BSA councils attempt to defraud public for funds

[evmori 11]

Merlyn (This message has been edited by a staff member.)

[awesome1_in_cc 10]

WOW!! I just stumbled on this thread and couldn't believe what I was reading. IMHO, Merlyn does have some valid points regarding how we get funding as an organization. We (the BSA organization as a whole) have to be above board and honest in our dealings, otherwise it undermines the whole organization as what we stand for.

 

I'm sure we all know that:

 

A) The BSA is a "private" organization who has the right to set its own membership requirements.

 

B) As a result of point A, we really should have no dilutions of getting funding from State or Federal sources but will need to rely upon those private individuals who believe in the program we are teaching.

 

C) We are under attack from those who feel they are being excluded and have a "right" to participate in our program. Last time I checked, the US constitution grants all citizens the right to pursue happiness, but not join the BSA.

 

Why are we wasting our time, trying to change people like Merlyn who believe differently then we do? We should be out in the streets drumming up support for the program and the values the BSA stands for.

 

I promise you that Merlyn can come up with thousands of things that the BSA has done wrong and will at every chance he has. But please remember that for every thing the BSA has done wrong, there are thousands more things that we have done right. We have influenced millions of young men over a 98 year history, but we have so many more now that need us.

 

Long story short, Merlyn has his opinions of us as and organization and that is perfectly fine. We should not be using our talents and resources trying to change him or challenge him on every little point, but spend it trying to protect the program we love.

 

My path forward from this is to send a check to Los Padres Council!!

 

[Merlyn_LeRoy 72]

Ed, (This message has been edited by a staff member.)

[Merlyn_LeRoy 72]

awesome1_in_cc writes:

C) We are under attack from those who feel they are being excluded and have a "right" to participate in our program.

 

No, you are "under attack" from people who feel (rightly so) that they are being unlawfully excluded on the basis of religion from a HUD-funded program that requires no discrimination on the basis of religion.

 

Lose the HUD funding or lose the discrimination. You can't have both.

[awesome1_in_cc 10]

Merlyn,

 

I could not agree with you more!! Since you see it as your right to membership based on the BSA receiving tax payer money for the program, then I agree we should work harder to procure private funding.

 

Once we do that for councils nationwide, you will have no argument left.

 

Sincerely,

Awesome1_in_cc

 

 

 

(This message has been edited by awesome1_in_cc)

[Trevorum 24]

I don't know that we are "under attack". I've certainly never been attacked. Perhaps you mean "criticized". That would seem to fit better. The word "attack" does connote some kind of violence.

 

I do know of many people who have criticized the BSA - not for the programs we offer but for our membership policies which exclude many fellows from participating in those programs. IMHO, that's a shame. I believe that every boy deserves an opportunity to be a Scout, even those whose parent(s) do not believe in a god, and even those who discover they are gay.

[awesome1_in_cc 10]

Trevorum,

 

Maybe the word "attack" is strong, but that is my belief. There are outside sources that wish for the BSA movement to either conform to their wishes regarding membership or they want us shut down.

 

Thats is the simple truth as I see it.

 

(This message has been edited by awesome1_in_cc)

[Trevorum 24]

Again, I haven't heard that anyone wants to "shut us down". Rather, I think that many people believe that BSA simply has exclusionary membership policies which are out of touch with today's America. Even those people, when pressed, will readily admit the value of Scouting in developing character in youth.

 

[awesome1_in_cc 10]

Trevorum,

 

So you don't believe that ACLU and other organizations by their actions of fighting the BSA in courts all over this country to have us removed from DOD installations, removed from schools that we too help pay for, taking our chartered sponsors to court to stop them from chartering BSA units is not trying to shut us down? Once a charter is lost, do you believe these organizations give a hoot if those kids find other units to join?

 

The BSA and our chartered sponsors are spending tons of money each year to defend themselves from these "attacks" by those who disagree with our membership standards and I guess I am simple minded because I can't see how the diversion of funds from the program to fight court battles is helping us provide a quality character education program for our youth.

