Conservatives Predict ‘Mass Exodus’ If Boy Scouts Accept Gays

[Pema_Jampa]

Conservatives Predict ‘Mass Exodus’ If Boy Scouts Accept Gays

Feb 4, 2013 at 10:12 am

This week, the executive board of the Boy Scouts of America will reconsider the organization’s policy of barring gay Scouts and leaders. As a result of this proposed change, many conservatives are urging the group to maintain its discrimination.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) has written extensively about how the Boy Scouts affected his life, and he reiterated those thoughts to hundreds of Texas Scouts who gathered in the state House of Representatives on Saturday for their annual Report to State. Speaking to reporters afterward, Perry defended the discriminatory policy:

PERRY: Hopefully the board will follow their historic position of keeping the Scouts strongly supportive of the values that make Scouting this very important and impactful organization. I think most people see absolutely no reason to change the position and neither do I… To have popular culture impact 100 years of their standards is inappropriate.

Perry also disagreed that a change would make the Scouts more tolerant, claiming, “I think you get tolerance and diversity every day in Scouting.”

Fellow former presidential hopeful Rick Santorum has offered a similar screed against theproposed change in the Scouts’ policy, suggesting the board’s vote this week is “a challenge to the Scouts’ very nature” that will cause a “mass exodus,” “leaving the Scouts hollowed at its core.” Indeed, a whole coalition of anti-gay hate groups is calling on the Scouts’ to maintain the policy because of the false assumption that all homosexuals are pedophiles.

Over the weekend, President Obama disavowed all of these claims in a pre-Super Bowl interview, saying that the Scouts should drop the policy because “gays and lesbians should have access and opportunity the same way everybody else does in every institution and walk of life.” Obama has previously condemned the policy because he “opposes discrimination in all forms.”

[jcrew6]

I don't predict a mass exodus.

[rccmom]

 

Quoting jcrew6:

I don't predict a mass exodus.

 I agree. I don't think there will be a mass exodus. For most people, very little will change. They will have the same people at their scout meetings that they had before the ruling. 

[Raintree]

I was reading something on this issue in the wee hours of the morning, and came across the idea that the scouts should just join together into one large organization. CoEd! Ahhh.....!!!!!!

This seemed to be met with some amount of horror.

Funny to me, because I grew up in a scouting organization that is co-ed. It was fine. I'm sure- as with any large organization- it has had it's moments, but for the most part, it was very functional.

[soonergirl980]

I believe there will be some exodus but not a mass exodus. I don't really care my son isn't interested in Scouts so it doesn't effect us.

[broncfan]

I doubt there will be much change, each group will continue to "police" it's own.  A good scout group is one that is handed down through the years to parents that have been involved.  If you just "send" your son to a scout troop and never bother to get involved or even go on a camp out, much less summer camp you might have problems, but like everything else, you get out of it what you put in it.

[MrsBridges19]

My children won't be joining the scouts unless they make it a nation wide accept of gays and lesbians.  I will NOT allow them to be part of an organization that teaches them the opposite of what I teach them which is tolerance and loving of everyone.

[JakeandEmmasMom]

 There will not be a mass exodus.  If anything, parents who refused to allow their kids to join before may have a change of heart.

And the discrimination is just so silly.  Sexuality doesn't come up in any way.  There is nothing for those who oppose the potential change to be afraid of.

[mikiemom]

I doubt there will be a mass exodus, if anything there Will be a mass influx as kids who previously did not want to join the Boy Scouts due to their hateful discriminatory policies will be more likely to join.

[jcribb16]

I guess next will be the Girl Scouts accepting gay boys in...

[shannonnigans]

Mass exodus? Give me a break. In reality, they will simply change from exclusion to discrimination against those who they now begrudgingly include. Not like they suddenly discovered tolerance.