Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Polite Political Discussion- is it Possible? An Experiment. -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: epicure who wrote (27)	7/27/2006 7:50:08 PM
From: the_wheel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1695

I was wondering the same thing. Mainly because I don't have children at least not any that could be in a Boy Scout troop, but I have often thought it would be nice to be a scout master. It never crossed my mind that being childless would be a problem. The part I don't understand is the "Strict scrutiny does not apply" part. Is this legalese? Do you have formal legal training? If so, perhaps that is my confusion with this sentence about strict scrutiny. Also, maybe there are formal legal "classes" which can be the basis of legal suits. Did I guess correctly? It's legalese?

To: epicure who wrote (27)	7/27/2006 8:04:06 PM
From: Rambi	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1695

Are you the new elitist thread? Why have I not received an engraved invitation? Am I not elite enough? Polite enough? Must I denounce you? Rambi the Emily Post of SI.

To: epicure who wrote (27)	7/28/2006 7:01:07 AM
From: Ilaine	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1695

I am not up for an argument on this but would like to point out that "protected class" has to do with state action. The Boy Scouts, not being any governmental body, can discriminate all they want, unless they violate some law. (For non lawyers, that means a civil rights law. Federal civil rights laws prohibit discrimination against the following classes: race, religion, national origin, gender (male vs. female), age, disability, and pregnancy. Note that homosexuality is not something federal law protects.) It may well be that living where you are, there are laws against discriminating against people on the basis of sexual orientation. But that's simply not so in most of the country. We see this playing out everywhere in the country in the gay-marriage-law litigation. I don't keep a close watch on it but occasionally the topic comes up on, say, NPR, where I learned yesterday that no state in the union allows gay marriage but Massachusetts, and so far all the laws have withstood judicial scrutiny. Seems to me that if it's legal for governments to discriminate against homosexuals, it's even more legal for non-governments to discriminate against homosexuals, except in places like San Francisco, where the law prohibits such discrimination. Maybe sexual orientation should be a protected class, but it's not. We've had similar discussions before, so I don't really want to keep arguing this with you, just pointing out that I don't believe you're correct on this, and we can agree to disagree. (As others may not know, yes, I am a lawyer, not just by training but by occupation, and I don't advise clients to take legal positions which will be expensive and losing positions in litigation. Let the activists be the shock troops, that's not for lawyers. Lawyers do the mopping up. Example, Thurgood Marshall, who never took a case he couldn't win, which meant waiting for the right moment to come. He didn't create the moments, they came to him.)

To: epicure who wrote (27)	7/28/2006 1:49:53 PM
From: Brumar89	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1695

Sexual orientation isn't a protected class and I don't think it needs to be. Particularly when protecting that class may mean demonizing and destroying largely beneficial institutions like the scouts. Similar campaigns could be waged against every church or religious institution in the country. I believe they have kept out some scouts who wanted to be in troops because they were gay. If true, that would be unwise in that people shouldn't assign sexual orientation to kids. And I know there was an argument from a scout who didn't want to affirm the God thing, which is also a problem with the scouts, imo. Then he shouldn't join the scouts. Or maybe atheists could start their own scout troops. Establishing and furthering religion is all well and good, but it isn't something the state should (imo) be involved in. Scouts aren't a state institution and they're entirely voluntary. I'm not sure why you would think my opinion would have changed.. Since you'd said only parents s/b scout leaders - a good idea with which I agree btw. I wondered whether knowing that the only gay guy (James Dale) who has wanted to be a scout leader and can't because he's gay has no children. Thus it appears the Scout ban on gay scout leaders affects no one who is a parent of a scout.