 

On the flip side, with the amount of time, energy & money that these organizations are spending trying to "change" the BSA movement, they could do a world of great things for Americas youth.

 

I don't see this a fight for "what's best for Americas youth" because these organizations could be truly changing lifes with the resources they are spending fighting the BSA.

 

I have to ask the following question, where does one person's right begin and another person's rights end?

 

I certainly believe that these organizations and their members have every right to associate with those who share the same values as they do but don't I have the same rights?

 

And as far as the argument about changing with the times, I have to say no thank you. I don't know if it is the fact that our kids are not safe in schools, today's youth seem to lack personal control or responsibility, courts telling us how to raise our kids, etc. but I long for a time long ago.

 

Sincerely,

Awesome1_in_cc

 

[Merlyn_LeRoy 72]

awesome1_in_cc writes:

[to Trevorum] So you don't believe that ACLU and other organizations by their actions of fighting the BSA in courts all over this country to have us removed from DOD installations, removed from schools that we too help pay for, taking our chartered sponsors to court to stop them from chartering BSA units is not trying to shut us down?

 

I don't. The ACLU is making sure that the US government doesn't practice religious discrimination.

 

The US military can no longer charter BSA units, because the government would have to practice religious discrimination to do so.

 

Public schools can no longer charter BSA units, because the government would have to practice religious discrimination to do so.

 

I haven't heard of any chartering organizations being taken to court apart from the DoD.

 

The BSA and our chartered sponsors are spending tons of money each year to defend themselves from these "attacks" by those who disagree with our membership standards and I guess I am simple minded because I can't see how the diversion of funds from the program to fight court battles is helping us provide a quality character education program for our youth.

 

Well, since the DoD agreed to stop chartering BSA units, and the BSA itself agreed to stop using government entities like public schools as chartering partners, it looks like the ACLU was in the right. You can have a private, discriminatory organization, but the US government can't support one that has religious requirements for membership. That pesky first amendment and all...

 

I certainly believe that these organizations and their members have every right to associate with those who share the same values as they do but don't I have the same rights?

 

Sure you do. You can have a private, discriminatory organization and pay for it yourself, just like everyone else. If someone starts a private, discriminatory group that only allows atheists, and ran it using HUD grants, or had public schools running their supposedly "private" clubs for students, or had military installations sponsoring their clubs, I think some people would object. I certainly would object.

[FireKat 10]

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

 

I have always wonder how the idea that giving monies to a non-denominational but religious organization would truly violate the above? 

If they give without respect to the religion or lack there of (all meeting other criteria equally) it is fair treatment across the board.  But as it stands now the govt is supporting the religion of no religion (religion as in belief in no god) and ONLY that religion.  So in a way the govt is establishing the religion of no religion.

 If you want govt money you cannot be tied to any religion but the religion of no religion. That seems a bit unfair.  They are prohibiting the exercise of religion it by trying to ban BSA from bases. Are they going to ban all prayer services on base too?  

I hate legalease!!! And the way lawyer twist things around.

[Axeman 10]

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

 

 

 

I have always wonder how the idea that giving monies to a non-denominational but religious organization would truly violate the above?

 

It is probably the interpretation of the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment.

 

The establishment clause prohibits 1) the establishment of a national religion by Congress, or 2) the preference of one religion over another or the support of a religious idea with no identifiable secular purpose.

 

 

[GernBlansten 10]

Well, one solution is for all of us to back Huckabee. One of his campaign promises is to "to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards"

[Hiromi 9]

FireKat,

 

I awoke this happy morning to find myself agreeing with you on something.

 

I think you are correct in your assessment of the realpolitik of the situation and its cynical realities. In schools where they have spent at least 50 years wiping clean religion form the text-books, the teacher training, and even the ideology of teaching and learning- its replacement is not some mild non-sectarian benign learning experience- but instead an indoctrination staging ground for the replacement religions and their affiliated lobby and activist bases-

Environmentalism

Secular Humanism

Multiculturalism

Feminism

Socialism

Transgenderism

Sexual enlightenmentism

Earth-Motherism

Athleticism

And the associated Sadism and natural social orders of cliques and hazing that comes with putting children into an environment where they overwhelm the parent population about 15 to 25 to one.

