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Kipper: I hope you know that I don’t intend to attack you, and I appreciate your candor and willingness to be inclusive. I think the thing at stake here is whether gay youth should be allowed to have the same experience in scouts and on missions as straight youth, or if it should be something–separate but equal. I guess that’s what we’re here to work out.
Quote:why would a gay youth (or young adult or adult male or female) be more trustworthy in a potential intimate setting than a straight?
This is a good question. In my fifteen years of working on my attractions, I’ve met and become familiar with many gay mormon men and their experiences. The answer to the question about would be “Because they already are or have been in these intimate settings, and for the vast majority of them nothing inappropriate has happened.”
I would say that this is also true of our straight youth.I’m uncomfortable with the standard mormon anxiety that if you put a male and a female in a room alone together, sex is inevitable. I just don’t think that’s true, and I think that it greatly underestimates our youth. I’m not advocating that we have zero boundaries–I just think we should teach our youth correct principles, and trust them to make the right choices. If two kids decide to mess around, they will find a time and place to do it, regardless of our imposed boundaries. I’d like to hear what others think about this. As for “intimate settings”–can we define this? What is an intimate setting? What intimate settings arise in scouts and on missions? What are the dangers there, and what can be done to address them?
Again, I hope you know that I’m not trying to “demonize” you. I’m just pushing back a bit.
As to “straight communities” and “gay communities”, can we not be “no more strangers and foreigners, but fellowcitizens with the saints, and of the household of God”? Can we forget about the LGBT “other” and consider the lesbian, bi, gay, and transsexual members of the Church to be a part of us, and for these problems to be “our” problems rather than problems caused when two communities collide?
Quote:Why do you want to demonize me for pointing these types of concerns out?
I don’t want to demonize you; I want to understand you. Those are very different things – and disagreeing is NOT demonizing. That’s why I have continued in the conversation and asked you if how I was reading your comments was correct. I wasn’t being facetious or confrontational; I was being honest and straightforward.
You seem to be most concerned about unwanted sexual advances. I understand that, particularly if you have personal experience with such advances – and it’s the exact same reason most people want to separate gay youth from straight youth, particularly in situations where they are alone.
Let me share an example from someone with whom I was very close. He had been sexually assaulted as a young boy, and he taught his kids that “the world” was rampant with people who were sexually aggressive. When one of his daughters moved far from home, her husband told me that this man had promised her she would be propositioned more than once and that she probably would be sexually assaulted at least once. For him, it was a given, since it was his own, personal experience.
Again, the only times sexual activity will be an issue are when there is a mutual attraction (consensual) or one person is a predator / aggressor to some degree – when one person won’t stop making advances even when nothing is reciprocated or when advances are rejected. (non-consensual). The first isn’t an issue for a straight youth and a gay youth, and you seem to be focused on the second. While such unwanted advances and assaults absolutely do occur, they can be avoided completely ONLY if we keep gay youth completely separated from straight youth of the same sex – and, if we do that, we are punishing all gay youth for the actions of very, very few gay youth. If we are going to be equal in our approach to this, we would have to forbid all associations that include only two people, especially if we aren’t positive of the sexual orientation of each person. There is no way we are going to do this with straight youth (forbidding all one-to-one interactions between male and female youth), so we shouldn’t do it with gay youth. We’ve done it, essentially, in the past, and the results have been horrendous for our gay youth.
I’m not willing to go there, and the research says clearly that gay youth are no more prone to over-aggressive sexual advances than straight youth. In fact, they tend to be less aggressive due to the severe costs of making mistakes with advances. I personally know quite a few gay LDS youth, and every single one of them is MORE careful than their average straight counterpart at church and school. Yes, there are those who are not as careful, but, in general, making advances to the wrong person still carries extreme costs that are not just possible but actually likely.
Finally, you have said you are concerned with gay youth being in “intimate” situations. I will NEVER support eliminating meaningful, physical intimacy from anyone’s life.
I’m NOT saying I support no restrictions on sexual activity. That is not my stance at all.However, we decry the Catholic system of requiring life-long celibacy and complete lack of physical intimacy for priests and nuns – and we even blame that system for much of the problem with abuse that has plagued the Catholic Church. I think we are more than just a little hypocritical if we castigate one group for denying some of its members all forms of physical intimacy and then turn around and do the exact same thing to some of our own religious family. To follow-up on turinturambar’s last comment, as with most things, my standard is “equality under the law” – meaning I support the same standard for all members. Also, if we are unwilling to allow gay members to serve with straight members of the same sex in a setting that would put them alone together, and if we are unwilling to allow gay members to serve with other gay members of the same sex in a setting that would put them alone together, we are effectively denying them completely the opportunity to serve missions – and serve in callings where they might be with only one other person of the same sex – and go on activities or be in classes that include only two people of the same sex – and serve as Home or Visiting Teachers – and serve in leadership callings of pretty much any kind – and on and on and on.
I simply can’t accept that.
I just was reading through the thread catching up on all the comments. As far as the OP goes…I hope the statement about the missionary department is true…and authorities don’t classify it as a disorder. That sounds like progress. On the discussion with Kipper and T. and Ray…it gets me thinking…
Aren’t all rules unfair? Aren’t there always exceptions to the rules? “Equality under the law” is the ideal, and should be sought after, but it isn’t always possible because only God can truly judge what is just for all.
