Screw you Boy Scouts! Send your badges back!

One brave former Boy Scouts returns his badge…will others follow suit?

Keywords: boy scouts anti-gay, eagle scout badge, martin cizmar

Over here at wePRIDeny.com we’ve been keeping you updated on the unfolding discriminatory events taking place within the Boy Scouts of America. It’s lead to the firing of scout leader and lesbian mom Jennifer Tyrell which promoted a few higher up resignations and much publicity. Due to this,  the Boy Scouts of America retaliated with a statement  in which they “came to the conclusion that this policy is absolutely the best policy for the Boy Scouts,” the organization’s national spokesman, Deron Smith, told the Associated Press.

But now comes hope. Martin Cizmar, a writer from Irving, Texas who earned his Eagle Scout honor badge in 1998, has returned his badge to the Scouts with a letter explaining why.

Just mailed my Eagle Scout medal back to the BSA to protest the ban on gay scouts. Kinda sad, but important.

— Martin Cizmar (@martincizmar) July 19, 2012

“Though I didn’t know at the time, I was acquainted with a number of gay scouts and scouters. They were all great men, loyal to the scout oath and motto and helpful to the movement. There is no fair reason they should not be allowed to participate in scouting.”

“A national policy on sexuality forces good, principled people from scouting,” he continues. “I can only hope that someone inside the BSA has the courage to fix this policy before the organization withers into irrelevance. I don’t want to be an Eagle Scout if a young man who is gay can’t be one, too.”

Let’s hope that this brave and amazing move prompts others to do the same. The Boy Scouts of America missed a HUGE opportunity by not moving towards inclusion but instead reinforcing hate and discrimination. Lame.