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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I am the poster who started writing about my issues with the Boy Scouts and their exclusion of atheists. I want to say a couple of things and then I'm going to exit this thread. First of all, I am under no illusion that the Boy Scouts and especially individual troops are, on the whole, malevolent. I think that they do a lot of good for a lot of boys. While some troops are, of course, better than others, I don't doubt that, in this area in particular,  they do a lot of good. In fact, I think that the organization as a whole is just a couple of reforms from all ing their remaining major issues.

That said, the people suggesting that the discrimination against atheists is no big deal and that the BSA is acting like other religious organizations are missing the point. There is a BIG difference between promoting a specific belief system and excluding a specific belief system. It is the difference between, for example, the Mormons saying that only Mormons are welcome in our temple (perfectly normal) and saying that absolutely everyone except Jews are welcome in our temple, which is bigotry. As many people have pointed out, the BSA does not use its status as a private organization to promote any one single belief system. What people don't like to point out is that the BSA does use its status as a private organization to exclude, marginalize, and stigmatized one particular belief system.

I hope that they eventually do better. [/quote]

I've appreciated hearing your perspective.  I do think that it's all about how you frame it.  Boy Scouts does promote a system of belief that acknowledges that some form of faith in a higher being guides your morals. Many of us that are religious (I'm a very liberal Catholic) find that IMPORTANT!  The point of BSA is charter-building and just because you think that character is unrelated to God doesn't meant that I (or BSA) needs to agree with you.  I can respect you, but I don't have to agree with you.

Do you feel the same way about Alcoholics Anonymous? Are they too bigoted, striving to marginalize you. [/quote]

Actually, AA is an interesting comparison.  It is an overtly religious organization but there are AA meetings that are specifically designed to be non-religious in order to accommodate atheists and agnostics.  That said, it has long been the practice of courts in the US to sentence drunk drivers and other convicts who had committed alcohol-related offenses to attend AA meetings.  This practice, which I did find inappropriate, was ultimately ruled to be unconstitutional because it violated the Establishment Clause.  The rulings against coercive participation in AA helped in the development of a number of non-religious recovery programs as courts sought out Constitutional alternatives.

While this is an interesting aside, where it intersects with the BSA is in the government funding and support that the BSA received over the course of its history that went far beyond what other private organizations received.  This was also a violation of the Establishment Clause.  There has been a lot of back and forth about just how much support the government provided (I think that it used to be a lot more before this issue started getting traction) but it's still not none and, for everyone talking about the BSA as a private organization that can set whatever policies it wants, this should be a concern.

http://militaryatheists.org/news/2012/07/time-to-end-federal-support-of-boy-scout-discrimination/[/quote]

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