’m wrong.
A puzzle to me has been how the BSA ended up with board members trying to change its longstanding policies from within. Money I guess.
MARK
1991 - BSA released a position statement regarding membership: "We believe that homosexual conduct is inconsistent with the requirement in the Scout Oath that a Scout be morally straight and in the Scout Law that a Scout be clean in word and deed, and that homosexuals do not provide a desirable role model for Scouts.” The BSA thus "believes that a known or avowed homosexual is not an appropriate role model of the Scout Oath and Law." Opponents of this position argued that BSA allowed scouts and adult leaders to participate in sexual relations, within or out of Scouting, as long as it was heterosexual conduct. For the next 22 years the internal debate among volunteers was bracketed as the “3-G’s” = God/ girls/ gays. Later it was expanded to include a “4th G” = guns.
1991 – today – More than 70 local United Way (UW) chapters (out of ~1,400 total) across the land have defunded BSA local councils within their boundaries. Most councils (~294 total – the number is soft because some council consolidations are still occurring) have several local UW chapters within their boundaries. The UW chapters claimed that their local charters prevented them from distributing funds to non-profit organizations which discriminated. Several corporatons during the 1990s announced they would discontinue donations to BSA. They included CVS, Levi-Strauss, SeaFirst Bank, and Wells Fargo. Anecdotal reports from the field indicated that local council professionals were encountering harsh business reactions when they attempted outreach for financial support. The councils most affected were primarily located on the west coast, upper mid-west, and east coast/northeast.
May 1991 - The Washington Times published a major 5-part investigation entitled “Scouts Honor” on sex abuse in the BSA. Newspaper staff worked for 2 years preparing the series. The newspaper mostly restricted itself to reported cases of male scout leaders abusing Boy Scouts prior to the introduction of the YPT program in 1988. The newspaper discovered that 1,151 Scouts reported being abused by their leaders over the 19-year period, 1971-1990. The investigation also found that 50 lawsuits were filed against the BSA by families of molested boys from around the U.S. It revealed to the general public for the 1st time that BSA had maintained “ineligible volunteer” files since the 1920s. In summation, they wrote “The Boy Scouts are a magnet for men who want to have sexual relations with children ... Pedophiles join the Scouts for a simple reason: it’s where the boys are.”
NOV 1992 – NAMBLA sent a letter to BSA CSE Ben Love in which NAMBLA predicted that BSA would eventually succumb to homosexual demands. The letter was also published in the NOV, 1992 NAMBLA Bulletin.
11/03/1992 – WJC was elected as the 42nd POTUS with 43% of the popular vote. During his watch he appointed 2 lesbians to his cabinet - Donna Shalala as Secretary of Health and Human Services and Janet Reno as Attorney General. In all, he was reported to have appointed at least 2 dozen homosexuals to high-level posts in his administration, including Roberta Achtenberg as Assistant Secretary for the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
1993 – BSA released an updated position statement regarding membership: "We do not allow for the registration of avowed homosexuals as members or as leaders of the BSA."
12/21/1993 – POTUS #42 WJC issued Defense Directive 1304.26 which ordered that military applicants were not to be asked about their sexual orientation. This policy became known as "Don't Ask, Don't Tell". For the 1st time in U.S. history, homosexuals could legally serve in the military if they kept their sexual orientation secret.
1994 - Edward O. Laumann’s book, The Social Organization of Sex: Sexual Practices in the United States, was published. It has since become the most accepted study on the incidence of homosexuality in the U.S. population. The National Health and Social Life Survey (NHSLS) found that 2.8% of the male and 1.4% of the female population identified themselves as homosexual, lesbian, or bisexual.
10/08/2002 – A Gallup Poll reported that Americans estimated 21% of men were homosexuals and 22% of women were lesbians.
11/18/2009 - BSA announced its intention to purchase property near Mount Hope, WV, as the future home of The Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve. The property was 10,600 acres (43 km2) in size. It would serve as the future home of the national scout jamboree (NSJ), the Summit High Adventure Base, and the National Center for Scouting Excellence. The acquisition of the property and its construction was made possible through a donation from the Stephen D. Bechtel, Jr. Foundation. The US$50 million donation was the largest in the history of the BSA. On October 22, 2010 the BSA announced that total donations had reached US$100 million, including a US$25 million donation from the Suzanne and Walter Scott Foundation. It will be 1 of 4 facilities managed by the National Council of the BSA (the others being Northern Tier (MN), Philmont (NM), and National Sea Base (FL).