 

On the basis of pure logic, FireKAt, you would think that the argument wouldn't stand.

I.E. that by eliminating the power for a state agency to make law respecting the establishment of religion there would then by that lack of a law be an opportunity to form the establishment of a religion. But you rightly point out, FireKAt, the natural state of humanity- we are endowed with our creator with a natural condition to create a deity (call it what you will, it is treated with the reverence and paid the deference of a God) and the inclination to worship it and derive our authority from it. If this authority is not given to us, we will take it. If it is denied us, we will make a new one.

 

I worked in public education for nearly a decade. I knew that most of my peers were not practicing a faith. And yet, they believed in the experiment of public education as an article of faith. Their belief in public schooling was similar to religious belief. Like a faith, they took in stride the many glaring contradictions and empirical evidence that did not mesh with their working assumptions and tenets of the inherent goodness and rightness of the cause of public schooling for all. This is faith.

 

The faith in or belief in Public education, or in a socialist or egalitarian paradise, in a political cause, or in any type of revolution- does rise in many respects to meet the test of religiosity. (Including in many respects the Boy Scouts of America).

 

Merlin will surely point out to you that you would never be able to allocate public moneys equally and or fairly to all religious groups. But if you simply argued that most groups have at their center a statement of belief that by its nature will embrace a certain willing membership of those same shared values and beliefs, and by its very inclusive nature also exclude those members of our society that don't share those beliefs you can demonstrate the legality of public moneys going into any group of citizens if they meet the goals of those public moneys. (Including a soccer camp for inner city Latinos).

 

I see absolutely no difference between letting Rotary international (Service before self), The Salvation Army, The Daughters of the American Revolution, Catholic Charities, the Red Crescent, and the Boy Scouts of America run a soccer camp with public funds or hold meetings in Public facilities.

 

Many of the people like Merlin (but not perhaps Merlin Himslef) have a modus operandi which is not for fairness, but for the establishment of an anti-clerical state. The French Revolution is the first and best historical example of the results of this type of revolution. The French were not to be satisfied until their atheism established a state mechanism to punish believers and reward members of the new faith in the State.

 

Youll find the same revolutionary elements tagging along or insinuating themselves into many of the well-intentioned movements spreading across America. A great example for this is the cause of Environmentalism. It has become a big tent movement for a potpourri of Revolutionary types from Anti- Capitalist-Corporate types to Anti-Christian Pagans to the general enemies of Consumerist Middle Class America and its requisite values of Patriotism, Belief in God, and its institutions like the Boy Scouts. While Environmentalism may seem non-sectarian and secular and politically neutral as a cause- it is none of these. It has the full range of diversity of a religious denomination from zealots to the luke warm. It has a tenet of beliefs like an established religion. It should be viewed as much as a religion as the example of Rotary and The Boy Scouts.

 

Thanks Again FireKat

 

Great Food for Thought!

 

Pappy

(This message has been edited by Pappy)(This message has been edited by Pappy)

[Axeman 10]

Huckabee promises that? wow

 

'The 'establishment of religion' clause of the First Amendment:

 

Neither a state nor the Federal Government can set up a church.

 

Neither can pass laws which aid one religion, aid all religions, or prefer one religion over another.

 

Neither can force nor influence a person to go to or to remain away from church against his will or force him to profess a belief or disbelief in any religion.

 

No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance.

 

No tax in any amount, large or small, can be levied to support any religious activities or institutions, whatever they may be called, or whatever form they may adopt to teach or practice religion.

 

Neither a state nor the Federal Government can, openly or secretly, participate in the affairs of any religious organizations or groups and vice versa.

 

Excerpt from Thomas Jeffersons response to the Danbury Baptist Association, Jan. 1, 1802

 

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man & his god, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, thus building a wall of separation between church and state.