Today the BSA lifted its ban on gay youth but chose to keep the ban on gay adult volunteers and employees. They saw this move as a compromise. It was an attempt to walk a find line between a more accepting public and their homophobic Christianist church sponsors who threatened a revolt against the BSA if they jettisoned their ban on gays altogether.

The message to gay youth is clear: We will tolerate you when you’re young, but you will never truly belong. You will never be accepted. There is no place for you among us, and once you grow up, we don’t want to see the likes of you around here any more because we think you are evil.

When you’re young, and you’re just getting a sense of who you are as an individual, and you have people telling you this, people who are supposed to love you, care for you and look out for you, the people who are supposed to be on your side--Mom, Dad, Grandma, Uncle Joe, your minister, your Scout leader--before you know how to respond to it and defend yourself against it, it can ruin you, and even if you manage to survive it, you may be scarred for life.