Talk:Controversies about the Boy Scouts of America/Archive 5

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Contents 1 FAC time? 2 Article merge 3 Support from government 4 FAC comment 5 Girls article 6 Featured article 7 Sandbox 8 Scouts Canada 9 Berkeley Sea Scouts 10 Bisexuals 11 Camp Fire Boys and Girls 12 US Constitution 13 Characterization as a paramilitary organization

FAC time?

Jagz, Gadg, Habap,Rlevse, everbody.. Whatcha think? Should we FAC and see what happens? or is there still work to do?--Alecmconroy 22:49, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I can't think of anything else. The good article review seems to be taking a long time. The nominated long articles are not even in chronological order anymore.--Jagz 03:51, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Okay. it's been nominated here. If ya like this page, go say so, if ya don't like it, go say that too :). --Alecmconroy 05:26, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

I think you should have waited for the GA as they often find things those involved with the article don't notice, but we'll see how things go. BTW, if an article is already a GA or GA nomination and makes FA, it gets removed from the GA list. Rlevse 09:57, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Article merge

Yesterday, we were discussing the other articles in Category:Contentious issues about the Boy Scouts of America. The category contains eight lawsuits and two bills in, all stubs. I recommend merging all those into this article- there is probably a lot of it here already. I also recommend merging United States National Scout Jamboree#Funding controversy, as there is a lot of duplication. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 10:55, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

So we don't make this article too long, maybe all the lawsuits can be merged into one article and the bills either into that article or their own article. We could change our links to a bill's section in the article. The Jamboree Funding controversy was in an earlier version of this article but dropped off when the article was overhauled by Alecmconroy. I put the section in the Jamboree article because I thought it had some good information. --Jagz 20:42, 18 July 2006 (UTC)

Ya took the words right out of my mouth. I agree that Litigation involving the BSA or Legislation involving the BSA or some other such article would be okay, but I definitely don't think we should try to cover everything in just this article. It's long enough as is, and the more we try to cover, the harder it is to cover everything well. The one thing we got out of the feedback from the first time we went to FAC was a need to focus a little more tightly, rather than making this article "Everything controversial or legal about the BSA". I also don't think it's the end of the word if court cases are a little stubby-- consider them an online version of law books. Sometimes you don't need to have a huge article on a case, but you do want to have short entry on it. --Alecmconroy 02:29, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

• I think that bills that became part of law, like the Support Our Scouts Act should maintain their own articles, and in fact should be categorized under the legislation categories. --evrik 15:33, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Now that we've got FA status, I think it's even more important than ever that we don't do a massive merge. There's just a lot of information in the sub-articles that should be preserved but doesn't need to be in THIS article. Take Barnes-Wallace v. Boy Scouts of America. That article tells us a lot of details about the case: that the plantiffs are Lori and Lynn Barnes-Wallace, a lesbian couple, together with Michael and Valerie Breen, an atheist couple; or that "Since 1957, the City of San Diego has leased part of the city's Balboa Park to the Boy Scouts of America for the price of $1 per year.". That's useful information, information that should be preserved in the encyclopedia, but certainly it's a level of detail we don't need in THIS article. --Alecmconroy 13:59, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Not sure who put the merge tags on then. Have to check the history. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:06, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

The merge tags were put on by Kintetsubuffalo. --Jagz 17:06, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

It sounds like there isn't enough support for merging those articles into this article. --Jagz 22:24, 6 August 2006 (UTC)

I removed the merge tags. There is insufficient support to merge the articles. --Jagz 18:18, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Support from government

I removed the lead sentence, "Congress has on several occasions passed resolutions and bills in support of the Boy Scouts of America and its access to governmental resources-- actions which can be interpreted as indirect support for the BSA's stance on gays and atheists." I removed it because some in Congress may be showing support for the BSA despite their membership policies. Granted that support for BSA indirectly supports their policies but that may not have been their intention. --Jagz 08:01, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Constitutionally speaking the statement was correct, no matter what intention was - and with the current crop of religious fanatics and bigots in washington I would bet it was their intention as well 65.125.133.211 19:55, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

FAC comment

What about the comment by smurrayinchester to shorten the list of references by removing duplicates? --Jagz 21:56, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

Girls article

After this FAC is over, I suggest those interested make an article on the girls controversey and get it to FA. Rlevse 22:44, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

• PS: I'd call it Boy Scouts of America female membership controversy and put a link at the top of each to the other. Let me know if this one takes off.Rlevse 22:48, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

We changed the current article a bit on the coverage of the girls issue. --Jagz 22:17, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't think the girl controversy deserves its own article, as the association is explicitly called "boy" scouts and it seems to be known for its wide discriminatory practices anyway. What content (and how much of it would there be) would you expect to add to such an article? -- Coffee2theorems | Talk 23:21, 13 September 2006 (UTC)

Featured article

The article is now a "featured article"!!! It started out as a section of the main BSA article. Here's what this article looked like in September 2005.[1] --Jagz 07:55, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