12/10/2010 – A Gallup Poll indicated that during BSA’s centennial year, 39% of adult men in the U.S. had been a member of the organization at 1 time. Fewer men in their 20s and 30s reported having been in the Boy Scouts than older men, suggesting that younger generations were not joining at the same rate as previous generations.
12/22/2010 – The Don't Ask, Don't Tell Repeal Act of 2010 was passed by the House on 12/15, the Senate on 12/18 and signed into law by POTUS BHO on 12/22 to permit homosexuals, for the 1st time ever, to openly serve in the U.S. military. The Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates, (a Republican who had previously served in the same capacity under POTUS #43 GWB) had been instructed by POTUS #44 BHO nearly 2 years earlier to make the Joint Chiefs of Staff come around to this way of thinking, and he did. Robert Gates is a recipient of BSA’s honorary Distinguished Eagle Scout Award and former volunteer president of the National Eagle Scout Association (NESA).
3/27/2012 – A Gallup Poll on religiosity in the U.S. during 2011 was released. 40% of Americans were very religious, 28% of Americans were moderately religious, and 32% of Americans were nonreligious. Eight of the 10 most religious states were in the South (MI, AL, LA, AR, SC, TN, NC, and GA), with 1 straddling the line between the South and the Midwest (OK), and 1 in the West (UT). Six of the least religious states were in New England (VT, NH, ME, MA, CT, and RI) and 4 were in the West (AK, OR, NV, and WA, with the District of Columbia and NY rounding out the list).
4/19/2012 - According to a report from the Public Religion Research Institute and Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace & World Affairs, a growing tide of young Americans is drifting away from the religions of their childhood - and most of them are ending up in no religion at all. One in 4 young adults chose “unaffiliated” when asked about their religion. Some of them will return to their faiths as they age, but there’s not a lot of evidence that most will come back. The trend away from organized religion dates back to the early 1990s. Nearly 6 in 10 younger Millennials (59 %) approved of homosexual marriage, with distinctions among religious groups generally mirroring those on abortion.
4/25/2012 – Jennifer, Tyrrell, a 32-year-old stay-at-home lesbian mother of 4 in Bridgeport, OH, was kicked out of BSA after serving less than 1 year as her Cub Scout son’s den leader.
4/30/2012 – Today was the deadline for the voting members of BSA’s NEB to submit resolutions to be considered at BSA’s upcoming annual national council business meeting. An unidentified member from the northeast U.S. submitted a resolution to amend BSA’s exclusive membership policy against open homosexuals by allowing for the “local opton”, i.e., allow the individual charter institutions (69% are churches) to determine the membership eligibility of adult and youth applicants to their scouting units.
5/08/2012 – A Gallup Poll revealed that 50% of Americans believed homosexual marriages should be recognized by law as valid, with the same rights as traditional marriages -- down slightly from 53% the previous year, but marking only the 2nd time in Gallup's history of tracking this question that at least half of Americans have supported legal homosexual marriage. Forty-eight percent said such marriages should not be legal.
5/09/2012 – For the 1st time, POTUS #44 BHO openly declared his support for homosexual marriage.
5/19/2013 - The NAACP's board of directors passed a resolution expressing support for same-sex marriage equality.
5/21/2012 – BSA national office announced that Wayne Brock, age 64, was selected to be the next (12th) CSE. He would assume the duties upon the retirement of incumbent Robert J. Mazzuca in SEP 2012.
5/27/2012 – Representatives from Change.org, a homosexual activist group, requested a meeting with the BSA at its annual national business meeting in Orlando, FL. They wanted their spokesperson to present signatures generated from their online petition to BSA representatives and to make their case that BSA should change its exclusive membership policy by adopting the “local option” and re-instating Jennifer Tyrell as a den leader. While it was not on the BSA national business meeting agenda, out of courtesy and respect for differing viewpoints, the BSA said they wouold accept the petition during a private meeting.
