Are Ex-Gays Next?
"In Germany, the Nazis first came for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, but I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time there was no one left to speak up for me."-- Martin Niemoeller, Berlin Lutheran pastor arrested by the Gestapo and sent to Dachau concentration camp in 1938.
The Battle over the Boy Scouts
by Peter Ferrara
June 28 will mark the one-year anniversary of the Boy Scouts' victory in the landmark Supreme Court decision of Boy Scouts of America v. Dale. In that case, the Court ruled that the Boy Scouts could dismiss an adult troop leader who had openly declared his homosexuality and become a gay activist, contrary to the teachings and principles of the Boy Scouts. The Court held that the constitutional right to freedom of association protected the Scouts' freedom to choose their own leaders and the messages those leaders would send by their own personal example.
As with many court decisions, this was not the end but just the beginning of a culture war. The surprising result is that a year into the siege, the Scouts are more than holding their own.
In response to the Dale decision, liberal and left-wing activist organizations began a nationwide campaign to ostracize and isolate the Scouts. The Scouts may have a legal right to their policy on gays, but these groups want the rest of society to ostracize them if they continue to exercise that right. This attitude was best expressed by the New York Times, which labeled the Scouts as "something akin to a hate group" because they will not retain openly gay Scoutmasters.
In Los Angeles, county sheriff Lee Baca refused to end his office's sponsorship of Scout activities, after hearing protests of the city council's decision from local supporters, Scout alumni and radio talk shows. Instead, Baca criticized the council's action. Dade County, under public pressure, was forced to back off its ban on Scouting in public schools. In Royal Oaks, Michigan, citizens defeated by 68 percent to 32 percent an ordinance banning discrimination against homosexuals, based in part on arguments from opponents that such ordinances have been used against the Boy Scouts.
When California Democrat Lynn Woolsey introduced a bill in Congress last September to rescind the national charter of the Boy Scouts, the House voted it down in lopsided fashion, 362-12. This tally merely reflects public opinion. A recent national Portrait of America poll found that 75 percent of the public held a favorable view of the Boy Scouts, versus 11 percent unfavorable. After hearing of the Scouts' position on openly gay adult leaders, 36 percent view the Scouts more favorably and 28 percent less favorably. By an overwhelming margin of 61 percent to 17 percent, the public believes the Scouts should be free to set their own policy on the issue.
In a liberal society, the Boy Scouts should be free to decide whom they want as adult leaders and what moral messages they want to communicate. Those who disagree with the Scouts would, of course, be free to criticize them. They could even organize a private-sector boycott of the Scouts if they wanted. But a more liberal-minded response would be to start their own competing scouting organization. There is a model for such an approach. Some religious groups who think the Boy Scouts are too secular started their own religious scouting groups years ago. Others who consider the regular Scouts militaristic and too hierarchical have started competing groups.
But there is something more fundamental at stake here, which explains why our modern "liberals" have chosen instead a frontal attack on the Boy Scouts. The true target of the anti-Scout groups is not the Scouts, but the traditional moral views they espouse. They wish to brand those views as socially unacceptable discrimination. If the Boy Scouts are engaged in such discrimination and are "akin to a hate group" as a result, then so are the Catholic Church, traditional Protestantism, and Orthodox Judaism. Which leads to the question: If the Left wins this cultural battle over the Scouts, what's next?
All of this liberalism stems from a fundamental change in the gay rights movement. It began by arguing that adults should be free to do what they choose in the privacy of their own bedrooms, without government interference. But today, the movement advocates the very different proposition that the power of government should be used to force everyone to approve of homosexual conduct, morally and socially. That cannot be achieved by liberal means, because it is not a liberal goal.
Peter Ferrara is associate professor of law at the George Mason University School of Law and executive director of the American Civil Rights Union.
This article is reprinted with permission of The Weekly Standard, where it first appeared on June 11, 2001. For more information on subscribing to The Weekly Standard please call 1-800-283-2014 or visit the website www.weeklystandard.com.