BSA New Policy

Nothing. The church agrees that gay youth should be allowed to participate. I don’t think they’ll see this as much different and/or rock the boat. I also don’t think many will try to join church troops, although I’m interested to see.

Our ward has a now young adult man (born female) who grew up here and was fairly outspoken about his desires to be in Scouts instead of Young Women. At the time it was strictly verboten, of course and he was mostly inactive. As a young adult he moved away, and has undertaken some steps toward sex reassignment. His sister still lives here and he does visit and even comes to church sometimes, where I am happy to say he is welcomed by most (there are a few Pharisees and other assorted snobs who try to ignore him). He was here over Christmas and even took the sacrament, although he is inactive in his own ward.

FWIW I think when Monson dies (and I pray he lingers longer because I don’t like his next-in-line much) the church will pull out of Scouting.

The thing is, scouting is seen as an extension of the young men’s program, and if a trans boy wants to join, especially if he’s a ward member, he would definitely be rocking the boat. The Church refuses to recognize non-cisgender people’s identity as valid. If a troop refuses to let trans youth join, would they get in trouble with the local council? Would a bishop be able to discipline parents if they fight for their trans son to participate in the ward’s lds troop?

Those are good questions. Related questions that play in are:

-How many active transgender youth are there?

-And of those how many have parents supportive enough to fight for it?

-And of the transgender youth, how many really want to be part of a church troop? Or the church at all? They know they’re on the road to excommunication anyway.

Leadership roulette exists, but under normal circumstances with reasonable leadership (and I think the vast majority are reasonable) I don’t think parents would be disciplined for stating their opinions or advocating for their child. One of the main jobs of a parent is to advocate for their children. They could be disciplined for refusal to abide by a negative decision and/or taking the case public (thereby openly opposing their leadership and/or attempting to gain a following).

I think the council would leave them alone or perhaps tell the kid to join a different troop. I recognize that it might be different way outside the Corridor where I live because church troops are a minority (churches of any kind, actually). Generally I think the council may see it like gay Scoutmasters – while allowed in BSA the church is not required or forced to allow them.

And as I said before, I think the days of the church and Scouting are numbered anyway, and even though I have two Eagle Scout sons I am highly in favor of that separation.

I do think it will cause a portion (the majority) to mentally turn the dial on, “The world is going to hell and WE have to double down.”

This is the biggest trigger for me in church. What is wrong with these people? How can you (the nebulous you, not anyone specifically) be so proud of erasing people’s experiences and kicking them out when they are most vulnerable? It’s the antithesis of mourning with those that mourn. God made us all different for a reason. If you only accept as valid those who are like yourself, you’re making the exact opposite of a zion society.

A hospital is supposed to be a place of healing, not for finding the weakest “patients” and bleeding them dry. I guess this is a sign that some may need to find another home.

Last I heard, there are 2 transgender members in wards near me. I don’t know how often they attend, but I do know they have in the past. The shelter I work with has a transgender attendee. A handful of LDS wards volunteer and don’t make any issue out of it. Maybe there is a little light on the horizon.

I also know plenty of YM who couldn’t care less about scouting. Scouting as we know it doesn’t exist outside of the US for YM. And I have known of a few who didn’t like the LDS troop and joined a non-LDS one and had a great time.

Sincere question – what’s the difference on a practical level? I’ve been in scouting my entire life and nobody ever looked at my birth certificate. Presumably the Scoutmaster, the COR (Chartered Organizational Representative), or my dad just marked “male.” My son is very “pretty” with a delicate face and has long blond hair. When he plays football everybody yells “watch the girl” when referring to my son. Nobody has ever asked to see his birth certificate when registering for scouts.

Is the new policy any different than the old policy from an enforcement perspective? It seems like an announcement made for PR purposes to me.

Yes, it’s different. Parents can no longer pressure local troops or councils to kick boys out because they are trans. Here’s the story that caused the change: http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/29/us/trans-boy-boy-scouts-trnd/

I do think the church will probably part with scouting. And I think this would be accelerated by Monson passing away given how much of a scouter he was.

I totally agree. I am an Eagle Scout, but feel it is time for the Church to part from Scouting. I have some friends in Bishoprics; a Bishop and a counselor that hoped that the Church would just “can” scouting and do it’s own program. My friend ran the Friends for Scouting drive and he stated that all he wanted was to try to get the quota, and that he hates scouts and feels that the youth are better served by doing Young Mens/Young Womens and participating in sports or some other community activity or club that involves people or other faiths.

I was fortunate to have been in a very diverse scout troop with an Israeli, and Jehovah’s Witness, Catholics, Protestants, and some boys that later became gay. Scouting was great when we had a lot of participation, parental help, and great diverse youth. Now, I feel it is hard to get kids motivated, or parent’s to even help. I have helped with camp outs, but see it as a burden since usually time needs to be requested off to participate. I see scouts fizzling out eventually. Time will only tell.

In my participation with other churches, I have experienced Awanas (Baptist), Pioneer Club (Church of Christ and Society of Friends), and Royal Rangers/Missionettes (Assembly of God). I expect that if the LDS church parted with scouting it would do something similar but with a Mormonesque flavor.

What I like about scouting is that earning an eagle scout rank or serving as a scout leader is something that is recognized and respected outside of the church. I feel that any replacement program would lose that benefit.