Obama Missing Historic Boy Scout Jamboree for Fundraisers, 'View' Taping

Batman, as I've acknowledged, I am in agreement. The issues that we speak of are adult issues. My son is nine. He is in scouts for the positive aspects and not the politics. If there was a similar organization with the inclusion and acceptance we all seek, I would be touting his membership there.

As Deckard has explained, as a parent, you must balance what is "wrong" in the world with what may be beneficial for your kids. That is our job as parents to provide the framework for their growth. I am not going to routinely deny my child's wishes and happiness for my own political beliefs (within reason).

If our local chapter ever took action against our current gay or lesbian members, they would hear it from me and we would pull out. This would be a different reality. In that event, I would explain to him within his own level of understanding, why we are leaving. Within the framework in which he is reared, I would dare say he would question why we ever joined in the first place. For now, it is not an issue that a nine year old need worry over.

I neither seek your validation, nor feel lessened without it, you're a good man.

+++
Sometimes I'm right, but I can be wrong
My own beliefs are in my song
The butcher, the baker, the drummer and then
Makes no difference what group I'm in

I am everyday people
Yeah, yeah

There is a blue one who can't accept the green one
For living with a fat one trying to be a skinny one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on, and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha
We got to live together

I am no better, and neither are you
We are the same, whatever we do
You love me, you hate me, you know me and then
You can't figure out the bag I'm in

I am everyday people
Yeah, yeah

There is a long hair that doesn't like the short hair
For being such a rich one that will not help the poor one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha
We got to live together

There is a yellow one that won't accept the black one
That won't accept the red one that won't accept the white one
Different strokes for different folks
And so on, and so on and scooby-dooby-doo

Ooh, sha, sha
I am everyday people

 

I hear you, Rashmon. And I'm not saying I'd act any differently. I don't know. I was in Cub Scouts and I loved it. I can't say that I'd deny my children that experience on political grounds.

I am only pointing out that it demonstrates the gap that still exists between attitudes toward bigotry to gays v. bigotry to blacks.

It's not meant as a condemnation, it's just apparently a fact.

When I say I hope that that will change, I'm not saying I hope you'll pull your son out of boy scouts. In fact, what I'm really hoping that the boy scouts will change their position.

Regardless of your situation, it saddens me that that kind of bigotry is even possible, even allowed, in 2010.

 

Great "Everyday People" reference, by the way. You should hear the Daniel Johnston cover I have of it.

 

I will admit, there are meetings where I bite my tongue. When those meeting are over I make sure that I provide "clarification" regarding anything I felt was not within the expectation I have as a parent. This is true of just about any situation we encounter. It's an incredible balancing act sometimes, but my twenty-five year old is a proud liberal, so I guess I'm doing okay.

 

^ I'm completely positive you're doing great. Deckard too.

 

Here's hoping Obama shows up and delivers a classic speech encouraging the national scouting organization to broaden it's scope of inclusion for all people.

 

That would be heartwarming at least and it might even move the needle with some people given how persuasive he can be, but we are, sadly, apparently still not a time in our attitude to gays as a society where it would be a politically smart thing to do. Or, at least, the administration's relatively cautious approach to gay rights issues has signaled that they've made that sort of calculation.

I've relatively little doubt Obama's for gay marriage as well (though he says he isn't), but even if he is he's made the calculation that saying so would be politically hazardous and maybe catastrophic. That's a terrible shame, but that's where we are -- partly as evidenced by the fact that BSA can even get away with such institutionalized bigotry.

If the issue somehow got into the news (and not just crazy OddsOn threads), I think it would be different. Then he wouldn't be bringing it up out of thin air, changing the subject from the economy and unemployment and the oil spill and Afghanistan to gay rights. And I would certainly hope that, in that case, he would do the right thing.

I can't say I know if he would. Obama's a pragmatist before he's a progressive. That's something that anyone who's been paying attention has known since he started running for president. He's pretty cautious and he's pretty smart too. He's not going to do something like that before he feels the nation is ready for the message.

 

See, this is the D&D I like: where we can disagree, but not make it personal. Thank you Rashmon, Deckard, and Batman Jones for discussing this with me in a civil manner. Gives me hope for the future! :grin:

 

You know me: always civil!

 

Yeah, Civil War! :grin:

 

Am I a bigot because I think the only kids that are in boy scouts are there because their not athletic enough to play sports? Most kids like baseball, football, basketball or soccer. I wouldn't feel comfortable sending my son to camp with grown men that preach anti-gay messages. Don't get me wrong, I don't condone a gay lifestyle but I might as well be asking him to be a alter boy.

I enjoy the politics of baseball, competitiveness, teamwork and teaching kids that if they want to be good at something they should put in the extra work to get there, but that's my opinion.

Obama is working hard at making this country a better place.

Kids ought to do what makes them happy even if it is boy scouts. But don't make Obama out too be the bad guy when he's out trying to get his message across and working, and not hosting a boy scout meeting when he's already hosted two.

I'm angry because he hasn't hosted a Little League event, but I'm sure he has better things to do. Like run a country and fight off attacks from the left and right.

 

Maybe it's just the nature of the web, but so many only seem to understand things in "absolutes." That is not the way it really works in real life.

My son also plays baseball, soccer, basketball or football. Being a parent can be a very busy existence.

We've been in scouts for 3 years and have never heard anyone preach an anti-gay message. It's not in the handbook either, by the way.

Am I aware or have I read about the national organization's official stand and subsequent legal hoopla? Yes.

Has it had any impact or effect at my local level? Not that I have witnessed.

Does it really bother me that President Obama is not appearing at the jamboree? Not in the grand scheme of things.

Will I vote twice for him again? You betcha.

