Posted on 11/05/2002 12:27:48 AM PST by kattracks
SEATTLE (AP) — An Eagle Scout who has earned 37 merit badges said Monday he has been kicked out of the Boy Scouts for refusing to declare a belief in a higher power. Darrell Lambert said he was told of the decision earlier in the day by the Chief Seattle Council, the Scouts' regional governing body.
"Am I bitter? No. Disappointed? Yeah," he said. "We're in the 21st century. Our country was founded on religious freedom, and the Boy Scouts of America are still discriminating."
Lambert said he plans to appeal the decision within the Scouting council within the required 60 days.
On membership applications, Boy Scouts and adult leaders must say they recognize a higher power, although not necessarily a religious one.
As a private organization, the Boy Scouts can bar anyone it chooses from membership. The organization's ban on gay leaders was upheld by the Supreme Court in 2000.
The issue arose about a month ago, after Lambert attended a Boy Scout leadership training seminar where he argued with a Scout leader about whether atheists should be expelled from the organization.
Last week, the council said it would give him about a week to declare his belief in a higher power. Lambert refused, saying that to lie would make him a bad Scout.
The Irving, Texas-based Boy Scouts of America did not return calls seeking comment Monday.
Lambert, 19, said he has been an atheist since ninth grade, when he concluded that science had disproved the accounts of creation given in the Bible.
He had declared his atheism to the Scout leaders overseeing his Eagle Scout application last year, but was still granted the award.
"They commended me on my honesty," he said.
His mother told CNN that no one in their family attends church, and that her husband is also an atheist.
"Darrell's not just fighting this for himself. He's fighting this for all the Scouts that have no real belief in God," Trish Lambert said.
Copyright 2002 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
Not all parents are so tight-butted about homosexuals being in the company of their children. Heck, some parents are gay.
You're right. Not all parents are anything. The vast, vast majority of parents don't want their teenage sons spending lots of 'quality' time with homosexual men in their (the parents') absence. They have that right. You can send your 14-year old sons out camping with homosexual men if you want. You have that right. Of course, the parents of a couple of thousand raped and molested Catholic teenage boys are regretting that their sons spent so much 'quality time' with homosexual priests. The point is - we have the right to raise our kids as we see fit - and you have the right to raise yours as you see fit. But nobody has the right to say to me: "I'm an active homosexual man, and I have the right to take your son out camping with me." That right does not exist.
I'm glad. So, if you believe that that one experience means all homosexual men won't harm your sons, go ahead and send your sons out camping with homosexual men. I prefer to keep my sons away from men who have abnormal sexual attractions to them. I must be a monstrous bigot.
You may be a bigot if you believe all homosexual men have an abnormal sexual attraction to boys. How would you tell which homosexuals do or do not, or which Scout leaders engage in criminal behaviour of any kind? With that mindset you will be uncomfortable letting your boys near a Scout troop anywhere.
Correct. The BSA is not a public institution.
I can really only speak for myself. At 14 I knew what a homosexual was and that I was not homosexual.
The last thing parents want is for an older man on a scout trip to try to engage their son in homosexual activity.
Of course.
Again, that's their right. (And most parents don't believe that 14-year olds are well-equipped to make good decisions regarding sexual behavior anyway.) You might think they're misguided, but so what? You raise your sons as you see fit. We will raise our sons as we see fit. Do you concede that we have the right to do so?
Of course.
It's up to the parent, it's their choice. If they know and trust these homosexual leaders, then fine.. if not, it's their right to deny their children the scouting experience.
Most parents, believe it or not, do not want to increase the odds that their children will be molested. But apart from that, most parents don't want to condone, implicitly or explicitly, the filthy practices engaged in by (the majority) of homosexual men - such as anal intercourse - or the promiscuity which is endemic to homosexual society.
What about the filthy, promiscuous heterosexual men who engage in anal intercourse with their wives and/or girlfriends? :-o.
Should they be barred from Scout leadership as well?
You may disagree with these parents - but they have the right to determine who will be in charge of their children. Homosexuals are in a far outer universe to think that they have the right to be in the close company of other people's children on overnight campouts in the absence of those children's parents. They don't. So sorry.
Not in the Boy Scouts, no.
What are you talking about? Parents have the right to choose the organizations that they think will most benefit their children. Several millions parents have chosen Boy Scouts of America to help raise their kids. It's a good choice - because Boy Scouts brings a lot of benefits to their sons. If you don't like their policy on homosexuals, I'm sure you can find some homosexual men to take your kids on overnight camping trips. Liberals expect everyone to trust homosexual men with their teenage sons. People don't. The continued yearly molestation of Boy Scouts by homosexual men, the molestations and rapes of thousands of teenage boys in the Catholic Church by homosexual priests, the continued attempt by homosexuals to tell kids that homosexuality is 'normal' and 'healthy' (it's not), the continued attempts by homosexuals to lower ages of consent in every state in the union, the vilification of anyone who has any reservations about homosexuality, etc. etc. tells you why. But of course, liberals distinguish themselves almost always by a complete lack of common sense - whether on Iraq, foreign policy in general, affirmative action, bilingual educaiton, welfare, etc. etc. Putting homosexual men in charge of other people's teenage boys is just one more example.
Homosexual men represent the practice of anal intercourse (a practice which most of them engage in and which is well known to most teenage boys). Surprisingly to you, I'm sure, most parents don't want to promote that practice to their sons. But hey, if you want to promote the joys of humping other men's rear ends to your sons, go ahead.
It's quite obvious that a significant percentage of homosexual men will not or cannot keeps their paws off of teenage boys (or we wouldn't have continual homosexual molestations of boys in the Boy Scouts and in the Catholic Church). I never said that all homosxual men would do so - as you well know. But hey, calling people names like 'hater' and 'bigot' is the sine qua non of the homosexual movement.
Yep.
If you don't like their policy on homosexuals, I'm sure you can find some homosexual men to take your kids on overnight camping trips. Liberals expect everyone to trust homosexual men with their teenage sons. People don't. The continued yearly molestation of Boy Scouts by homosexual men, the molestations and rapes of thousands of teenage boys in the Catholic Church by homosexual priests, the continued attempt by homosexuals to tell kids that homosexuality is 'normal' and 'healthy' (it's not),
It is for homosexuals who practice safe sex.
the continued attempts by homosexuals to lower ages of consent in every state in the union, the vilification of anyone who has any reservations about homosexuality, etc. etc. tells you why. But of course, liberals distinguish themselves almost always by a complete lack of common sense - whether on Iraq, foreign policy in general, affirmative action, bilingual educaiton, welfare, etc. etc. Putting homosexual men in charge of other people's teenage boys is just one more example.
I guess I'm not someone to judge another person as deviant based on their sexual preference.
The Boy Scouts are exercizing their religious freedom. Discrimination is good. Just imagine what the world would be like if nobody was discriminating about the things they chose to do. It would be chaos.
The Boy Scouts are a religious group who don't want to be taken over by Aitheists and forced to take God out of their organization. This guy should feel free to start the Aitheist Boy Scouts of America.
But of course, this isn't the issue being debated here. Homosexuals have the right to live their lives as they see fit. They do not have some automatic right to close quarters with other people's teenage sons. That's the issue. I'm fine with letting them live their lives as they see fit. I wish they could have the same respect for me (and millions of others like me) - including the right to decide who I want to take my teenage sons on overnight camping trips. The homosexuals who have attacked the Boy Scouts are incredibly intolerant.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.