Bsa Prez Calls For End To Ban On Gay Leaders

[smac97]

Here:

The president of the Boy Scouts of America on Thursday called for an end to the group’s blanket ban on gay adult leaders, warning Scout executives that “we must deal with the world as it is, not as we might wish it to be,” and that “any other alternative will be the end of us as a national movement.”

At the same time, religious organizations that sponsor a majority of local Scout troops, including the Mormons and Roman Catholics, should remain free to set their own policies for leaders, said the president, Robert M. Gates, the former director of the C.I.A. and the former secretary of defense.

Wow. I wonder what the behind-the-scenes story of this is.

Mr. Gates called for the changes at an annual national meeting of the group, in Atlanta. He said that he was not yet making a formal proposal but that the Scouts’ governing body should take up the issue formally at a future meeting.

The treatment of gay men and boys has been a source of wrenching debate over the last decade. Conservative religious groups that sponsor many Scout troops, including the Mormon Church and the Roman Catholic Church, have opposed the participation of openly gay members while local leaders in more liberal areas have called for an end to the ban.

I wonder if a bifurcated system can work, one where scout groups chartered by religious groups can choose continue the BSA's current policy, whereas other chartering organizations can end the policy.

I also wonder how long that "choice" would remain intact for religious groups. Not long, I think.

In 2013, Boy Scout leaders from across the country voted, with more than 60 percent approval, to say that no youth may be denied membership “on the basis of sexual orientation or preference alone.” But it left intact the policy that no openly gay adults could serve in the organization.

Since then, a Scout group in New York has defied that policy by employing an openly gay leader, and several other groups around the country have expressed opposition to the ban.

Mr. Gates said in his prepared remarks Thursday, released by the Boy Scouts, that the national leadership would take no action against defiant local councils.

At the same time, he said that in the name of religious freedom, the Scouts should allow local sponsoring organizations “to determine the standards for their Scout leaders.”

“Such an approach would allow all churches, which sponsor some 70 percent of our Scout units, to establish leadership standards consistent with their faith,” he said.

“We must, at all costs, preserve the religious freedom of our church partners to do this.”

We'll see.

Thoughts?

-Smac

Edited May 21, 2015 by smac97

[Senator]

Cool

 

Maybe this is the catalyst that finally gets us out of the BSA

[Scott Lloyd]

Here:

Wow. I wonder what the behind-the-scenes story of this is.

I wonder if a bifurcated system can work, one where scout groups chartered by religious groups can choose continue the BSA's current policy, whereas other chartering organizations can end the policy.

I also wonder how long that "choice" would remain intact for religious groups. Not long, I think.

We'll see.

Thoughts?

-Smac

I agree with your prediction. While Gates is paying lip service to "religious freedom," now, that won't last long. Eventually, the Church will be obliged to end its BSA affiliation and formulate its own activity program for youth. And it will do it far more cost-effectively, not having to require its membership to help pay for, among other things, the corporate jets and other perqs of executives such as Gates.

Edited May 21, 2015 by Scott Lloyd

[Storm Rider]

For young boys I wonder how many of them even begin to understand their sexuality much less be so bold as to want to proclaim to the world that at eleven years old they are gay, straight, blue, green, etc.  If anything, any child that feels the need to do so does not feel the need; he feels the need of his parents or some other influencer.  It is a rare exception indeed that "knows" their sexuality at eleven, but I digress from the topic.

 

I am so completely tired of the entire issue of society bending over backwards in order to provide more rights to an already overindulged, hyper-sensitized group such as those in the LGBT whatever group.  I need to just shut my mouth on this topic.  Pass the nails I am ready to spit a few more in the privacy of my own home. 

[HappyJackWagon]

Good move BSA. Git R Done and stop discriminating!

[Avatar4321]

Cool

 

Maybe this is the catalyst that finally gets us out of the BSA

I don't want us out of bsa. I love scouting and the positive influence it's had on me and my family

[Gray]

I am so completely tired of the entire issue of society bending over backwards in order to provide more rights to an already overindulged, hyper-sensitized group such as those in the LGBT whatever group.  I need to just shut my mouth on this topic.  Pass the nails I am ready to spit a few more in the privacy of my own home. 

 

I feel the same way about far right religious activists in my less charitable moments. 

[ALarson]

I don't want us out of bsa. I love scouting and the positive influence it's had on me and my family

I agree.  Both of my sons are Eagle Scouts and it was a very positive experience for all of us.  Having this on their resume's has gotten them respect and positions in their careers too, so it continues to be a positive.

 

I hope the church stays with bsa, but it won't surprise me if they eventually make a break. 

 

I also support this decision.

[Senator]

I don't want us out of bsa. I love scouting and the positive influence it's had on me and my family

 

I respect that you and others have had that experience with scouting.

[Duncan]

I think people conflate gay leaders with pedophiles and so if they want to get rid of the ban then it makes me no nevermind

[Buckeye]

Here are the actual remarks, with my emphasis bolded.

 

 

FINALLY, LET ME ADDRESS MEMBERSHIP POLICY.

 

I TOLD YOU A YEAR AGO THAT I WOULD OPPOSE RE-OPENING THIS ISSUE DURING MY TWO-YEAR TERM AS PRESIDENT OF THE BSA. I HAD HOPED THEN FOR A RESPITE DURING WHICH WE COULD FOCUS ON HEALING OUR DIVISIONS FROM THE 2013 DECISION, IMPROVING OUR PROGRAM, STRENGTHENING OUR FINANCES AND ENDING OUR DECLINE IN MEMBERSHIP.

 

HOWEVER, EVENTS DURING THE PAST YEAR HAVE CONFRONTED US WITH URGENT CHALLENGES I DID NOT FORESEE AND WHICH WE CANNOT IGNORE. WE CANNOT IGNORE GROWING INTERNAL CHALLENGES TO OUR CURRENT MEMBERSHIP POLICY, FROM SOME COUNCILS – LIKE THE GREATER NEW YORK COUNCIL, THE DENVER AREA COUNCIL, AND OTHERS – IN OPEN DEFIANCE OF THE POLICY, TO MORE AND MORE COUNCILS TAKING A POSITION 

IN THEIR MISSION STATEMENTS AND PUBLIC DOCUMENTS CONTRARY TO NATIONAL POLICY.

