Congress Still Debating the Usefulness of Men and Boys An Ambivalent Senate Can't Decide About the Value of Fathers and Boy Scouts By: Mary Mostert, Analyst, Banner of Liberty (www.bannerofliberty.com) June 15, 2001 Yesterday the U.S. Senate passed President Bush's Education initiative, doubling its cost, now that the Democrats are in control. Also, on a vote of 51-49 the Senate approved a proposal by Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC) to deny federal funding to any school district that discriminates against the Boy Scouts or similar groups that "prohibit the acceptance of homosexuals." The pro-homosexuals in the Boy Scouts Senators countered by an Amendment introduced by Sen. Barbara Boxer which provides equal access for homosexual youth groups. An analysis of the votes on these two amendments indicate that three Democrat Senators, Zell Miller of Georgia, John Breaux of Louisiana, Byron Dorgan of South Dakota and Jean Carnahan of Missouri voted in favor of both amendments. On the other hand, Democrats Robert Byrd of West Virginia, Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Ernest Hollings of South Carolina voted in favor of Helms Boy Scout Amendment and Against the pro-homosexual amendment. Republicans who voted against the Scout Amendment were Senators Lincoln Chafee of Rhode Island, Mike DeWine of Ohio, Chuck Hagel of Nebraska, Olympia Snowe of Maine and George Voinovitch of Ohio. What we now have going into conference are two amendments, one of which equates youth groups sponsoring homosexual activities with the Boy Scouts and its "morally straight" and "duty of God" form of citizenship. If, as is planned, the Conference drops the Helms amendment and keeps the Boxer Amendment we the youth in America's schools will be taught that sexual behavior known by the National Institute of Health to shorten lives by up to 30 years will be taught as equally "valid" as the principles taught by the Scout program.
The timing of this charade is interesting. Three days before Father's day is observed in America. the U.S. Senate votes first to support the world's finest program to train boys to become good fathers, then promptly reverses itself to force all schools to allow access to any group that supports the exact opposite.
As Gavin Grooms, National Chairman of "Save Our Scouts," (http://www.saveourscouts.org) which was organized last year to defend the principles of the Boy Scout program, said: "Camping, good turns, jamborees, he said "are all means, not the end. The end is character with a purpose. And that purpose, that the next generation may be sane in an insane world, and develop the higher realization of service, active service of love, and duty to God and neighbor."
"Yet, in some Scout programs in the world, you will no longer find God. You will no longer find a safe and morally straight environment for young men who once had a program that taught them how to become courageous, honorable and loyal husbands and fathers.
"One by one, radicals have chipped away at the great oak planted by Lord Baden-Powell - demanding that God be removed from the program, or that it be neutered so girls can be "boy scouts" or that the words "morally straight" be removed or redefined to allow those who do not ever want to become husbands and fathers to feel comfortable.
"With the support of many in the media and well-financed nonprofit organizations, today the Boy Scouts have been made to look like the "bad guy." The undefined term "sexual orientation" can be, and has been, defined to protect just about any kind of sexual behavior in existence today. It mostly certainly would protect any group, for example, organized to defend and practice oral sex. If that happened, would all organizations and schools then be required to accept as leaders those who declared themselves to be oriented to oral sex? And, would oral sex be a healthy behavior tolerated in a Boy Scout leader?
When the Boy Scout organization was founded by Robert Baden-Powell, it was designed to teach boys, in Baden-Powell's words rules of personal behavior patterned after King Arthur's "rules for his Knights of the Round Table. The romance of the Knights has its attraction for all boys and has its appeal to their moral sense. Their Code of Chivalry included honor, self-discipline, courtesy, courage, selfless sense of duty and service and the guidance of religion."
Baden Powell's vision, articulated in his own writings, was founded on "his vision of a world of future husbands and fathers, men who practiced "active citizenship" that was based on the "code of the medieval knights."
How can it possibly be that in America, the land that gave the notion of freedom of speech, religion and association, we have ended up with a Senate composed of people who can't decide whether or not ordinary people and organizations such as the Boy Scouts should be allowed to have a program based on an old soldier's plan to death honor, self-discipline, courtesy, courage, selfless sense of duty and service and the guidance of religion?
In the debate yesterday Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-CA, argued the Helms Amendment was "hurtful to a group of people - it divides us again in this country." The Senate's new Majority Leader, Tom Daschle, D-SD, said the amendment would force schools districts to "either disregard their own conscience or they could follow their conscience and lose millions of dollars that their schools and their children need," he said. "We believe in principled compromise, but we cannot compromise on the fundamental issues of civil rights."
These are both incredibly stupid statements. The U.S. Supreme Court in June of 2000 ruled that forcing the Boy Scouts to abandon its "morally straight" principle was a violation of their First Amendment rights. On June 11, 2001, just four days ago, the U.S. Supreme Court held in GOOD NEWS CLUB et al. v. MILFORD CENTRAL SCHOOL that the Milford School District "violated the Club's free speech rights when it excluded the Club from meeting after hours at the school."
How could any member of Congress now believe it is constitutional for a School District to deny the Boy Scouts of America the right to meet in public buildings, as the Los Angeles School District and other districts around the country already have done? As recently as March of 2001 The Santa Barbara County, California board of supervisors to end the Boys Scouts' lease granting exclusive use of the top floor of a public building, known as Scouthouse, that the Scouts had been using for 70 years.
If atheists, homosexuals and lesbians wanted to have a program similar to the Boy Scouts of America, only excluding Baden-Powell's standards of behavior and duty to God, nothing prevents them from organizing such programs. However, practicing homosexuals and lesbians don't produce offspring with their habits, and, therefore, would have to either adopt or convert children to be IN such a program. Is that what keeps them from setting up their own program, having homosexual or lesbian leaders and asking parents to send their children to their program?
How many "straight" parents would send their young sons and daughters to a club set up by homosexuals and lesbians? Do you supposed that "straight" parents might "discriminate" against such a club, knowing that the average lifespan for a homosexual in America is only 41 years and that up to 30% of all 20 year old homosexuals in America will be either dead of or infected with AIDS by the age of 30, according to the Centers for Disease Control? "Why, do you suppose, has there been such a determined effort on the part of people who do not WANT or cannot possibly BECOME a husband or father to force changes in Scouting so they can be members of a Boy Scout troop?" Gavin Grooms asks on the Save Our Scouts website. "Why would a radical feminist, a practicing homosexual or a dedicated atheist demand the 'right' to join an organization that was founded to teach them to become a God fearing "husband and father?"
"Simple logic tells us their effort to change or destroy the Scout program has nothing whatever to do with 'fairness' or 'equality." That just about says it all.
To contact Gavin Grooms: scouter@saveourscouts.com To contact Mary Mostert - mmostert@bannerofliberty.com
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