Image By: jxson

The Boy Scouts of America deserve a merit bage.

The BSA announced Monday morning that they are considering lifting their longstanding ban on gay youth and adult members.

The national board is set to decide on this issue as soon as early next week.  

BSA representative Deron Smith told USA today, 

“The policy change under discussion would allow the religious, civic or educational organizations that oversee and deliver Scouting to determine how to address this issue.”

This would mean that decision to allow homosexual members would be up to BSA’s 290 local governing councils and 116,000 sponsoring religious and civic groups. 

This potential shift in policy has come as a shock to some.

Only seven months ago a committee of  volunteers assembled by national leaders of the Boy Scouts heavily examined the issue of homosexuality in the organization.  They decided to keep their long-time ban on gay members. 

There has been a considerable about of backlash towards the Boy Scouts since Patrick Boyle published his book, “Scouts Honor” in 1994. Boyle’s book examined sexual abuse cases which were covered up in the organization.

More people also took part in the movement to overturn the ban after 2000 when the Supreme Court upheld BSA’s decision to ban gay members.  Since then, 462,000 people signed a petition on Change.org asking for Ryan Andresen, an openly gay Californian, to be granted an Eagle Scout application. 

The BSA may be changing their position on homosexuality, but if you are an atheist you are still out of luck.  

The BSA considers “Duty to god” to still be one of its core values. 

David Silverman who is the  president of American Atheists,  was quoted on Monday,

“If they are considering lifting the ban on gays, that’s a good thing, that’s progress. If they lift that bigotry from their requirements, I would hope they remove the rest of the bigotry and admit atheists as well.

Do you think its time for Boy Scouts to add a new  merit badge for equality to their uniforms?