 

NOR CAN WE IGNORE THE SOCIAL, POLITICAL AND JURIDICIAL CHANGES TAKING PLACE IN OUR COUNTRY – CHANGES TAKING PLACE AT A PACE OVER THIS PAST YEAR NO ONE ANTICIPATED. I REMIND YOU OF THE RECENT DEBATES WE HAVE SEEN IN PLACES LIKE INDIANA AND ARKANSAS OVER DISCRIMINATION BASED ON SEXUAL ORIENTATION, NOT TO MENTION THE IMPENDING U.S. SUPREME COURT DECISION THIS SUMMER ON GAY MARRIAGE.

I AM NOT ASKING THE NATIONAL BOARD FOR ANY ACTION TO CHANGE OUR CURRENT POLICY AT THIS MEETING. BUT I MUST SPEAK AS PLAINLY AND BLUNTLY TO YOU AS I SPOKE TO PRESIDENTS WHEN I WAS DIRECTOR OF CIA AND SECRETARY OF DEFENSE. WE MUST DEAL WITH THE WORLD AS IT IS, NOT AS WE MIGHT WISH IT TO BE. THE STATUS QUO IN OUR MOVEMENT’S MEMBERSHIP STANDARDS CANNOT BE SUSTAINED.

 

WE CAN EXPECT MORE COUNCILS TO OPENLY CHALLENGE THE CURRENT POLICY. WHILE TECHNICALLY WE HAVE THE AUTHORITY TO REVOKE THEIR CHARTERS, SUCH AN ACTION WOULD DENY THE LIFELONG BENEFITS OF SCOUTING TO HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF BOYS AND YOUNG MEN TODAY AND VASTLY MORE IN THE FUTURE. I WILL NOT TAKE THAT PATH.

 

MOREOVER, DOZENS OF STATES – FROM NEW YORK TO UTAH – ARE PASSING LAWS THAT PROTECT EMPLOYMENT RIGHTS ON THE BASIS OF SEXUAL ORIENTATION. THUS, BETWEEN INTERNAL CHALLENGES AND POTENTIAL LEGAL CONFLICTS, THE BSA FINDS ITSELF IN AN UNSUSTAINABLE POSITION. A POSITION THAT MAKES US VULNERABLE TO THE POSSIBILITY THE COURTS SIMPLY WILL ORDER US AT SOME POINT TO CHANGE OUR MEMBERSHIP POLICY. WE 15

MUST ALL UNDERSTAND THAT THIS PROBABLY WILL HAPPEN SOONER RATHER THAN LATER.

 

IN 2010, A FEDERAL DISTRICT JUDGE IN CALIFORNIA OVERTURNED THE MILITARY’S DON’T ASK, DON’T TELL LAW AND THE REVERSAL WAS APPLIED NATIONWIDE IMMEDIATELY. ONLY A STAY GRANTED BY THE APPEALS COURT – GRANTED, I BELIEVE, MAINLY BECAUSE WE WERE IN THE PROCESS OF CHANGING THE LAW – PREVENTED DRAMATIC DISRUPTION IN THE ARMED FORCES.

 

WE CANNOT PREDICT IF OR WHEN THIS MIGHT HAPPEN TO US, BUT I PERSONALLY BELIEVE OUR LEGAL DEFENSES HAVE WEAKENED SINCE THE DALE CASE. AND IF WE WAIT FOR THE COURTS TO ACT, WE COULD END UP WITH A BROAD RULING THAT COULD FORBID ANY KIND OF MEMBERSHIP STANDARD, INCLUDING OUR FOUNDATIONAL BELIEF IN OUR DUTY TO GOD AND OUR FOCUS ON SERVING THE SPECIFIC NEEDS OF BOYS. WAITING FOR THE COURTS IS A GAMBLE WITH HUGE STAKES.

 

ALTERNATIVELY, WE CAN MOVE AT SOME FUTURE DATE – BUT SOONER RATHER THAN LATER – TO SEIZE CONTROL OF OUR OWN FUTURE, SET OUR OWN COURSE AND CHANGE OUR POLICY IN ORDER TO ALLOW CHARTER PARTNERS – UNIT SPONSORING ORGANIZATIONS – TO DETERMINE THE STANDARDS FOR THEIR SCOUT LEADERS. SUCH AN APPROACH WOULD ALLOW ALL CHURCHES, WHICH SPONSOR SOME 70% OF OUR SCOUT UNITS, TO ESTABLISH LEADERSHIP STANDARDS CONSISTENT WITH THEIR FAITH. WE MUST, AT ALL COSTS, PRESERVE THE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM OF OUR CHURCH PARTNERS TO DO THIS.

 

OUR OATH CALLS UPON US TO DO OUR DUTY TO GOD AND OUR COUNTRY. THE COUNTRY IS CHANGING AND WE ARE INCREASINGLY AT ODDS WITH THE LEGAL LANDSCAPE AT BOTH THE STATE AND FEDERAL LEVELS. AND, AS A MOVEMENT, WE FIND OURSELVES WITH A POLICY MORE THAN A FEW OF OUR CHURCH SPONSORS REJECT – THUS PLACING SCOUTING BETWEEN A BOY AND HIS CHURCH.

 

THE CHALLENGES ARE BEFORE US NOW. THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE, THE NATIONAL EXECUTIVE BOARD AND OUR LEGAL COUNSEL WILL WORK TO DETERMINE OUR RESPONSES AND OUR BEST STRATEGY. WE WANT AND VALUE YOUR THOUGHTS ON ALL THIS, RECOGNIZING THE IMPORTANCE OF PROTECTING OUR CORE VALUES.

 

THE ONE THING WE CANNOT DO IS PUT OUR HEADS IN THE SAND AND PRETEND THIS CHALLENGE WILL GO AWAY OR ABATE. QUITE THE OPPOSITE IS HAPPENING.