5/30-6/02/2012 – BSA held its annual national council business meeting in Orlando, FL. Telecom pioneer and Seattle Mariners co-owner, Wayne Perry, was elected as the BSA's 34th (volunteer) president. Perry, a life-long member of the LDS Church, began his career in telecommunications and was chairman and CEO of Edge Wireless until it was sold to AT&T in 2008. Sometime during the meeting, the “local option” resolution was delegated to a sub-committee. It was announced that AT&T had agreed to “light up” The Summit Bechtel Family National Scout Reserve in WV with wireless telecommunications capability in time for the 2013 National Jamboree just like it did for the 2010 National Jamboree at Ft. A.P. Hill, VA. This gift to the Reserve is reportedly of equal value to the Suzanne and Walter Scott Foundation’s donation of $25 million.
5/30/2012 – 20 year-old Eagle Scout, Zach Wahls, the son of 2 lesbians and who was born via in vitro fertilisation, delivered the Change.org boxes of petitions outside of the annual national business meeting to a BSA representative. The on-line petitions were signed by 275,000 private citizens demanding BSA change its membership policy to allow the “local option”.
June 2012 - Zach Wahls co-founded Scouts for Equality, a homosexual rights activist group whose mission is to change BSA’s membership policy. The organization began a public relations campaign to persuade corporations to drop their financial support of BSA. By 1/28/2013, the SfE web-site boasted that 3,813 Eagle Scouts had joined the organization.
6/01/2012 - For the 4th consecutive year, POTUS #44 BHO issued a presidential proclamation that June would be Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month.
6/06/2012 – BSA spokesman Deron Smith said that the “local option” resolution would go through the NEB process and a recommendation made ready by May 2013 – in time for the next annual national council business meeting.
6/07/2012 – A BSA public relations statement declared that, “Contrary to media reports, the Boy Scouts of America has no plans to change its membership policy. The introduction of a resolution does not indicate the organization is “reviewing” a policy or signal a change in direction.”
6/13/2012 – James Turley, CEO of Ernst & Young professional services and accounting firm, became the 1st member of BSA’s NEB (actually Mitt Romney was 1st in 1994 and Steven Spielberg was 2nd in 2001) to publicly disapprove of BSA’s membership policy and proclaimed his support for inclusion of homosexuals. Turley served on the NEB as the international commissioner on the 23-member executive committee. Ernst & Young has scored a 100% perfect score on the HRC Corporate Equality Index for 7 straight years since 2004. Turley had previously informed E&Y partners on 11/10/2011 that he would step down and make way for fresh leadership in line with a new long-term strategy.
6/13/2012 – Jennifer Tyrell called upon AT&T CEO, Randall Stephenson, who is also a BSA NEB member (his title is that of a vice president on the executive committee) to join Turley in speaking out against the BSA’s exclusive membership policy. Stephenson is expected to be selected as the next BSA president in 2014. Both Ernst & Young and AT&T had been commended by homosexual-rights groups for homosexual-friendly employment policies. In response, AT&T issued a statement on Stephenson's behalf, indicating that he too might be interested in working internally to reconsider the membership policy. Both Ernst & Young and AT&T are corporate members of the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce. AT&T’s corporate HQ is in Dallas, TX, not far from BSA’s national office in Irving, TX. AT&T has scored a 100% perfect score on the HRC Corporate Equality Index for 7 straight years since 2004.
6/24/2012 – Hollywood film and TV actor, martial arts advocate, and BSA supporter, Chuck Norris, wrote an article for the web-site WorldNetDaily.com entitled, “Is Obama Creating a Pro-gay Boy Scouts of America?” The article posed a series of questions about the connections between POTUS #44 BHO and Ernst & Young CEO, Jame Turley, who sits on BSA’s NEB. “A Boy Scouts of America national board member, James Turley, who is also global chairman and CEO of the accounting firm Ernst & Young, recently said he “will work from within to seek a change” to overturn the BSA policy that bans gay scouts and leaders.” …
1. But is Turley working on his own initiative, or has the White House prodded him with perks and favors?
2. Is it a coincidence that Turley came out swinging against the BSA’s century-old policy to ban gays from leadership and that he has such close affiliations with the pro-gay Obama administration?
