Talk:Boy Scouts of America membership controversies

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Contents 1 Expulsions for public disagreement with the policies 2 Article introduction 3 Return to last week's intro 4 Request For Comment 4.1 The questions 4.2 Statements by current editors 4.3 Comments by outside editors

[edit] Expulsions for public disagreement with the policies

This statement in the subject section is not properly cited: "The Boy Scouts of America forbids its adult members from using their leader status to express political views to the public or to youth members." Someone said it may be in the Scoutmasters Handbook but I don't have a copy of it. --Jagz 21:57, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

You can probably check out Dave Rice's story on Scouting for All. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 23:47, 13 November 2006 (UTC)

I'm looking for the official BSA policy that says something to the effect that the BSA forbids its adult members from using their leader status to express political views to the public. The Scouting for All site is down temporarily but I don't think there is anything there that makes that general of a statement; it says Dave Rice was removed for "involving Scouting youth" in his effort to have a BSA policy changed. I think that there needs to be clarification here. What does the Scoutmaster's Handbook say exactly, etc.? --Jagz 02:22, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I have the latest SMH at home- I will try to remember to check it out tonight. I do not recall any policy of this nature. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 15:47, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Someone commented that the "Scoutmaster Handbbook page 153 under uniforms alludes to it". --Jagz 15:59, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Someone removed ^{[citation needed]} again from the section so I rewrote it according to the information we have now. --Jagz 16:01, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Does anyone have information on anyone other than Dave Rice being expelled? --Jagz 03:48, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article introduction

Someone keeps changing the second paragraph of the introduction. Right now it states:

"The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character".[2][3] Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and amount to discrimination. [4][5] BSA advocates counter that it is not discrimination, but is adherence to their membership standards."

Any comments. Does it sound okay? --Jagz 16:15, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. --evrik ^(talk) 16:20, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

I would expect that it would sound good to you since you're the one who changed it. --Jagz 16:43, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

• • No need to get testy. --evrik ^(talk) 16:58, 15 November 2006 (UTC)

Would you two please take a timeout on this? Just step back for a day or so and come back to this amiably. If you are this passionate about this, then you just need to let go a bit. --Gadget850 ( Ed) 02:04, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• I'm not upset by it. I thought the whole thing was amicable ... sort of. :-) --evrik ^(talk) 14:17, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

My thought on the last sentence-- the "BSA advocates counter" is that introductions in particular are prone to having a runaway "back and forth" debate. Having "Side 1 says _____, and Side 2 says _______." is fine. But then you can get into "Side 1 counters.... and Side 2 counter-counters....", on and on. There's no logical way to end it-- one side can always have a logical reply back to something said by the other side.

Instead, I try to have the intro and the "pro-/con-" sections of page just go: "Side 1 believes its good because..." and then "Side 2 believes its bad because". I usually don't care who goes first, but I often bump into people who feel strong that having the "first impression" or the "last word" conveys some advantage, so I usually okay with whichever. If left to my own resources, I usually just pick whichever side seems to have held the position first to be the one that goes first.

So far, not having heard any good reason for its addition, I'd suggest removing the "BSA advocates counter" sentence. The sentiment is already covered when we say "The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character"" The intro gets it on the record that one side feels these policies are "Good" and very concise description of why. The intro then gets on record that the other side feels these policies are "Bad" and a very concise descrition of why. Boom. That's all the intro needs to be.

Obviously, the BSA and its supporters do feel the policies are lawful and therefore, not illegal discrimination. And critics would counter that legality does not imply morality. And supporters could reply that the policies are moral, and the law is just recognizing that. And critics could counter that the legality of the policies is a commentary more on libertarianism in the US constitution than the moral content of the policies. ANd .... so forth. Saying "BSA advocates counter that it is not discrimination, but is adherence to their membership standards" doesn't really add any new information that isn't in the FIRST BSA sentence (which says the policies are "Good") or in the next paragraph )which definitively says the policies are legal).

Personally, I like the version we had up circa a week ago:

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and amount to immoral discrimination.

It has that symmetry I talked about. Side 1: Good! Side 2: Bad! The end.

Looking through the history, I see the first objection to the was that the discrimination should be described as "legal" rather than "immoral". But I strongly disagree on that point, because the legality of the policies is not a point of dispute anymore, only the morality of the policies. The "crux" of the criticism is that the policies are somehow "bad", not that the policies are illegal. (Obviously, we need to mention that the policies ARE legal, which we do, in no uncertain terms, in the very next sentence).