 

I KNOW MY REMARKS ON THIS SUBJECT UNSETTLE MANY OF YOU. SOME OF YOU MIGHT BE ANGRY THAT I RAISE THIS SUBJECT AND WITH WHAT I HAVE SAID. BUT THIS MOVEMENT SHAPED MY LIFE AND MY ONLY PURPOSE – MY ONLY REASON FOR ASSUMING THIS LEADERSHIP ROLE – IS TO PRESERVE THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA IN RECOGNITION OF ALL IT HAS DONE FOR THIS COUNTRY, AND ALL IT CAN AND MUST DO IN THE FUTURE. SCOUTING IS NEEDED IN THIS COUNTRY NOW MORE THAN EVER.

 

I ASSURE YOU THAT I HAVE NO HIDDEN AGENDA. I WANT ONLY TO APPRISE YOU OF THE NEW REALITY I SEE: THAT BOTH INTERNAL AND EXTERNAL EVENTS AND PRESSURES OVER THE PAST YEAR AND LOOKING TO THE FUTURE WILL REQUIRE ACTION AT SOME POINT. FOR NOW, I ASK THAT, IN THE DAYS AND MONTHS AHEAD, EVERYONE HERE REFLECT AND PRAY ON OUR PATH FORWARD. WE CAN ACT ON OUR OWN OR WE CAN BE FORCED TO ACT BUT, EITHER WAY, I SUSPECT WE DON’T HAVE A LOT OF TIME.

 

FOR ME, I SUPPORT A POLICY THAT ACCEPTS AND RESPECTS OUR DIFFERENT PERSPECTIVES AND BELIEFS, ALLOWS RELIGIOUS ORGANIZATIONS – BASED ON FIRST AMENDMENT PROTECTION OF RELIGIOUS FREEDOM – TO ESTABLISH THEIR OWN STANDARDS FOR ADULT LEADERS, AND PRESERVES THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA NOW AND FOREVER. I TRULY FEAR THAT ANY OTHER ALTERNATIVE WILL BE THE END OF US AS A NATIONAL MOVEMENT.

 

 

http://scoutingnewsroom.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/05/DR-GATES-REMARKS.pdf

[danielwoods]

The Assemblies of God started their own Boy and Girls groups a while ago. It works just as well if not better, because it's not restricted to BSA rules. 

[Buckeye]

I really don't understand the opposition to Gates' position. He is not advocating that church-sponsored units be forced to change their standards. He is trying to preserve religious freedom by changing the policy at national. This is precisely the tact that was originally tried until the SL Council objected and forced national to go with the current middle-ground of allowing gay boys, but not gay leaders.

 

I too worry that the LDS Church may abandon scouting because of this change, but wonder why. The change would not mean the church couldn't set its standards. Actively gay adults would not be scoutmasters or committe chairs in LDS-sponsored troops. Rather, the only time gay leaders would interact with our youth is on the council and national levels - for example, the FOS rep may be gay, or the cook at scout camp, or the geneology merit badge counselor at the council midway. Seriously, is it worth dumping the entire BSA program in the church because of fear of those interactions?

 

Our youth will have interact with opening gay adults quite often in their lives. Gays are found in the ranks of the teachers, sports coaches, fellow employees, and so forth. We send of 18-year old boys as missionaries to the four corners of the world, and yet we can't allow a 17-year to old to be taught environmental science by an openly gay counselor? Please. The exasperation seen on this board in the halls of our churchs is simply a reflection of the pain that the church is losing on this cultural war. Let's not shoot the youth with friendly-fire out of spite at the world.

 

FWIW, I wonder whether the time pressure Gates feels is not just from courts and businesses, but from the failing health of the greatest LDS-advocate for scouting: President Monson. Best to get this done while he still has the sway to keep the church in the BSA fold.

[Buckeye]

The Assemblies of God started their own Boy and Girls groups a while ago. It works just as well if not better, because it's not restricted to BSA rules. 

 

The better analogy would be the camps already run by the LDS church. We call them Girl's Camps. I am very appreciate to the time and resources that go into those camps, but having seen both girl's camps and BSA camps, I can say the two are worlds apart. If the LDS church tried to create its own form of BSA, it would be a vastly poorer experience - in particular in areas where the church is thin. What you'd find instead is that members (like me) who want scouting for their boys will start joining non-LDS troops, thereby creating even more conflicts that keep our youth our of LDS activities. Cancel scouting in my ward, and you might as well shut down the mid-week meetings.

[Jeanne]

I have a feeling..I do not KNOW but I believe that the LDS involvement with the BSA with remain with current policy.  Whatever..each religion has this right..that being said, I wish for all religions to do their own thing..with one requirement, if they leave the BSA...then now is the time to get the young women into scouting..really involved.  Perhaps Eagle Awards would give a young woman a chance in her chosen career..it could help family..and for heaven's sakes..at least equal out the monetary award equally for both sexes..whether gay/lesbian/straight or not.  Yes, the world is evolving but churches can keep their religious beliefs and still remain fair.

[Damien the Leper]

In future news, Duty to God has become way more popular. Not really and probably wont happen.

[smac97]

Have any of you ever read this article by Dr. Judith Riesman?  It addresses at some length what she describes as an "organized homosexual campaign to recruit children."  The article is heavily annotated.  Starting on page 35:

 

V. CRAFTING BI/HOMOSEXUAL YOUTH

 

While many Kinsey followers suggest sexual orientation is innate, the tactics of gay activists themselves suggest otherwise. The following strategies for crafting "gay" children suggest homosexuality requires vigilant and organized wooing that rivals the recruitment techniques of the United States Marine Corps. Children, (labeled "initiates" as in prostitution or religion) are weaned from their "old fashioned" parents, "first into a self-affirming semisecret group, then by collective socialization into a ‘gay’ cultural system,"204 a form of religio-sexuality cult. San Francisco State University Sexuality Professor and homosexual advocate Gilbert Herdt spells this out in his anthology Gay Culture in America.205 Hundreds of homosexual activists who "range in age from twenty-three to the late forties,"206  "aid" child initiates. Homosexual advocate Frederick Lynch describes the function of advisors in the suburban context.

