Being Gay in the Boy Scouts of America

            There was never a place that I felt at home more in life than in my Boy Scout Troop.  My two best friends have followed me in the program the whole way through, the scouts were like brothers to me and I will always hold the experiences that we had together close to my heart.  To me, scouting was a place where my full potential could be found, nurtured and embraced.  It was in scouts where I learned to publicly speak, teach and most importantly, lead.  Scouting has taught me life lessons that will only help to continue my success in life.  Scouting has also brought me experiences that nothing else would like, jumping off telephone poles, hiking 3 mountains in one day during flash floods, sleeping in a shelter made by myself in the woods, rappelling down a cliff and saving a life.  And I will always treasure my time in Boy Scouts as one of the best bonding experiences with my dad, who helped me the whole way through the program.

            There was not a single time in scouting that anyone had ever picked on me for being different or shunned me for my perceived sexuality.  In fact in my troop, many scouts looked up to me as a role model, respected me as a leader and worked with me to accomplish goals.  Because of this I do not believe that the people in scouting send a message of hate to gay people.  Instead it is the higher up National Officers that instate these arbitrary rules.  They say that a scout who is gay does not follow the point in the Scout Law of being “morally straight.”

            I believe that my morals are straight, I volunteer to teach people how to save lives and save them myself, I am a voting citizen that obeys the laws of my city, state and country, I don’t lie, cheat or steal and I will always fight for what I believe in.  Morality is not the same as sexuality and should not be measured as such.  As an Eagle Scout, the national authority of the BSA believed that I encompass the true ideals of an Eagle Scout, that I will always be true to God, Country, others and self and that I will be a leader of tomorrow.  All of these things were true and will remain so forever because I will always be an Eagle Scout because it is a mark of character even if I am also gay.