Atheism and family shame

One of the problems with the internet is that absolutely everything you post is public. If there's anything that you would not want somebody else to know, never-ever post it on-line.Case in point. An atheist's son is old enough to be involved in Cub Scouts and wants to. Said atheist had himself been a scout and, despite religious misgivings towards the end of that experience even though religion was never a factor in my troop, sincerely believed in the principles of Scouting and in the benefits of the experience. Said atheist was then approached by the current leadership, which was burned out and starting to falter -- did I mention that this pack did not have any kind of Webelos program? -- to take on the role of Cubmaster. Hmm. Said atheist thought about it and researched it (did I mention that he had had college; as per classic Bill Cosby film, Bill Cosby himself, everyone who's graduated from college researches every question, such as childbirth), reading the actual BSA bylaws and rules & regulations, advancement guidelines, etc. In the end, he came to realize, especially with BSA's official "absolutely non-sectarian" rules and their refusal to even define what "Duty to God" is supposed to mean because that is entirely and strictly determined by the member's own religious background, that he could harmonize his atheism with the Boy Scouts. No real problem there.Then the Randall twins hit the news and said atheist was taken totally aback by BSA's reaction which was completely contrary to their own rules. So said atheist, a college graduate, started researching the matter. And being a member of CompuServe, he lurked in CompuServe's Scouting forum and was further astounded at the vicious postings there, all of which were in direct violation of officially published BSA policies and rules. So he spoke out, directly quoting BSA policies and rules.And one day, he was sadly informed by another BSA litagant in Chicago, also active on CompuServe, that all the postings on CompuServe had been passed on to the BSA lawyers, including said atheist's, and were being used as evidence in federal court. Said atheist was expelled from BSA after an odd phone conversation in which the local council's Scout Exec was mainly trying to establish that said atheist's beliefs were not the same as his own. The closest that said atheist could get as a reason for his expulsion was that he could not do his "Duty to God", which wasn't even a determination that BSA was supposed to make.During all this, said atheist met a Unitarian minister and he joined the church, since he had shared the beliefs for the past 30 years of his life. According to officially published BSA policies, etc, the only person who has any say as to whether you fulfill your "duty to God" is your own religious leader, your minister. Said atheist's minister certified directly to BSA, in writing, that said atheist fulfilled his "duty to God" in accordance with Unitarian-universalist teachings. And BSA completely ignored him both times and every single time said atheist presented them with copies of his minister's letters to BSA.Early on, said atheist's minister gave him a copy of BSA's official statement about Life Scout Paul Trout. Paul was a Unitarian and during his Life Scout board, his ideas about God, while in line with his Unitarian beliefs, were not in line with a brand-new BSA policy. You see, even though BSA officially excluded itself from defining "duty to God" or even "God", they had suddenly started to define "God" as a "Supreme Being", which is not necessarily in line with Unitarian-Universalist beliefs (nor with Buddhist beliefs, etc). In 1985, the hundreds of letters of protest pressured Chief Scout Exec Ben Love (remember that name) to reinstate Paul Trout, apologize to him publically, and rescind their new-fangled "Supreme Being" rule. Then in 1991, the exact same Ben Love had not only reinstated that verbotten "Supreme Being" rule, but he was using it with extreme prejudice against everybody despite thousands of letters of protest.Funny thing about the Randall affair. The judge did find BSA guilty of discrimination, so it went to the state supreme court. In the meantime, they were allowed to continue to participate. They continued in said atheist's pack, while said atheist not only had implemented and run the pack's Webelos program, albeit with one dad who couldn't be involved acting as a straw leader, though they always had 100% parental sign-up for Members of Committee and enough MCs were always present at all Webelos functions to meet all official requirements. And, interestingly, this exact same atheist did more to promote the religious awards program than anyone else he had ever heard of. Because he really and honestly believed that everybody needs to know all that they can about what they believe in.Here's how the Randalls turned out. While their case was pending, they continued to participate. And moved up into Boy Scouts. And progressed all the way up to their Eagle Board. At which time, the state supreme court suddenly decided that the law does not apply to the BSA. Not that they didn't discriminate, but rather that they were absolutely free to discriminate. At the same time, said atheist's case, which had been held pending all that time, was suddenly finally decided against him; even though he was promised the right to be informed of the final meeting in advance so that he could be present, none of that ever happened. And years before that, BSA had severed all connections with the Unitarians, in part because they had kept reminding BSA that it was violating its own rules. And since the Randall case had presented so many citations from BSA's own bylaws and rules & regulations, etc, that those BSA has since greatly restricted access to those publications. And they continue to maintain their false "requirement" for belief in a "Supreme Being". Even though they officially stated again in 1995 that that "requirement" doesn't exist -- as soon as BSA became aware of that official's statement, even though he was precisely the official to make such a statement, that official was immediately demoted.And BSA continues in its evil ways. To the detriment of Scouting.If there is something that you do not want to be made known, then do not announce it on-line. It sucks, but there you have it.

According to some (including Penn and Teller), it's the result of the Mormon Church's take-over of BSA in the 1980's. Scouting is the Mormon's youth program of choice. Every single Mormon boy is registered with BSA. And Mormon adults are ordered to be leaders -- a coworker who married into that church and only had daughters was one day complaining bitterly at work that he had been ordered to be a Cubmaster. And they are all registed in BSA until the age of 18. Even though they are all pushed through to get their Eagle at age 14, whereupon they go into the church's sports programs from that point onwards. And at the council campouts (eg, camporees), there was always grumbling among the non-Mormon veteran Scouters about how the Mormon troops never ever stayed, but rather always pulled out late Saturday in order to make it to church Sunday morning.In the court cases, one agrument BSA presented repeatedly was that the Mormon Church vowed to remove all their support should any of the Three G's (Godless, Gay, Girl) ever be allowed to join. BSA was at the same time proclaiming themselves proud to discriminate and that they were being forced to discriminate by the Mormon Church. The same as they would proclaim themselves either a religious organization and not now nor ever-ever a religious organization, all depending on what argument they were trying to use in court. Lawyers may well take a different view of this, but to the rest of us it reeks of hypocrisy.During the Randall "burning times", our local council, the one actually actively engaged in that particular act of discrimination and in the subsequent legal proceedings (which BSA had invited; to the twins' father, "So sue us."), put out a full-page ad in the county's major newspaper. It vainly proclaimed, "Our Principles are Not for Sale". To which I replied, "Of course not. You already sold them out to the Mormon Church!"Now here's a bit of irony. When I became an atheist those 46-47 years ago, I sat down and thought about my moral compass. Since my reason for becoming an atheist was that I could no longer be a Christian because I couldn't believe the Bible, then the Bible could not serve as a basis for morality. Instead, I chose the Scout Oath and Scout Law. And indeed, during those "burning times" (forgive me if I appear to make light of what our Wiccan brethren had to endure; I speak here as a Unitarian-Universalist), BSA's official magazine to Scouters included a quote from Lord Baden-Powell saying what a great gift the Scout Law (referring to the original British Scout Law, not the expanded religion-ized American version) was, because instead of telling us what not to do (as in "Thou shalt not ..." of the Ten Commandments and of organized religion), it told us what we need to do in order to have a good life.As it has always been. As it shall always be. In spite of the BSA professional pinheads.So say we all!