 

(W)hat has not been brought out fully in some other coming out studies is the role of guide, teacher, or "helping hand" in either the signification state, the coming-out-stage, or both . . . . (T)he often benign and helpful role that older, more experienced homosexual men play with regard to younger (males).208

 

Left  is  an  ad  by  the Mulinomab County Children & Youth Commission offering "rewarding opportunities" to those seeking to aid "sexual minority youth," etc., with the Commission (like many homosexual "youth" groups) offering scholarships to those children who will attend their events.

 

In their New York University Press classic, Lavender Culture,208 editors Jay and Young present Gerald Hannon address "Gay Youth and the Question of Consent."209  This prestigious homosexual political manifesto candidly describes the organized homosexual campaign to recruit children. "I believe . . . we have to behave in a certain way vis-à-vis young people. I believe that means we have to proselytize . . . . The answer is to proselytize. Aggressively so."210  The homosexual movement has long advocated ending age of consent laws.211 Shocked that the "gay" youth group he guides did not fully favor eliminating age of consent laws, Gerald Hannon says the boys will learn better soon:

 

Why is sexual childhood necessary? By that I mean why is it necessary to maintain the myth that children are not sexual beings? It is maintained, after all, in the face of rather massive evidence to the contrary. Infants in their cribs have orgasms—Kinsey documented them in babies less than a year old . . . .212

 

Simply being young does not endow you with a perspective on social change. That has to be learned. Consciousness-raising is crucial . . . And if the Gay Youth Group isn’t prepared quite yet to demand an abolition to age-of-consent laws, that’s all right. But it’s one of the things they’re preparing for . . . .213

 

During the recent gay conference in Toronto, the matter of age-of-consent laws surfaced for reconsideration. Their abolition is one of the demands of the National Gay Rights Coalition (NGRC) . . . its contingent should contain a few teenagers . . . The question is where to get them. The answer, again, is to proselytize. At present, we do not have organizations that are chock-a-block full of young people . . . . To attract young people to the gay movement in large numbers should be the challenge to the next phase of the movement. It is a challenge we have set ourselves . . . .214

 

As a result of such cult proselytizing in schools nationwide, many homosexual groups are now "chock-a-block full of young people."215 "Adult advisors" also answer the challenge to what Hannon called the next phase, "to attract young people to the gay movement in large numbers."216  Child "initiates" (many who die early of AIDS)217  are

courted, given a pseudo-home and family, welcomed, wooed, held, and embraced. Herdt says:

 

(T)he adult advisors, in their twenties and thirties are around.

 

The adolescent newcomer’s reception is also unexpectedly warm, remarkably praising and positive, for advisers make every effort to acknowledge the courage of "new people" in joining the group. . . . Each person is loudly applauded.

. . . (A)ll "new people," those who have come for four Saturdays or less, are ushered into a smaller separate room, where they huddle with one or two advisors as an isolate.218

 

They laugh at "straights," derided as "breeders,"219 share clothes, are loaned money, have "fun with friends, and adult-supervised learning:"220

 

Their seclusion past, they enter the larger Horizons’ group as public initiates . . . . Their feeling of belonging makes the heterosexual conventions they must obey at home, school, or work seem unreal, as if they belong to another time and place . . . . Parents are a constant source of exasperation and amusement.221

 

Children’s past values of family and nation are treated with contempt and ridiculed as narrow-minded and shallow.

 

Cults commonly separate and isolate children from their parents and family members, those who might reveal to them the harm of their new "friends." Protective adults must attend to the "gay" press proclamation that, "the (erotic) love between men and boys is at the foundation of homosexuality."222 

 

Herdt, editor of Gay and Lesbian Youth, 223 agrees.  He explains that laws against adult sex with children are irrelevant, citing a female psychologist’s view that as culture shapes behavior,"age itself becomes an ‘empty’ variable."224

 

Herdt articulated the homosexual movement’s call to eliminate the words "child or childhood"225 from the vocabulary in The Journal of Pedophilia, while another homosexual academic notes some "small boys are made into big strong men through pederasty . . . . Aspiring initiates firmly believe this."226

 

Writing on the role of adult homosexual "Coaches," Fredrick Lynch says, "Indeed, in this study five subjects (boys) were taken to bars or otherwise initiated into the gay subculture by men who were either the same age or older." 227

 

Writing in After the Ball, gay rights strategists Kirk and Madsen are candid about what commonly happens to boys in "gay bars" with "men" the "same age or older" than a teenage boy. "(U)nless we have a young, handsome face and tight body, and dress in fashionable clothing, the minute we step through the door of a gay bar we learn who the real queer bashers are: us."228

 

Every year, the ideals of countless naïve, fresh-faced youths are— metaphorically, if not literally—gang-raped in the bars by older, more cynical predators. . . . Wanting to retrieve something from the ruin of their hopes . . . sooner or later, there they are at the Greyhound bus station, waiting to greet the next busload of farm boys from Peoria.

. . . .

 

. . . One very young New York City boy, homosexually active since puberty, spent his entire sixteenth birthday riding trains through the city and weeping for his lost youth.229

 

If taking boys into gay bars (which, by the way, is illegal) where men pick up the youngsters for quickie sex is "benign," what does Lynch mean by "otherwise initiated into the gay subculture?"230

 

A. The Induction Process

 

The "gay" child requires sustained contact with one or more homosexual "coaches" to establish the child’s "sexual identity as a homosexual," to facilitate "the process of coming out."231 A critical read of these "gay" position papers on youth identifies both unambiguous seduction and the absence of any candid admissions of the massive, organized boy prostitution traffic. For such adult "guides" and "advisors" as often as not seek profit from using and selling the boys’ sexual favors. The critical reader, bearing in mind the boy prostitution traffic, ponders Lynch’s three-stage initiation process:

 

·First is the "sensitization" stage, a same-sex experience in childhood or adolescence.232 (Here even Lynch documents early sexual trauma as normally causal in a homosexual outcome.)

·Second is the "signification" stage, when a child wonders about his or her heterosexuality "in their late teens or . . . somewhat  earlier–usually  by  reading about homosexuality."233  (This is a regular occurrence now in classroom activity and via the establishment media.)

