[21094] in APO-L
[APO-L] Fwd: BSA
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Frodonic@AOL.COM)
Fri Jul 28 11:54:14 2000
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Date: Fri, 28 Jul 2000 11:42:42 EDT
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From: Frodonic@aol.com
Full-name: Frodonic
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Date: Thu, 27 Jul 2000 07:29:27 EDT
Subject: BSA
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Brothers I love and admire,
My only comment on this issue is to applaud the "activist"/Brothers who
recognize that the "relax, change will come in a generation or two"-style
argument has been used many times in history to squash uprisings that are
righteous and just, including fighting for a living wage, fair work
conditions, suffrage, etc.
1. Change will not come without the call for change which must and should
come from visionary LEADERS. (The Freedom Summers and March in Selma
excelerated the s l o w progress being made in the Civil Rights movement.)
2. To "not get our hands dirty", to "not get political" -- these are
hackneyed, tired excuses for inaction. It says "I agree with you basically,
but I do not want to invest myself in action that may cast me in unpopular
light to others." This is not political or spiritual -- to me it is an issue
of dignity and honor and FRIENDSHIP. (How many young men and women will
commit suicide as ostracized members of a society that rejects them for their
faith or their sexual being while we "wait it out" comfortably behind the
safety of the walls of uninvolvement?)
3. Society is not in agreement. But people of principle have stood united on
these issues for many years, decades. Taking no action IS taking action --
and tolerance of intolerance is NOT tolerance at all. Helping build a
society that can evolve and become more able to embrace itself, each segment
and each single part, is perhaps the greatest SERVICE we can perform.
Sending a message to the BSA is not new. We did this when they asked us to
cut ties -- we said "NO." Were we intolerant of their desire to determine
their affiliations? Who is the best person to tell you when stray from the
path you should take? I say, a friend. APO may be the perfect "friend" of
the BSA to help spur its change -- it is NOT the Lambda Legal Defense Fund or
N.O.W.
I know what I suggest is difficult and heart-wrenching, perhaps now you can
get in your gut the feeling James Dale had every day after the BSA ejected
him -- he was a model Scout, an exemplary Scouter, and, in my sincerest
opinion, the most morally straight person to wear a BSA uniform I've ever
read about. I would be proud to have him as a member of Alpha Phi Omega and
would fight any effort to exclude him.
I was a Scout and Scouter. I am a Christian. I do not feel the "Founders" of
Scouting or APO foresaw the world at the change of the millennium, but I have
to believe that they were people of vision who, alive today, would call on
our movements....THEIR movements....to open our doors and grow and reach out.
I do not feel a statement in December 2000 from APO to the BSA will effect
the change I wish for in January 2001, but I can proudly say it was a step
down the "glory road" that ended in May 2005? September 2008?
I love you all and thank you for your discussion of this issue. It is itself
a step.
In Leadership, Friendship, and Service,
Jim, a Brother
Fall 1983 - R.L. "Pops" Brittain Pledge Class
Lambda Omicron Chapter
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