Similarly, the next stab it was simply to say "critics contend the policies amount to discrimination"-- but this is again inaccrute, because whether or not the policies are (in the literal since of the word) "discrimination" is not being debated either. (To the extent that supporters of the policies dispute that word, it is because "discrimination", as commonly used, has become synonymous with '"'immoral discrimination"). In general, it seems unwise for us to remove "immoral" from the summary of the critics' POV or to insert "legal" in its place. While most critics DO admit the policies are legal (as show in the following sentence), this is hardly the point-- the critics don't object to the policies because they believe the policies are legal-- they object to the policies because they believe they are immorally discriminatory.

My vote, therefore, is to move back to the version as of a week ago (an edit I'll make in just a sec). This version:

• Gives each side one and only one sentence in the intro, so that we know they both exist.
• Lets each side very concisely "make their case", stating the tiniest kernel of their position.
• Immediately thereafter states the legality of the policies as an unequivocal fact, in no uncertain terms.

As such, there is no need to delete the critics' POV that the policies are immoral discrimination. Similarly, there's no reason to add in a additioanl sentence stating that the supporters think the critics are wrong-- this is implicit. Nor is there any reason to add a separate supporters' opinion that the policies are legal-- this is unequivocally stated as a fact in the following paragraph.

--Alecmconroy 16:06, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• The word immoral is loaded with POV. --evrik ^(talk) 16:36, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Oh, you're quite right, it is-- it's the critic's POV. We, the "Wikipedia voice" cannot say the policies are immoral. The sentence "The BSA's policies are immoral." must NEVER appear in the article outside of a quote. But we can say that the critics regard the policy as immoral, which they do.

The flip-side of this is that it's loaded with POV to say that excluding gays/atheists will "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Two people could have a never ending debate over whether the policies instill or degrade ethical character in young people. But this sentence,too, is okay, so long as we attribute that view to the BSA.

--Alecmconroy 17:07, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• I added the citation. I don't have a problem with the word "discrimination." I do have a problem with the word "immoral" which is what started this series of edits. --evrik ^(talk) 17:14, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Legal discrimination doesn't explain why people have filed lawsuits. If they filed lawsuits, they must have thought it was illegal. People are not required to have NPOV beliefs. Beliefs are inherently POV. People's beliefs can't be legislated or dictated (however, their actions can be). --Jagz 18:05, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• That may be putting the cart before the horse...

1. People got kicked out
2. They filed suit
3. They Dale case went to the Supreme Court
4. The Boy Scouts were affirmed in their right to exclude people who don't meet the membership standards.

--evrik ^(talk) 17:29, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Return to last week's intro

Okay, I've again returned the intro to last week's intro. As of this moment, there isn't a consensus to change it, so we talk about it until there is one.

Evrik-- I'm sure that some people do have a problem that critics of the BSA consider the policies to be immoral. I'm sure that many opponents of the policies similarly have a problem with the fact that the supporters of the BSA consider homosexuality to be immoral, or that the BSA feels that excluding gays&atheists helps children become more ethical. I'm know for a fact that BOTH sides have deep problems with the POVs of the other side.

However, your disagreeing with the critics' POV does not cause them to cease to exist, or cause their point of view to no longer be revelent. The fact is, critics DO feel the policies are immoral discrimination. That's just how they feel. May be right, may be wrong, but that's they way they feel about the subject. That's why there's an article about this in the first place-- if you DIDN'T have a problem with them calling hte policies immoral, and if they didn't have a problem with the BSA calling homosexuality/atheism, then we wouldn't have an article here in the first place.

If you want the critic's point of view removed, it is not sufficient for you to argue that their point of view is wrong, or that you take issue with it. We don't debate the issues, we don't decide the issues, we just cover 'em, ya know? If you want the statement taken out, you need to prove that the critics do NOT believe that the policies are immoral discrimination. Saying that YOU don't believe they are immoral discrimination does not help your case in any way, because we're not saying that you believe that, we're saying the critics believe that. To remove it, you have to say that the critics some DON'T believe it's immoral discrimination.

I think this is a very difficult case to make, because there are a number of primary sources in which the critics refer to the policies as a) "discriminatory" b)"immoral" and c) "immoral policies of discrimination". See, for example this page which bears a title Scouting For All's National Day of Protest Against the Boy Scouts of America's Immoral Policy of Discrimination Against Gay Youth and Adults. Or take the critical site BSA-discrimination.org, the url and site name both mentioning "Discrimination in the BSA".