·Third is the "coming out" stage, which commonly takes place at that gay bar where benign "advisors" bring their boys.234

 

B. The Role of "Adult Advisors"

 

Recall, Herdt carelessly notes that many hundreds of homosexual "volunteers" who "range in age from twenty-three to the late forties"235 act as "adult advisors" for these children. Sociologist Fredrick Lynch’s observation that "what has not been brought out" is the way the guide serves as a "helping hand . . . (and) often benign and helpful role that older, more experienced homosexual men play with" impressionable young boys.236

 

After the advent of the AIDS epidemic, academic homosexual leaders worried that boys  were  avoiding  gay  men.  Herdt explained  that  homosexual  leaders determined they must access schools, scouts, and other child institutions in order to "institutionalize ‘socialization’ techniques"237 to bring homosexuality to mainstream youth in the mid-1980s and reverse a growing youthful resistance to homosexuality. School newspaper ads seeking "gay" youths238 and proclaiming a battle against gay suicide and associated "hate" crimes began to appear regularly. Herdt explained why homosexual recruitment efforts increased. "We had not foreseen that . . . gay youth would also have to contend with the new horrors of AIDS (and that) . . . teenage gays and lesbians would shun older gays as role models or even as friends . . . ."239

 

To meet this challenge, Herdt said, "(O)nly now has gay culture begun to institutionalize ‘socialization’ techniques for the transmission of its cultural knowledge to a younger generation . . ."240 as "local ‘gay’ movements provide their own infrastructural support for the coming out process in teens."241

 

Homophile medical anthropologist Douglas Feldman claimed, "these kids are our (the gay community’s) future and we must invest in them."242  Yet, Feldman admits that gay and lesbian organizations discourage having "gay" boys tested for HIV.243 Why? Feldman’s reply is disturbing. "Teenagers tend to be very susceptible to sexually transmissible  diseases  (that  testing  might  expose),"244  observed Feldman,. In any event, Feldman observes, these boys "have about a one in four chance of developing AIDS in approximately five years."245 So how does the gay community counteract the unforeseen boyish fear of homosexual sex and an early, painful and lonely death?

 

Methods  of  socialization  into  "gay  cultural  values"  were subsequently developed and implemented.246  The victim-minority propaganda techniques which Marshall and Kirk diagramed in After The Ball were largely followed to facilitate sexual access to all American schoolchildren. "How To Stop Child Abuse," is one of a series of full-page, fear-based advertisements designed by Kirk and Madsen to sell the idea of "bi/homosexual youth" to middle-America.247  Propagandizing as science the false Kinsey data that "one in every ten kids" is gay, the ad poses a forlorn, average young boy of about thirteen years of age. Implicit in the ad language is the threat to parents and boys–this could be you.248

 

The ad says the boy felt "different" when growing up and realized he was gay.249 Then he was abused (thrown out of his home) by his parents and brutally rejected by his friends.250  Because most children feel

"different," telling children this could mean they are "gay" exploits the viewer’s fear even as it encourages homosexual experimentation and recruitment.251

 

Kirk and Madsen provide an eight point "Strategic Evaluation" form to evaluate an ad’s success in vilifying the "straight" world as scoundrels and smearing "parents (and) his folks," who are not gays, as child abusers.252  This advertisement rates a "Bull’s–eye," say Kirk and Madsen,253 for implicit in the ad "How To Stop Child Abuse" is the boy’s possible suicide because of "his folks’" intolerance of yet another "gay teen."254 Following is the Kirk and Madsen analysis of the ad:

 

STRATEGY: Jamming / Conversion / Desensitization. Build straight sympathy and protectiveness toward gays by portraying them as innocent victims of circumstance and bigotry. Teach readers that homosexuality is extremely common. (Kinsey’s fraudulent 10 percent claim)

 

COMMENT: The headline catches the eye, and trades on the perennial public hysteria about child abuse (which is, of course, often blamed on gays). Then the copy turns the tables on straights: by focusing on teens, the ad portrays gays as innocent and vulnerable, victimized and misunderstood, surprisingly numerous yet not menacing. It also renders the ‘anti-family’ charge absurd and hypocritical. Bull’s eye. 255

 

However, the truth is that the "public hysteria about child abuse" is grounded in real sexual violence, including sexual violence to boys by men. Moreover, current U.S. population data comparing heterosexuals and homosexuals finds that child abuse should be "often blamed on gays," a population which reports that its strategy of winning youths necessitates  "coaching"  and  "guiding"  children  into  homosexual experimentation.

 

C. One Teenager in Ten

 

In an era of pandemic child sexual abuse and pedophile predators, despite the mortality of AIDS, sexual license is regularly proffered in classrooms by allegedly platonic pedagogues who claim to harbor no libidinous yearnings for their charges. Lesbian teacher Virginia Uribie began the current practice of recruiting children into homosexuality via the classroom. Her organization describes itself as follows: "PROJECT 10, named after Kinsey’s (1948) estimate that 10% of the population is exclusively homosexual . . . has become a district-wide and nation-wide forum for . . . lesbian, gay, and bisexual teenagers."256

 

But, the entrapment of children under national programs like PROJECT 10 continues where Kinsey left off. An incredible thirty-eight percent of the short stories in ONE TEENAGER IN 10 celebrate child-adult sexual activity and normalize child sexual abuse.257 A sampling of these stories read as follows: "I was twelve . . . (when) my dance teacher . . . brought me out;"258 I was in seventh grade when I moved in with my "32-year-old-lover;"259 I was in fourth grade and had sex with my uncle;260 "I’m fifteen," and have sex with "this guy Reggie, who is 23."261

 

D. The Schools Pitch In

 

Examples of sexual recruiting continue. New York City Schools: In 1991, the AIDS Program Services, New York City Department of Health published and distributed "A Teenager’s Bill Of Rights"262 to New York schoolchildren. The pamphlet, endorsed by a series of credible organizations, tells the readers, "I have the right to decide whether to have sex and who to have it with," without reference to parents, age of consent, or statutory rape.263 The following tender, romantic directions grace an illustration of "How to use a condom." Children should use condoms in "vaginal sex (penis into a woman’s vagina), oral sex (penis into the mouth) and **** sex (penis into the butt). Use a dental dam . . . or plastic food wrap for oral sex . . . . Hold it over her vagina to keep from getting her fluids in your mouth."264 Romantic indeed.