Sandbox

Do we want to keep the Controversies about the Boy Scouts of America/Sandbox or have it deleted? --Gadget850 ( Ed) 13:11, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure what you should do. --Jagz 00:18, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I had it deleted. Good eye Gadget. --Alecmconroy 14:00, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Noticed it after doing some jmboree merges and cleaning up redirects. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:07, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Scouts Canada

This may be of interest [2]. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 13:33, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

You should take a look at this.[3] --Jagz 16:53, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. Missed that one. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 17:16, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

Berkeley Sea Scouts

Berkeley Sea Scout Decision Appealed to United States Supreme Court[4] --Jagz 22:20, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Sounds like Berkeley was formerly giving the Sea Scouts special access to berthing in its marina (at no cost) like it does to other nonprofit groups. I guess the court ruling essentially said that Berkeley did not have to keep giving them special access because the BSA's exclusionary membership policies conflicted with the local anti-discrimination ordinance. This appeal to the Supreme Court seems to say that the Scouts should not be deprived of special access to the marina because the Scouts are only exercising their right to freedom of association. I guess it could be said that the Sea Scouts want equal special access (special access that is equal to that given by Berkeley to other nonprofit groups). --Jagz 17:32, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

Not quite. The Berkeley Marina only gives a very few non-profits privileged status (probably between 5 and 10); remember the marina must remain solvent so it can't hand out space to every or even many non-profits. Each group has to re-apply year by year for the privilege and has to show that it is providing a substantial benefit to the community. For instance one group has specially outfitted sailboats for people with disabilities. Anyone can rent these boats but it does enable a segment of the community to sail that otherwise could not. Another group is a sailing co-op that provides low cost rentals to the general public (and classes for adults). A third has classes aimed at children. And so on. The anti-discrimination policy is just one hurdle and is there to ensure that the group will benefit the entire community. --Erp 00:21, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

If that is the case, and without a legal background to base my opinion on, I predict that the Sea Scouts will lose the appeal. --Jagz 01:36, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

It sounds like Berkeley has a system of special "preferential access" or preferential "special access", something not covered in the Support our Scouts Act. --Jagz 03:36, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

While Berkeley is entitled to decide whom they give free access to, deciding based upon what the national organization does rather than any act by the local group (keeping in mind the Sea Scouts is co-ed) seems harder to justify. The argument is that the Sea Scout group is being punished for its politics and affiliations rather than anything it has done. The only ones who suffer are the young men and women of the community who can no longer benefit from the program. --Habap 04:10, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

The California Supreme Court covers this in its opinion. Note the local Sea Scouts had the option of signing a non-discrimination agreement (the City was not asking the BSA to sign only the local unit) and would then have been over that hurdle and been free to compete with the other groups for the limited space (still no guarantee that they would have gotten it though the chances would have been fairly good). They could not because the BSA said the unit would be kicked out of the BSA if they did and therefore lose their low cost insurance. We are getting into politics here and away from the article text.--Erp 20:37, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

There is a new political Wiki website, Campaigns Wikia. --Jagz 21:05, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Erp, you're right, I am swaying away from the article. Sorry about that. I forgot about BSA's instructions to units against signing NDAs (I don't remember if there is anything citation on this, but have read that such exists), but that does mean the unit did something rather than just the national office. So, nevermind. --Habap 21:18, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Here's the case being used to help support the appeal.[5] --Jagz 22:24, 29 July 2006 (UTC)

Bisexuals

The word bisexual is not mentioned in the article. What is the BSA policy towards bisexuals? Should we add the word to the article? --Jagz 17:12, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I think we're safe in assuming that bisexuals would be considered homosexuals for the purpose of the policy-- but finding a source that explicitly say so would be nice. Also, something we don't cover-- many religious groups differential between homosexual CONDUCT and homosexual ORIENTATION. The theory being that the former is immmoral, but the latter might not be. I don't know which BSA's policy applies to. Just conduct? or both. --Alecmconroy 17:53, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I think the BSA would kick someone out for known or avowed homosexual conduct or orientation although their policies tend to be vague, cryptic, and unsophisticated. Some individual Scouting units may be more lenient. The Scout Association of the UK seems to be able to articulate their policies a lot better.[6] --Jagz 21:39, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I believe that conduct by a boy is ground for dismissal. I also think that 'open' orientation is grounds. I am not sure whether boys who are struggling with their identity would be expelled, especially if they are private about it. Should be easy to find a policy on this though. --NThurston 18:22, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Camp Fire Boys and Girls

Camp Fire Boys and Girls is mentioned in the article. Hasn't this organization changed its name to Camp Fire USA? --Jagz 19:44, 5 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes. See Camp Fire USA. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:45, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

US Constitution

someone should note that these policies (definantly the atheist/agnostics ban, and possibly the homosexuality ban) technically make it a violation of the 1st ammendment to the US Constitution for the government to support this organization - as it is engaged in religious bigotry. 65.125.133.211 19:57, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Characterization as a paramilitary organization

I deleted the subject section of the article because it doesn't belong in this article. This article is about BSA membership controversies and not other types of controversies or criticisms. --Jagz 21:24, 18 August 2006 (UTC)