Friday, December 14, 2007

Boy Scouts

A couple of months back, Bob was all worked up about the City of Philadelphia having the gumption to charge the Boy Scouts a fair market price of $200k/year to rent city-owned property. (Here's the WorldNetDaily article that Bob cribbed off of.) For years, the Scouts have been renting the property for $1 a year. I wish I could find rent like that!

For those unfamiliar with the group, the Boy Scouts have stated policies of discrimination against Atheists and "avowed homosexuals." The Supreme Court ruled in 2000 that this discrimination is fine because the Scouts are a private organization and not subject to anti-discrimination laws. Basically, if you don't believe in God or happen to prefer men over women, you can't go camping with the Scouts, earn merit badges or become an Eagle Scout. The government of Philadelphia doesn't want to subsidize an organization that discriminates against its citizens so it raised the rent to a reasonable level.

Of course, Bob's reasoning as to why this is bad is illogical. Bob stated that the Boy Scouts don't have to employ or allow Gays or Atheists because they're a private organization. That's correct. As an analogy, he stated that the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) wouldn't be forced to employ a hunter on their staff. That's also correct. But can you see the logical flaw here? PETA isn't getting a $200k per year in free rent from the government!! Bob conveniently omitted that fact.

In short, the Boy Scouts are free to discriminate all they want. They just can't do it by screwing over taxpaying citizens!

3 comments:

DJ said...

He also omits the fact that this "private organization" gets millions of dollars from the federal government every year. If they're going to discriminate they shouldn't get a dime.

kdog said...

If I were a parent of a boy going on an over-nite trip with the boy scouts, I wouldn't want gay men going along. One only has to look at gay groups like nambla to see how perverted some homosexual men are.

Anonymous said...

One only has to look at gay groups like nambla to see how perverted some homosexual men are.

One only has to look at Christian groups like the Westboro Baptist Church and the Army of God to see how immoral and dangerous some Christians are.

You see kdog, it isn't fair for me to equate Christians with some of their fringe groups, just like it's not fair for you to equate gay men with fringe groups like NAMBLA (which for all intents and purposes, no longer exists). It would be wrong for me to deny my children association with all Christians merely because some of them are wacked out loons who blow up abortion clinics or protest the funerals of soldiers.

The fact of the matter is practically all gay men practice the same self-control and restraint around under-age boys that most straight men practice around under-age girls.

I wouldn't hesitate to allow my son from attending an overnight campout with a gay man, because I have faith in human beings to act in an appropriate fashion. It's too bad that you don't have the same faith and trust in humanity that I do.