 

Minnesota Schools: The Minnesota Department of Education in its booklet "Alone No More: Developing a School Support System for Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Youth," stands on Kinsey’s false, "full continuum of sexual orientation."265  Denying the well-known sexual trauma inherent in the initiation of lonely and isolated children into early sex, and the predictable pattern of sexual disease and even death from homosexual conduct, the twin myths of condom safety and "informed consent" have become the sex educator’s fetish. School personnel are warned that they must adhere to the new sexuality dogma or be labeled homophobes, subject to serious disciplinary action.266

 

Perhaps not coincidentally, The University of Minnesota is a central source of the current positive pedophilia program.  University of Minnesota Press is advertising its new book, "Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children From Sex,"267 as challenging widespread anxieties about pedophilia. Its author, Judith Levine, claimed there is no proof that "it’s always harmful for kids to have sexual relationships with adults . . . a boy’s sexual experience with a priest could be positive."268

 

"With more research, some scholars say, it may be only a matter of time before modern society accepts adult-child sex, just as it has learned to accept premarital sex and homosexual sex."269 "Children are the last bastion of the old sexual morality," wrote one of the trailblazers for this view, Harris Mirkin, an associate professor of political science at the University of Missouri-Kansas City.270

 

Massachusetts Schools: In Massachusetts, Department of Education employees are reported as "describing the pleasures of homosexual sex to a group of high school students at a state-sponsored workshop, March 25, 2000."271  Homosexual lecturers described the fun of "fisting," (insertion of ones fist–even an arm–into, another’s rectum) in libidinous, pornographic detail.272 The following is censored for this monograph. Full quotations appear in The Massachusetts News. "Fisting’s an experience of letting somebody into your body that you want to be that close and intimate with . . . (and) to put you into an exploratory mode."273

 

(Organized by) The Commission for Gay and Lesbian Youth, made up of homosexual activists from across the state, since 1992 the Commission has used the safe schools mantra and state money to persuade over 180 schools in Massachusetts to accept the (Gay-Straight Alliance (GSA)) clubs and their activities. Parents and others who offer any criticism of the programs are regularly accused of homophobia and endangering students’ safety.274

 

The information above became public only because a concerned parent took a hidden tape recorder into one of the meetings. After the parent circulated copies of the tape, homosexual organizations’ only response was to threaten to sue the parent for making the presentation public. Apparently they saw nothing wrong with teaching high school children how to do "fisting," while dismissing its psychopathology and ridiculing its obvious physical harms.

 

E. The Crafted Child

 

On the one hand, it has taken organizational commitment, planning, and effort to cultivate and initiate the current crop of bisexual and homosexual youth. However, on the other hand, homosexuality (bisexuality and transgendered sexuality) is the only extant sexuality cult receiving both tax dollars and direct access to school children, with laws protecting PROJECT 10 type teachers. The advisor, guide, teacher, or "helping hand" aids recruitment and limits potential escapees during all stages of initiation of children into homosexuality.275  Employing the language of religion and ritual, Professor Herdt says adult–led gay youth groups direct the "adolescent entry first into a self-affirming semi-secret group, then by collective socialization into a ‘gay’ cultural system . . . ."276 Men "seclude() and protect() the youths, furthering their initiation . . . which socializes them further into the cultural system of the gay community."277

 

These "advisors" are not the children’s parents and many, if not most, are on record as selfishly interested in "helping" these boys in the form of obtaining sexual favors and/or economic rewards.278 The massive boy prostitution industry, servicing a significant percentage of the affluent homosexual community, is prima facie organized by their elders.

 

_______________

200 Interview: John Money, PAIDIKA: J. PAEDOPHILA, Spring 1991, at 7.

201 Dan J. Stein & Donald W. Black, The Epidemiology, Psychopharmacology, and Neurobiology of Compulsive Sexual Behavior, 5 CNS SPECTRUMS 1, 18 (2000).

202 Id. See also DONALD BLACK, The Epidemiology and Phenomenology of Compulsive Sexual  Behavior,  5  CNS  SPECTRUMS  26  (2000),  available  at http://qube.oldsaclaw.com/~svp/CBSEpidemologyBlack00.pdf (last visited Apr. 4, 2002) who cites to the Kinsey "data" on total sexual outlet (TSO), using these "data" as the touchstone for normal sexual conduct. Kinsey et al, who developed the concept of TSO, reported that the median (TSO) was 2.14 for men from adolescence through age 30 years, and 1.99 for all men. TSO means how much one masturbates, has intercourse with men, women, children, objects or animals. Kinsey would add up all one’s orgasms and the higher the number the healthier the person. (Many child molesters would have a very high "healthy" TSO.)

203 See Biography, supra note 181; SECRETS: KINSEY’S PEDOPHILES, supra note 169.

204 Herdt, supra note 131, at 39-44. 205 Id. at 47-50.

206 Id. at 48 (emphasis added).

207 Frederick Lynch, Nonghetto Gays: An Ethnography of Suburban Homosexuals, in GAY CULTURE IN AMERICA, supra note 117, at 175.

208 Gerald Hannon, Gay Youth and the Question of Consent, in LAVENDER CULTURE 358 (Karla Jay & Allen Young eds., 1994).

209 Id. at 342-64. 210 Id. at 362-63.

211  "Repeal of all laws governing the age of sexual consent." State 1972 Gay Rights Platform, in ENRIQUE RUEDA, THE HOMOSEXUAL NETWORK: PRIVATE LIVES AND PUBLIC POLICY 203 (1982).

212 Hannon, supra note 208, at 358 (emphasis added). 213 Id. at 354 (emphasis added).

214 Id. at 362, 364 (emphasis added). These recruitment methods are well known to the author who, up to age 16, was a member of the "Labor Youth League," organized (I realized later) by adults in the Communist Party. However, experimenting with radical political ideologies, ideas of the mind, do not corrupt body and soul, and, unlike homosexual experiments, can be a learning experience, left behind as easily as an old pair of socks.