In addition to the deletion of the critic's views on immorality, the reorg edit had some other issues. The additional counter argument "BSA advocates counter that it is not discrimination, but is adherence to their membership standards" was re-added, despite my above expressed concerns. (As an interesting bonus, also note how the sentence rebuts a "phantom" criticism that was itself deleted from the article in that reorganization").

Lastly, and this, like all of the things i've said, is something we can discuss. I personally prefer 3 paragraphs to 2. Paragraph 1: Here's the situation. 2: Here's each side's POV. 3: Legal issues. Merging 2 into 1 is, to me, conflating two very distinct ideas. --Alecmconroy 18:34, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• I have a problem with the word immoral. I'm just fine with no word before discrimination or using the word "legal" which is also used by anti-BSA people.
  • http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=&q=+Boys+Scouts%2C+legal+right+to+discriminate
  • http://atheism.about.com/b/a/257901.htm
  • http://www.commondreams.org/views/092400-105.htm
  • http://atheism.about.com/b/a/258300.htm

--evrik ^(talk) 19:05, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

Legal discrimination doesn't explain why people have filed lawsuits. If they filed lawsuits, they must have thought it was illegal. Why do you keep bringing up "legal" discrimination when it doesn't make sense in this context? --Jagz 20:03, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• I will refer you to lawsuit... something doesn't have to be illegal or even immoral for a suit to be filed. People just have to disagree (and in most cases the law has supported the BSA). I bring up the word legal because I find it an acceptable alternative to the word immoral. --evrik ^(talk) 20:32, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

See, that's just the point exactly. the legality and the morality are two completely separate issues. Something doesn't have to be illegal for it to be immoral. The critics's point of view is that it is immoral, period. It's a fact that they feel that. If you want that fact removed, you have to start convincing all the critics in the country that the BSA's policies aren't immoral, and when all their sites and the reliable news sources report that the critics have changed their minds, THEN you can remove it. What I think, or what you think, or what Wikipedia thinks-- those are irrelevant. There are critics, they do have a POV, and we have to convey that POV.

Anyway, thank you for not editing it back and forth. Putting up the POV tag is a much better alternative. Now I will go ahead and post this on RFC and see what people think about which version is better and whether the current wording violates NPOV.

--Alecmconroy 21:44, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• Yes, but there are critics who also call it 'legal discrimination.' I'm okay with the word discrimination, but the (im)moralizing in inserting the word immoral is where I draw the line. If some people use the word immoral, so what - they're trying to make a point - and it's not neutral. The fact is, I could have cited this article Boy Scouts Beat Sodomites 362-12, or United Way supports babykillers and sodomites just to make a point. Drop the word immoral, and we can call it a compromise. --evrik ^(talk)

Why would someome file a lawsuit over something they thought was legal or lawful? It would be a waste of time and money. I don't think you've read the whole article, at least not carefully. Try reading it carefully along with the articles that are linked like the lawsuit articles. I like the term "unfair" discrimination myself. --Jagz 22:03, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• Jagz ... though I don't regularly edit this article, I'm surprised that you don't remember that I'm the one who prompted the creation of this page last year. --evrik ^(talk) 22:20, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

I remember your username. You seem like someone with strong religious convictions. Maybe that is the source of your motivation here. By the way, using bullets the way you do is kind of disruptive because it's hard to make out the chronological order that things were written. --Jagz 00:51, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

The difference, however, is that the titles are _our_ words-- Wikipedia's words. In the title, we declare things to be fact or fiction-- titles must RIGIDLY adhere to a neutral wording. In the article however, sometimes we are speaking as "Wikipedia". But when we summarize the views of others, we should present their views directly-- being careful to be balanced. Note, for example that the BSA's views are presented in what would be a non-neutral fashion, were we not explicitly attributing those views to the BSA and it's supporters.

Your proposal for a compromise is kind of you, and I appreciate the sentiment. I do think, however, it's better to go foward in cases like this, and see what others think, so that we can both better learn "what NPOV means". If we compromise, we sort of escape having to go through the learning process of figuring out which NPOV interpretation is right. But, no worries-- a Request For Comment isn't an adversarial, hateful thing-- nobody will get blocked, no harsh words need be shed. Just asking for a few eyeballs to come check our work.  :)

--Alecmconroy 22:13, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

There was an edit conflict ...