3. Is it a coincidence that Turley was nominated to President Barack Obama’s Export Council in 2010?
4. Is it a coincidence Turley was granted a seat on an investment advisory panel which met with none other than Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in Moscow on Oct. 17, 2011?
5. Is it a coincidence that Turley has been a global cheerleader for Obama’s economic strategies and an economic-ambassador-of-sorts to other mogul business leaders, as clearly seen in his Bloomberg media interview from the 2011 economic summit in Davos, Switzerland?
6. Is it a coincidence that the former assistant secretary for tax policy at the U.S. Treasury from 2009 to 2011, Michael Mundaca, who advised Treasury Secretary Geithner on all matters relating to taxation, recently joined the team of Ernst & Young?
7. Is it a coincidence that, as the White House website explained, “Ernst & Young LLP will honor [the Obama administration's Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship's] youth entrepreneurs at regional Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of The Year Award galas across the country, bringing important attention to the next generation of young entrepreneurs”?
8. Is it a coincidence that a couple months ago President Obama reversed his position on marriage, extending the union to gay couples, and that James Turley just came out of the closet in his position against the BSA?
9. Is it a coincidence that in the same couple-week period when James Turley turned on the BSA with his pro-gay stance that President Obama turned on the U.S. military and sent down a decree that the service branches must celebrate “Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Pride Month”?
10. Is it a coincidence that back in January 2010 President Obama nominated Katherine G. Hammack, who was formerly a leader in Ernst & Young’s Climate Change and Sustainability Services, as the assistant secretary of the Army (Installations and Environment), Department of Defense?
11. Is it a coincidence that Turley is in tight cahoots with the White House and that he is the only BSA national board member in 100 years to oppose its pro-traditional family stance? (incorrect – Mitt Romney did in 1994 and Steven Spielberg did in 2001)
12. Is it plausible that Turley and his associates had weekly contact with someone in Obama’s administration about all the above over the last couple years but there was never any dialogue or influence about Turley’s possibly pro-gay prodding on the National Board of the BSA?
13. Is it a coincidence that Turley just announced his resignation as CEO of Ernst and Young (effective June 2013) and that he’s now offering the White House a parting-pro-gay BSA gift in gratitude for all its presidential favors to him and Ernst & Young over the past few years?
7/17/2012 – BSA spokesman Deron Smith announced that after a 2-year study, an 11-member special committee returned a unanimous decision that BSA should retain its current membership policy excluding open homosexuals and atheists. The committee had been formed discreetly by top BSA leaders in 2010 and consisted of professional scout executives and adult volunteers. Many veteran volunteer Scouters bitterly complained of the lack of transparency in how this committee was selected and operated.
8/05/2012 - A spokeswoman for Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney, Andrea Saul, wrote in an e-mail to the press that Romney’s 1994 public support of homosexuals in scouitng remained his position today.
8/08/2012 – The White House confirmed today that POTUS #44 BHO, who serves as Honorary President of the BSA, opposes its anti-gay policy.
9/21/2012 - Intel Corporation declared that no donations would be made to any Boy Scout troop that discriminates for any reason.
10/18/2012 – A Gallup Poll, the largest of its kind on record (more than 121,000 adults surveyed) revealed that only 3.4% of American adults publicly identified themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender, with the highest percentage coming among the younger, less-educated non-whites. The percentage of self-reported LGBTQ Americans was much smaller than the general impression derived from their presence in popular culture and their perceived influence in liberal American politics.
10/19/2012 – The BSA was forced by court order to release over 20,000 pages of documentation from its “ineligible volunteer/”perversion” files on 1,200 alleged child sexual abuse cases within the organization, covering the time period from 1965 to 1985. A Texas judge has ordered the release of the post-1985 files, but the BSA is currently in the process of appealing to avoid that release. A Minnesota district judge has also ordered the released. A CA judge has similarly ordered the release of more files, and the CA state supreme court has denied an appeal from the BSA.
It has been alleged that BSA may have helped cover-up the abuse cases, sometimes with the aid of police and other officials, "to protect the good name and good works of Scouting." The reports showed incidents where accused abusers were allowed to continue in the Scouts, and in "more than a third" of the cases covered in the documents, information about the allegations were not passed on to police.