215 Id.

216 Id.

217 Douglas A. Feldman, Gay Youth and AIDS, in GAY AND LESBIAN YOUTH (Gilbert Herdt ed., 1989). "About half of all gay men in major North American cities with large gay communities are HIV-1 seropositive," says Feldman. Id at 189. He writes that the highly promiscuous sex acts of "gay" youths predispose them as early AIDS victims.. Addressing the resistance of adult homosexuals toward allowing "gay" youths to test for AIDS, Feldman explains these boys "would have about a one in four chance of developing AIDS in approximately 5 years." Id. at 188. Feldman, summarizing Bell & Holmes, adds, "Teenagers tend to be very susceptible to sexually transmitted diseases" concluding that teenagers will have higher HIV rates than bi/homosexual males who "come out" in "their 20’s, 30’s, and 40’s." Id. at 189. Feldman cites support data from the New York City Department of Health, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (1985). Id.

218 Herdt, supra note 131, at 40-41 (emphasis added). 219 Id. at 41 (emphasis added).

220 Id. at 44.

221 Id. at 44-45 (emphasis added).

222 Editorial, SAN FRANCISCO SENTINEL, Mar. 26, 1992 (on file with author).

223 Gilbert Herdt, Introduction: Gay and Lesbian Youth, Emergent Identities, and Cultural Scenes at Home and Abroad, in GAY LESBIAN YOUTH 3 (Gilbert Herdt ed., 1989).

224 Id. Herdt explains, "When we ask whether gay men are born and not made, we must simultaneously wonder whether gay culture has, paradoxically, been made and not born?" Id. at 3.

225 Interview: Gilbert Herdt, J. PAEDOPHILA, Winter 1993, at 12.

226 Gisela Bleibtreu-Ehrenberg, Pederasty Among Primitives: Institutionalized Initiation and Cultic Prostitution, in MALE INTERGENERATIONAL INTIMACY: HISTORICAL, SOCIO-PSYCHOLOGICAL, AND LEGAL PERSPECTIVES 16 (Theo Sandfort et al., eds., 1991) (emphasis added).

227 Lynch, supra note 207, at 175.

228 KIRK & MADSEN, supra note 17, at 312. 229 Id. at 315-17.

230 Lynch, supra note 207, at 172. 231 Id. at 172.

232 Id. at 172.

233 Id. at 173. 234 Id. at 173-77. 235 Id. at 48.

236 Lynch supra note 207, at 175. 237 Herdt, supra note 223, at 4.

238 See LASSON NEWSPAPER, Mar. 9, 1992. The Lasson is a student newspaper at George Mason Junior-Senior High School, Falls Church City, VA. The student newspaper ran an advertisement for an organization in the Mar. 9, 1992 edition that offered "support groups" and a "helpline" for "Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual Youth (aged 14-21) since 1985." The definition of "youth" as including those even age 24 appears throughout the homosexual school recruitment literature.

239 Herdt, supra note 223, at 3. 240 Id. at 4.

241 Id. at 29.

242 Feldman, supra note 217, at 192. 243 Id. at 188.

244 Id. at 189. 245 Id. at 188. 246 Id. at 192.

247 KIRK & MADSEN, supra note 17, at 228. 248 Id.

249 Id. 250 Id.

251 Id.

252 Id. at 229. 253 Id.

254 Id. at 228-29. 255 Id. at 229.

256 Karen M. Harbeck & Virginia Uribe, Addressing the Needs of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Youth: The Origins of Project 10 and School-Based Intervention, in COMING OUT OF THE CLASSROOM CLOSET: GAY AND LESBIAN STUDENTS, TEACHERS, AND CURRICULA 11 (Karen M. Harbeck ed., 1992).

257 ONE TEENAGER IN 10 (Ann Heron ed., 1983). One Teenager in 10 is a standard, sexually explicit text, commonly given to PROJECT 10 potential child initiates.

258 Id. at 60. 259 Id. at 33-34. 260 Id. at 48-49. 261 Id. at 67.

262 NEW YORK CITY DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, A TEENAGER’S BILL OF RIGHTS (1991). The pamphlet was published as part of New York City’s AIDS Program Services and was funded by the City and the Centers for Disease Control.

263 Id.

264 Id. at 2 (emphasis added).

265 MINNESOTA DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION, ALONE NO MORE: DEVELOPING A SCHOOL SUPPORT SYSTEM FOR GAY, LESBIAN AND BISEXUAL YOUTH (1994).

266 Id. at 1.

267 JUDITH LEVINE, HARMFUL TO MINORS: THE PERILS OF PROTECTING CHILDREN FROM SEX (2002).

268 Mark O'Keefe, Some in mainstream contend certain cases of adult-minor sex should be acceptable, STAR TRIBUNE (Minneapolis-St. Paul), Mar. 26, 2002, available at http://www.startribune.com/stories/384/2126968.html.

269 Id. 270 Id.

271 Brian Camenker, Special Report: Students Given Graphic Instruction in Homosexual Sex, MASS. NEWS  (Newton, Mass.) May, 2000 at 12, available at http://www.massnews.com/900fist1.htm.

272 Id.

273 Id.

 

A few thoughts:

 

1. I think Dr. Riesman's article in its entirety is worth a read.  

 

2. The organized homosexual campaign to recruit children as described in Lavender Culture "Gay Youth and the Question of Consent" manifesto would be fairly disconcerting to any parent.  

 

• When these folks are saying, in print, that "we have to behave in a certain way vis-à-vis young people," and that this "means we have to proselytize ... Aggressively so," I am going to take them at their word.  
• When they are publicly advocating for repeal of age-of-consent laws ("And if the Gay Youth Group isn’t prepared quite yet to demand an abolition to age-of-consent laws, that’s all right. But it’s one of the things they’re preparing for..."), I am going to take them at their word.  
• When they ridicule heterosexuals, referring to them as "breeders," I am going to take them at their word.  
• When a homosexual academic notes some "small boys are made into big strong men through pederasty," I am going to take him at his word.
• When I read Fredrick Lynch writing about how "five subjects (boys) were taken to bars or otherwise initiated into the gay subculture by men who were either the same age or older," I am going to take him at his word.
• When Lynch outlines a three-stage initiation process involving 1) the "sensitization" stage, a same-sex experience in childhood or adolescence, 2) the "signification" stage, when a child wonders about his or her heterosexuality "in their late teens or . . . somewhat earlier–usually by reading about homosexuality", and 3) the "coming out" stage, which commonly takes place at that gay bar where benign "advisors" bring their boys, I am going to take him at his word.
• When Lynch describes how the way the guide serves as a "helping hand . . . (and) often benign and helpful role that older, more experienced homosexual men play with" impressionable young boys, I am going to take him at his word.  
• When Herdt explains that after the advent of the AIDS epidemic homosexual leaders determined they must access schools, scouts, and other child institutions in order to "institutionalize ‘socialization’ techniques," I am going to take him at his word.
• When Herdt describes how adult–led gay youth groups (not parents) should direct the "adolescent entry first into a self-affirming semi-secret group, then by collective socialization into a ‘gay’ cultural system . . . .", I am going to take him at his word.