• Great, you want neutraility? The intro sets the tone for the article. Just drop both the words immoral and legal. We'll just leave the word Discrimination ... that we can agree upon. --evrik ^(talk) 22:20, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

For one, I seem to think somebody objected to that solution a while back and said it wasn't clear enough or something, but it might have been me that objected! :). In my opinion, immoral discriminiation best sums up the critical POV, because if we take the word in the literalest sense, everyone can agree that the BSA policies are, technically, a form of discrimination. The real crux of the controversy-- the thing that really separates the pros- from the cons-, is whether that discrimination is an immoral kind of discrimination (like banning all blacks would be) or very moral kind of discrimination (like banning all convincted sex offenders). --Alecmconroy 22:34, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

let's all not edit the sentence in dispute since i've gone ahead and written the RFC all out, it will confuse users if we change it around during the discussion. The NPOV tag is up, and it will stay up until there's a consensus-- so our readers will be informed that some part of the page is being disputed, and will know ot read it with an even-more-careful eye. Incidentally, Evrik, I think you've done four reverts on this now and technically could get like a 24 hour block or something-- so, let's not do that, let's freeze the intro for the time being. --Alecmconroy 22:57, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

• For the record in the last 24 hours Jagz has five substantive reversions on that paragraph (with two minor changes), you have three substantive changes (with no minor changes), and I have four substantive changes (and five minor) - so n o one has clean hands here. --evrik ^(talk) 23:24, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Request For Comment

This disagreement is over what the second paragraph of the introduction should be

The Initial Version

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and amount to immoral discrimination.

(emphasis added)

Proposed Version 1

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and amount to illegal discrimination.

(emphasis added)

Proposed Version 2

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and are discrimination.

Proposed Version 3

Critics believe that these policies are wrong and are discrimination. The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these exclusionary policies are not discrimination, but simply adherence to membership standards.

[edit] The questions

1. Which version is best?
2. Does the current version violate NPOV?

[edit] Statements by current editors

• The initial version is best. It is a well-cited fact that the critics do indeed regard the policies as immoral discrimination. On the other hand, it may or may not be true that all the critics regard the discrimination as legal-- i.e. complying with all federal, state, and local laws. This sentence should summarize the position of the critics, and their position is that they opppose the policies because they believe them to be immoral. It is not their position that they oppose the policies because they believe them to be legal. I believe the current version best conveys the nature of the controversy, and I do not feel it poses any NPOV problems. Similaly, the BSA's official statement, found in the initial version, does the best job of conveying the BSA's point of view. --Alecmconroy 22:22, 16 November 2006 (UTC)
• I think the word immoral is not neutral and that the entire paragraph should be rewritten and this text should be dropped because it is found later in the article

  ... are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character".^[1][2]

  I would like to see Proposed Version 3 used. --evrik ^(talk) 23:27, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Comments by outside editors

There are some people who believe it is illegal, some people who believe it is wrong, some people who believe it is immoral, and some people who believe it is a combination of the above. The only thing that all these critics agree on is that it is discrimination. In any case, the above three qualities are all quite clearly judgmental, and any one of those adjectives ought to be sourced. Something along the lines of "Critics believe that this is discrimination, and some say that it is immoral (source) or illegal (source)." - Che Nuevara 06:57, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Yeah the initial version, i.e. the version we've been using before this most recent content dispute is sourced (see this version of the article). There are critics who believe that the policies are legal. I know of no critics who do not believe the policies are immoral. --Alecmconroy 08:49, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Version 2 is the best and most neutral version. The one change I would make is in the last sentence. "... Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and discriminatory." Ramsquire ^{(throw me a line)} 18:46, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree completly with Ramsquire. JBKramer 19:21, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Ramsquire changed his choice from Version 3 to 2, so I guess you don't agree with him anymore. --Jagz 20:02, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I didn't change my choice. The listing of the versions is confusing. For some reason "version 2" is actually the third version listed on the page. The version I support, and have always supported is this one.

The Boy Scouts of America and its supporters contend that these policies are essential in its mission to "instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical character". Critics believe that some or all of these policies are wrong and discriminatory.

Ramsquire ^{(throw me a line)} 20:09, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

I am not substantially invested in version 2 vs version 3, the only difference appearing to be order and quote/paraphrase. Version 1 and the current version are bad. JBKramer 20:11, 17 November 2006 (UTC)