11/06/2012 – BHO was re-elected POTUS with 51% of the popular vote. According to the to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Institute, the Obama-Biden Administration has appointed more than 250 openly LGBTQ professionals to full-time and advisory positions in the executive branch; more than all known LGBTQ appointments of other presidential administrations combined.
11/06/2012 – State referendums in MD, ME, and WA approved homosexual marriage. MN defeated a referendum to define marriage exclusively between 1 man and 1 woman. To date, 9 states + the District of Columbia have legalized homosexual marriage. To date, 31 states have passed state constitutional amendments establishing marriage to be between 1 man and 1 woman. Two states defeated such amendments (AZ and MN).
11/12/2012 - The philanthropic arm of shipping giant UPS said it would no longer give money to the BSA as long as the group discriminated against homosexuals.
12/06/2012 - Mormon leaders unveiled a new website encouraging church members to be compassionate in discussions about homosexuality. Church officials insisted they hadn't changed the Mormon teaching that marriage is only between a man and a woman and that same-sex relationships are sinful. However, the website included an appeal to gay and lesbian Mormons to stay in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Mormons faced intense criticism after church leaders helped fund and lead the fight for California's Proposition 8, a constitutional ban on gay marriage that voters adopted in 2008 after the state Supreme Court ruled that homosexual Californians could marry. Mormon officials said they were stunned by the backlash from homosexual activists and from many Mormons who felt the church was wrong to take such a prominent role in favor of the ballot measure. Since then, church leaders in Salt Lake City and elsewhere have been trying to reach out to homosexuals to heal tensions.
12/07/2012 – The SCOTUS announced it would review the DoMA and announce its decision in JUN 2012.
12/10/2012 – Merck Pharmaceuticals’ charitable foundation announced it had stopped giving money to the BSA. The Merck Foundation said the BSA’s exclusion of gays from its ranks and leadership positions conflicted with giving guidelines and the company's nondiscrimination policy.
12/17/2012 – A USA Today/Gallup poll conducted over NOV 26-29, 2012,. found a slight majority, 52%, of Americans supported the official BSA policy of excluding open homosexuals from being Boy Scout leaders.
January 2013 – BSA representatives contacted leaders in the LDS Church, the RCC, and the SBC to inform them of BSA’s intent to change its exclusive membership policy and adopt the “local option”. This was done about 1 week before the BSA national office made its announcement. BSA asked the 3 denominations not to oppose the change. At least 3 national leaders of the SBC spoke out against the matter after it was announced on 1/28/2013.
1/28/2013 – Six months after announcing that BSA would retain its exclusive membership policy, BSA spokesman Deron Smith announced that the BSA NEB (~ 72 members) was prepared to vote on the “local option” resolution at its next business meeting a week away on 2/06/2013. It was later clarified that atheists would not be included in the “local option.”
1/29/2013 – Volunteer scouters mounted a massive phone call/e-mail/letter writing campaign to the BSA national office, the CSE, and members of the NEB to express their opposition to the “local option.” BSA’s Facebook wall was flooded with supporters of the “local option.” National’s phone and e-mail systems were overwhelmed.
1/31/2013 – The HRC, which initially welcomed the BSA's possible shift, said that it was inadequate and demanded that the BSA adopt a nationwide policy to accept homosexuals as scouts and adult leaders. The HRC said corporations that continued to donate funds to the BSA if any troops were allowed to discriminate would lose points in its annual Corporate Equality Index. The HRC said it would change the criteria for its annual Corporate Equality Index. To receive a perfect score, companies would have to prohibit philanthropic giving to civic organizations that have a written policy of anti-gay discrimination, or permit its chapters, affiliates, or troops to do so.
2/03/2013 – CBS News’ Scott Pelley interviewed POTUS #44 BHO in the hours before Super Bowl XLVII which was also broadcast by CBS. He asked the POTUS if scouting should be open to gays. “Yes,” the president replied. “Gays and lesbians should have access and opportunity the same way everyone else does.” With an average overnight household rating of 48.1/71, the following game was thought to be the highest-rated Super Bowl in metered market history.
2/04/2013 – The Family Research Council and 41 other family advocacy groups placed ads in newspapers across the land objecting to the BSA NEB’s planned vote on the “local option”.
