Slow Progress for the Boy Scouts

Quite frankly, I was surprised at the news that the Boy Scouts of America had voted to change their policy and allow the participation of gay young men and boys in scouting. Good for them, as far as it goes. Which is until the age of eighteen, after which the established practice of discrimination continues. It hard to know how to respond. On the one hand, this is welcome progress for a movement that has played such an important role in so many lives: the Boy Scouts have been at the work of helping boys to become men for a long, long time. But, they have also been about standing for discrimination and a bigotry that promotes specious and discredited stereotypes. The media is awash in responses: guarded approval from civil liberties groups, angry denunciations from conservative religious groups, formerly excluded scouts expressing their relief, alarmed scouts announcing that they are ready to exclude themselves. It is a watershed moment, and as measured as this passage is, it does move the Boy Scouts of America an irrevocable step forward into the twenty-first century. As a humanist, I welcome this vote, regret the limitation that remains (on gay and lesbian Scout leaders). But I am as much concerned with the discrimination that remains in place and is not presently receiving much attention. And that is the exclusion from Scouting of atheists, humanists, agnostics or those identifying as secular. Less in the public eye, but this exclusion is bigotry none-the-less from an organization purporting to teach values, ethics, moral judgement and citizenry. Non-beleivers need not apply.