Arguments over Boy Scouts

Wisconsin Gazette reported yesterday that Merck & Company have announced they will stop funding Boy Scouts of America, due to the organization's policy of excluding gays from participating as scouts or leaders.

Zach Wahls, an Eagle Scout himself, became an internet sensation when he spoke to the Iowa House of Representatives in favor of gay marriage.  Wahls now leads the group, Scouts for Equality.  He led a petition to the BSA to change the policy of exclusion.  After the organization re-stated its policy barring gays, Wahls began petitioning companies that donate to BSA to pull their funding.  With its recent decision, Merck now joins Intel and UPS as former sponsors of the Scouts who acted on their companies' policies not to direct charitable funds to groups that discriminate against gays and lesbians.  Scouts for Equality is currently petitioning Verizon to do the same.

Whenever a boycott like this, or the one against Salvation Army, comes up, the arguments fly.

"Don't punish the kids." "You're only hurting the people this group helps."

There are other charities.  I understand that there doesn't seem to be another organization that gives young people the skill and experiences provided through involvement in the Scouts, they are not completely irreplaceable.  If other groups were to form, and perhaps became beneficiaries of the companies that used to support BSA, then they could build the resources and structure to provide the same or better experience, without the harm that a group supporting prejudice includes.

Harm?  Well, since both sides are arguing harm, imagine this.  A young man from a poor family is part of the Scouts.  He aspires to make a difference by getting involved in politics.  He has worked hard to earn a trip to Washington D.C., a trip he could not possibly afford.  As the trip nears, he learns that it has been canceled because it relied on a grant from Merck, which was now pulled.

That was a hypothetical.  But now consider.  How is having this young man's dream pulled out from under him different than the story of Ryan Anderson, who did everything necessary to earn the rank of Eagle Scout, and was denied because he is gay?

I am not arguing that the Boy Scouts of America don't have the right to stand for a certain principle.  That is their right as a religious organization.  I am making the argument that a religious organization is what they are. And I am arguing that if they want to exclude gay people from participating in their experience, then gay people, and those who support equality, have the right to exclude BSA, and SA, from their donations.