 

My kid hasn't talked about scouts yet, but I was a scout as a kid, and one thing I remember about it was that politics, religion and sexuality were not a part of it for me. Ever. Look, I get it, people dissect the mission statements and bylaws and read the headlines and whatever else to "get at the core of what this thing is about", but what I remember is scouting. Not politics, not anti-anyone rhetoric. Camping, badges, camaraderie, earning accolades for tasks accomplished and lessons learned. Not once did I hear a pack/troop leader talk about religion, hating, or excluding anyone. Does it happen? Probably somewhere, but that has more to do with people and less to do with scouting, in my opinion, regardless how someone will view the mission statements and detailed rhetoric that might be formed by anyone but the children/scouts themselves. I applaud the parent who can represent the scouts as a leader without promoting an exclusive or hateful agenda all while enriching children through the positive aspects of scouting... and I suspect that is more common than not. I can't get with some of what's being said regarding their belief system, but honestly that was just never a part of my experience in scouting.

Personally I think Obama should go to such a thing, but honestly I'm not surprised that a Black Democratic president thought a TV appearance would be better in political times like these. Further, you know if he'd gone, the complaints then from the other side would have been about how he's trying to indoctrinate the youth or some tripe like that. I would venture to guess that there's a good deal of people in scouts that are relieved he didn't attend... for whatever reasons, good or bad.

For those against the BSA and what they 'stand for,' are you glad the President didn't validate them by going and supporting their 'hate agenda?' I don't know it matters, I just can't get my head around all the scoutbashing. Don't like it? Don't sign up. Don't like being excluded or what you see as a policy of excusion? Stand up and make a difference.

Also, are these things yearly? It's clear that no president goes to all of these, and most only went to one in two terms, so really, aside from the nostalgia of this being the 100th, it's a non-issue completely.

I agree that if this is an issue, the opposition is grasping at straws.

 

deckard, will you be my dad?

 

Let me try to explain it to you again then.

Gays are not allowed in the scouts. If you're gay, you can't be a scout or a scoutmaster. It's a "straights only" organization.

If the same was true of blacks, if it was a "whites only" organization, I don't think you'd have any trouble "getting your head around the scoutbashing."

 

Based on some of the Man Scouts I've known, I'm guessing they have a "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy.

 

Another excellent post (and our daughter started playing softball before she joined Girl Scouts), and straight out of the realty of a parent raising a child that involves constant efforts to both impart to him/her your own philosophy, in an effort to influence them towards a path that jives with that of you and your SO, and also giving the children the chance to find their own way, to think for themselves, to develop their own philosophy towards life. That's the tightrope I mentioned. Using what influence you have, a very powerful influence the younger they are, knowing that they will ultimately develop who and what they will be as an adult themselves. Knowing also that your influence, if you are a parent truly engaged in raising them (and not all are, as anyone with two eyes, two ears, and a functioning brain has seen in the real world... that an amazing number of parents get caught up more in their work, their own lives, and "dail it in" when it come to child rearing, convincing themselves that "school's taking care of it"), that it requires decisions they may not like, decisions that often you may not like, but decisions a responsible parent simply must make, juggling the pros and cons.

We decided to let our daughter join Girl Scouts, for the reasons previously mentioned, just as we decided to let both of them go to magnet middle and high schools, knowing that both were across town and meant the children would have to get up far earlier and, if riding the bus, take a very long bus ride. About an hour each way to attend the magnet high school from our home in southwest Austin. That was a very tough decision, but short of spending a small fortune on private schools, with the disadvantages many of them have, a lack of diversity one of the biggest for us, the magnet program was the only public alternative that offered diversity, smaller classes, teachers who had to go through a rigorous process simply to teach there, just as the kids have to write essays and be tested in order to qualify, needing to beat out other kids to be accepted. And we have an excellent public high school about ten minutes from the house. Excellent, but simply not in the same class as the schools in the magnet program.

It's pretty freakin' tough being a parent. We would be living in central Austin today had we not decided to become parents so late in life, and we'd be in an environment suited to us. Instead, we live in an area with excellent elementary schools, in a house bigger than the two of us would have needed, and too big for us to afford had we stayed in central Austin. At least once our daughter is out of the house, we can move back into town, at last.

No, but if I were single, I might ask you out on a date!

 

Doesn't really matter. Whether or not it's enforced at the local level, their policy is: if you're gay, you're not morally straight and clean in thought, word, and deed and are therefore not worthy of being included in the Scouting experience.

Batman brings up a very valid point: if this policy was directed towards the African American community, there would be no question that people would not only not participate, they would be actively campaigning against it. But because it's directed towards the gay community, people look the other way. It's just another example of the tolerance of bigotry towards gays, and how they are still treated as second-class citizens every day.

What bothers me more, however, is their self-righteous position against atheists and the non-religious. To claim that one must believe in religion to be a good citizen, and that only those who follow religion can be role-models is more than misguided: it's downright malevolent.

I hear people saying things like "I was a Scout, and we never talked about sex, religion or politics. That's not what it's about". Well, of course you never gave it a second thought: you were already in. But if you were one of those kids who was being told they couldn't join, or one of the parents being turned away, you'd be keenly aware that the policy is not some "dissection" of a mission statement, but is central to what the organization is really about.

I guess what it really boils down to is this: I don't support organizations that support intolerance. It's one of the reasons I no longer donate to the Salvation Army. The only way I can see myself making a difference is by taking a stand against it.

 

You've picked an appropriate username bti. Such an angry young man. I suppose you won't join the Y either?

I'm highly doubtful kids are told they're not allowed to join unless they pledge allegiance to a certain religion or declare their straightness. Back in my day, I wasn't a scout, but of my friends who were, one was hindu, one a buddist (i think), and the rest were rastafarian (in spirit, anyway).