Boy Scouts slammed—and celebrated—for its about-face on gay members
The organization walked back its policy change on sexual orientation, drawing thousands of rebukes and accolades on social media.
The Boy Scouts organization has always been an ideological lightning rod for its policies and leadership. On Jan. 28 it made a huge leap toward quelling at least one side of the criticism with an announcement that it was considering removing its membership restriction regarding sexual orientation.
The news immediately went viral, and, last Wednesday, Boy Scouts of America (BSA) issued another statement, saying it was backing away from making any immediate changes to its membership policy.
The announcement taking back the previous decision drew an outpouring of polarizing comments on its Facebook page. To its credit, the BSA has been letting the conversation run wild, letting the masses post offensive and inappropriate comments. Clearly, trying to manage the conversation would be fruitless.
The official Facebook page of the Boy Scouts has 225,000 “likes,” and 10 percent of those are “actively listening” to conversations. Since Jan. 28, the Twitter hashtag #boyscouts has been trending off and on.
An Ohio resident took a more conciliatory approach to his comment on Thursday responding to the BSA’s announcement on Wednesday. He said:
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