2/06/2013 – BSA spokesman Deron Smith announced that the NEB postponed its vote on the “local option” at today’s NEB business meeting. He said that more time was needed to evaluate the “local option” (6 months after BSA national announced it would retain its current membership policy). He also said it would be brought before the entire National Council voting membership ( National Exectuive Committee ~ 23 officers, NEB ~ 49 members at large and 5 youth members (including the National OA Chief and the national president of Venture Scouting) plus the Advisory Council chairman and the chairman of the Board of Regents of the National Eagle Scout Association, regional presidents = 4, 294 council Key-3s = 882, other (including honorary members) ~ 446, for a total of ~ 1,400) for a vote at the next annual national council business meeting over May 22-24 at the Gaylord Texan Hotel, in Grapevine, TX.
2/06/2013 - The independent Quinnipiac University poll of American voters released today said 55 - 33 % that BSA should drop its ban on openly gay members. There was a large gender gap as women supported gay scouts 61 - 27 %, compared to 49 - 39 % among men. White Catholics supported gay scouts 63 - 25 %. Among white Protestants, 44 % said open up scouting and 41 % said no. White evangelical Protestants opposed gay scouts 56 - 33 %. One troubling finding for Scouting in America was that 54 % of voters sald they were Boy Scouts or Girl Scouts, while only 36 % of voters, including 55 % of former scouts, said they have children in Scouting.
2/12/2013 – POTUS #44 BHO’s State of the Union Address was later in the calendar than normal. FLOTUS Michelle Obama invited 2 open homosexuals to sit with her in the gallery: (1) Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, Inc. and (2) Tracey Hepner, wife of the 1st openly-homosexual U.S. military general, Brig. Gen. Tammy Smith, and founder of Military Partners and Families Coalition. There was no mention of homosexual issues in the speech.
2/18/2013 - The Southern Baptist Convention's Executive Committee unanimously passed a resolution that criticized BSA NEB leadership for trying to change the policy on homosexuality but also urged BSA’s National Council voting members to uphold the current exclusive membership policy in May at the annual national council business meeting.
Thanks for the reply. That’s quite an extensive list. Oddly enough, I didn’t see the 2000 SCOTUS decision ruling that the BSA traditional membership requirements are constitutional.
It looks like there are 72 or more NEB members who will eventually vote on this proposed policy change. I wonder how much influnce the Ernst and Young and AT&T guys have among that large group.
The only way these tactics will ever be defeated overall is a nationwide, coordinated counter-boycott movement on the part of conservatives. I think businesses should stay out of controversial political issues, but since many don’t and there are all the pressure groups that try to force them to take stances, the counter-boycott is the only thing that could lessen it.
Most conservatives and traditional values folks probably oppose boycotts, but a time comes when one must fight fire with fire. There are more than enough conservatives to put the financial fear of God in these businesses if they ever decided to fight back. But if something like that doesn’t come about, these bully tactics by the ‘groups’ will never end and they will continue to have successes.
Yeah, I somehow overlooked that 1. You obviously are on top of it.
It looks like there are 72 or more NEB members who will eventually vote on this proposed policy change. I wonder how much influnce the Ernst and Young and AT&T guys have among that large group.
The opinions I am reading on the scouting forums suggest this will be a very close vote. The AT&T CEO is slated to become the next BSA volunteer president in 2014. He is spending a boat-load of $ to prepare The Summit in WV for this summer's national jambo.
The only way these tactics will ever be defeated overall is a nationwide, coordinated counter-boycott movement on the part of conservatives. ...
The Roman Catholics and the Southern Baptists are going to have to make their voices heard. It is looking like the Mormons are going to crumble on this matter. Can't depend on the Methodists either.
Most conservatives and traditional values folks probably oppose boycotts, but a time comes when one must fight fire with fire. There are more than enough conservatives to put the financial fear of God in these businesses if they ever decided to fight back. But if something like that doesn’t come about, these bully tactics by the ‘groups’ will never end and they will continue to have successes.
I see this fight as the Republic's last ditch defense. If the BSA crumbles, then there aren't enough conservatives left in the nation to save it from BHO and the Democrats. We will know in less than 3 months.
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