Yet, we have rules. Why? If they’re going to be imperfect? I think because in the absence of perfect equality for all, a law to protect the most people from the worst risks is acceptable to the most people. It is a compromise, which by definition is less than ideal. Right?
I am a grown man. I get called to the primary. I work with scouts. I am not treated equal. Women in primary callings don’t need a second woman in the class or they are required to prop the door open to avoid the risk or the appearance of risk that kids will be abused by a man.
That rule didn’t originate from scientific research or understandings of disorders. It came about when the church leaders had to deal with problems of some outliers…some men not normal to the rest of us…that acted out and ruined it for the rest of us.
I’m not going to advocate for equality with my female primary teachers, or female YW leaders. Despite how ridiculous to me it may seem that I should have to be treated differently, because I have zero tolerance for abuse to children, I can live within a society that accepts rules when the risk of children is at stake…even a remote risk.
Now…I can’t compare my situation to what a homosexual man has to deal with inside the church. There are root differences on the issues, and very different levels of the outcomes of rules. So don’t confuse my thoughts on homosexuality with the point I’m making on rules within a society or organization like the church which deals with imperfect people.
That would just be my input to the discussion on hand, and about kids of young age in tents with homosexual kids. I hope that doesn’t make me sound like I assume all homosexuals can’t control themselves, just like I don’t think all male primary teachers will abuse kids unless a door is propped open.
I could give stories of my daughter’s friends who were openly lesbian (actually are married now), and I always welcomed them in our home, let them watch movies in the theater room together, even let them sleep over with in my daughter’s room…but I won’t take a defensive position of something I don’t feel is needed to establish the point I am trying to make.
Why would I say I can see the point of rules for kids in tents when I allow gay youth to sleep in my daughter’s room? Because I knew these friends, and knew they aren’t out of control sexually. Which is my point…if kids going to a scout camp are with a youth I don’t know, or on a mission with another missionary I don’t know…then…well…I don’t have that same level of comfort, and while I would hate to be judgmental…bottom line is it may feel safer to me since I don’t now and there is risk.
I simply am suggesting that with kids on scout campouts, or missionaries on their own at a young age, isn’t it reasonable that rules are agreed to…even if not ideal…even if other parents aren’t as comfortable as I am with the situation? If good information exists to support that there is no risk to the kids, then OK, drop the dumb rules (outdated rules…such as Word of Wisdom…don’t get me started). But if there is a real risk, even a remote one of a terrible exposure to a child, as a parent, don’t we accept the inequality over the risk and just prop the door open? I think that is just life….isn’t it?
Heber, You make a great case for gay kids to just shut their mouth and stay in the closet. Then, nobody has to worry.
….which doesn’t sound like a “great” case after all. That raises new risks and new fears for the safety of children. …meaning…I don’t like the way that sounds for the safety of gay youth who would feel they would have to stay in the closet and live that kind of life. Since I see your point that way…I don’t like the case I put out there for discussion. Thanks for your comments, T.
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Came across this thread today and heard Kipper, Ray and Turiturambar talking around a point that I did not hear laid out plainly, at least as it applies to my history. That is, why be uneasy about a straight scout sharing a tent with a gay scout? Reminded me of something my father said to me about gay people. (I think my dad was worried about me going gay when he wasn’t worried about me having a schizophrenic crisis – and from his point of view in the times he had some worrisome indications of both dangers). My dad said – Think about it, gays won’t produce gay children from a gay relationship. So the only way gays can increase is by recruitment. My dad was worried about gays recruiting others who were not otherwise gay or on the fence to become gay. He would worry not so much about the gay scout in the tent sexually assaulting the straight scout as in seducing him. I think Kipper did actually say that in so many words, but I didn’t see that addressed as a concern. It would be a concern to me as a father, although some of the things that Turiturambar said about gay missionaries not being so inclined if applied to scouts would help allay that concern. Just thought I would make the observation. I would be interested in confirming or dissenting comments.
Regards.
It’s not possible to “catch the gay”. There is no such thing as being “on-the-fence gay”. Sexual orientation is neither a choice nor a disease. It makes as much sense to “worry” that the straight scout would turn the gay scout straight as it does the other way around. To clarify, having a non-straight orientation is completely natural. It seems reasonable that non-straight people might be more likely to have non-straight kids (though don’t quote me on that), but straight parents have gay, bi, or asexual kids all the time.
It was reasonable for your dad to assume you might be turned gay by someone recruiting you to become gay – since his generation assumed sexual orientation was a conscious choice and that all non-heterosexuals were lustful perverts. Knowing what we know now, “recruitment” and your father’s assumptions are ridiculous. All pedophiles, rapists, sexual assaulters, etc. are driven by lust and/or control/power issues. Those of any sexual orientation who prey on young people are pedophiles, and their sexual orientation has nothing to do with it.
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Admin Note]: We are not going to have a discussion debating or discussing that issue. Period. The current discussion is long and comprehensive enough. Therefore, I am closing this thread.
- The topic ‘A Simple but Important Step: Homosexuality and Missions’ is closed to new replies.