 

3. I reject an across-the-board allegation that all homosexuals are pedophiles.  That's simply not the case.  Such a calumny has no more merit than when feminists accuse all men of being rapists.  

 

4. Notwithstanding point #3, I am concerned that abandoning the current policy will lure pedophiles into scouting.  I mean, Herdt is openly advocating that gay rights folks utilize scouting programs to "institutionalize 'socialization' techniques."

 

5. Dr. Riesman cites studies and states that "research clearly identifies the percentage of child molesters among homosexual and bisexual males as significantly higher than among heterosexuals," and that this "inconvenient and historically recurring fact is particularly relevant in light of the debate over homosexual leaders in the Boy Scouts."  This article was published in 2001, and her comments remain relevant today.

 

6. To sum up: There are portions of the "gay rights" movement, and the gay community, that openly advocate for the recruitment of young men into the that lifestyle.  I am concerned that the BSA changing its longstanding policy would facilitate these efforts.

 

Thanks,

 

-Smac

Edited May 21, 2015 by smac97

[Gray]

Is this the same Reisman who blamed gays for the rise of the Nazi party and the Holocaust? She seems unhinged, to put it kindly. 

[smac97]

Is this the same Reisman who blamed gays for the rise of the Nazi party and the Holocaust? She seems unhinged, to put it kindly. 

 

I don't share all of Reisman's views, but the documentation she has compiled about the subject matter remains disturbing.

 

Thanks,

 

-Smac

Edited May 21, 2015 by smac97

[Scott Lloyd]

I really don't understand the opposition to Gates' position. He is not advocating that church-sponsored units be forced to change their standards. He is trying to preserve religious freedom by changing the policy at national. This is precisely the tact that was originally tried until the SL Council objected and forced national to go with the current middle-ground of allowing gay boys, but not gay leaders.

 

I too worry that the LDS Church may abandon scouting because of this change, but wonder why. The change would not mean the church couldn't set its standards. Actively gay adults would not be scoutmasters or committe chairs in LDS-sponsored troops. Rather, the only time gay leaders would interact with our youth is on the council and national levels - for example, the FOS rep may be gay, or the cook at scout camp, or the geneology merit badge counselor at the council midway. Seriously, is it worth dumping the entire BSA program in the church because of fear of those interactions?

 

I don't trust the gay rights movement to be content with a national policy that allows sponsoring organizations such as the Church of Jesus Christ to set their own policies regarding having gay leaders. Once the BSA caves in on this, the gay rights advocates will push to have the policy forced across the board. The Church won't give in to that. It will withdraw its affiliation, and without the support of the Church and other like-minded organizations, BSA will fold.

Edited May 21, 2015 by Scott Lloyd

[smac97]

Here's the Church's response posted earlier today:

 

We have noted the comments by Boy Scouts of America President Robert Gates in relation to possible policy changes in the Boy Scouts of America. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will, of course, examine any such changes very carefully to assess how they might impact our own century-long association with the BSA.

 

Is there any reading-between-the-lines to be had here?  This guy calls it an "ominous statement."  I dunno.

 

Thanks,

 

-Smac

[Scott Lloyd]

Here's the Church's response posted earlier today:

 

We have noted the comments by Boy Scouts of America President Robert Gates in relation to possible policy changes in the Boy Scouts of America. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints will, of course, examine any such changes very carefully to assess how they might impact our own century-long association with the BSA.

 

Is there any reading-between-the-lines to be had here?  This guy calls it an "ominous statement."  I dunno.

 

Thanks,

 

-Smac

This parting shot from the guy seems ominous on its own:

 

If they [LDS Church] really have so much of a problem with gay leadership merely existing in the BSA, well, maybe they don’t belong in an organization geared toward community.

 

 

I think what he wants -- what a lot of them want -- is removal of the Church from involvement in Scouting. They won't rest until it happens.

[smac97]

I don't trust the gay rights movement to be content with a national policy that allows sponsoring organizations such as the Church of Jesus Christ to set their own policies regarding having gay leaders. Once the BSA caves in on this, the gay rights advocates will push to have the policy forced across the board. The Church won't give into that. It will withdraw its affiliation, and without the support of the Church and other like-minded organizations, BSA will fold.

 

Sadly, that is my assessment as well.  I hope I'm wrong.  I can imagine all sorts of "strings" that could be attached to the Church's access to BSA's programs, facilities, etc., with capitulation on the Church's moral stance as the price of that access.

 

Thanks,

 

-Smac

Edited May 21, 2015 by smac97

[ALarson]

 

I think what he wants -- what a lot of them want -- is removal of the Church from involvement in Scouting. They won't rest until it happens.

 

What percentage of scouts are from troops in the church, do you know?  I have to believe it would be a huge hit for them if the church removed itself.

[Scott Lloyd]

What percentage of scouts are from troops in the church, do you know?  I have to believe it would be a huge hit for them if the church removed itself.

I heard at one time, but I've forgotten the precise number.

 

As I recall, it was overwhelming. So much so that with the Church gone, BSA ceases to exist.

 

Edited to add:

 

Here is a chart listing chartered organizations in the order of proportion of the whole. The Church is at the top of the list with 37,933 units. The next organization, United Methodist Church, doesn't even come close to that, 10,703.

Edited May 21, 2015 by Scott Lloyd