As noted a little while ago on

Reason 24/7, NBC News has an intriguing scoop: The Boy Scouts
may soon be ending its infamous ban on gay members, at least as
national policy. It will instead allow local troops and sponsors to
decide the matter for themselves.

The ban has survived years of external pressure and a Supreme
Court decision from 2000 that allowed the exclusion of gay
scouts under the First Amendment. But now pressure is being applied
much more firmly from within – not just from gay members, but from
whole chapters and
corporate sponsors:

Two corporate CEOs on BSA’s national board, Randall Stephenson
of ATT and James Turley of Ernst Young, have also said
they would work to end the ban. Stephenson is next in line to be
the BSA’s national chairman. …

About 50 local United Way groups and several corporations and
charities have concluded that the ban violates their
non-discrimination requirements and have ceased providing financial
aid to the Boy Scouts. An official of The Human Rights Campaign, an
advocate for gay rights, said HRC planned to downgrade its
non-discrimination ratings for corporations that continue to give
the BSA financial support.

“It’s an extremely complex issue,” said one Boy Scouts of
America official, who explained that other organizations have
threatened to withdraw their financial support if the BSA drops the
ban.

This would be a huge cultural domino to tumble if the ban is
actually lifted, second possibly only to the Catholic Church
reversing its opinion on gay relationships, were that to ever
happen.

The change would also notably different from the elimination of
the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy and the gay marriage recognition
battles. Both of those battles were/are fights with the government,
over the way the government classifies and treats its own
citizens.

While activists have attempted to make the Boy Scouts membership
policy a government issue, they have largely failed (though that
Supreme Court decision was a close 5-4). But when more and more
people who make up your organization tell you you’re out of step,
you might start to listen, especially if it starts to affect your
bottom line.

Inevitably, thoughts about culture’s evolving attitudes toward
homosexuality lead to thoughts about the Employment
Non-Discrimination Act (ENDA). ENDA would add sexual orientation
and gender identity to the list of categories over which private
employers may not discriminate. It has been introduced in Congress
over and over again for years and has not passed even when the
Democrats held most of the cards.

But do we even need it? Set aside for a moment, libertarian
reader, your objections to government coercion in employment
practices if you could. The argument is well taken – employers
should be able to select their own criteria for hiring. It is an
important component of human liberty. But set it aside for just a
moment, please.

The HRC publishes an
annual report looking at relevant corporate policies on gay and
transgendered matters. Their most recent report notes that a full
88 percent of Fortune 500 companies have non-discrimination
policies that include sexual orientation. In 2002 that number was
61 percent. A little less than half the states have
non-discrimination laws now, but that’s still a pretty big shift in
policy. (The percentage of Fortune 500 companies that now have
policies protecting transgendered employees from discrimination
made an even bigger jump, from 3 to 57 percent in a decade)

So, even without a federal law, there’s been a huge shift in
corporate behavior, no doubt due to pressures by gay (and gay
friendly) employees and customers, whose own attitudes (and
courage) have shifted in time. If ENDA passes someday (certainly
not through this Congress) would we even need it
anymore?

What about Chick-fil-A? They received plenty of attention last
year over their religious attitudes and opposition to gay marriage
recognition. Well, one of the activists promoting the boycott of
the fast food restaurant ended up spending New Year’s Day at a
football game with its president, Dan Cathy. Today,
he blogged about his experience and how engaging with the
businessman went a lot further to advancing his pro-gay aims than
the heavily politicized boycott that pretty much backfired. The
company has stopped donating to organizations with anti-gay aims
(they were only a small part of the company’s actual donations
anyway, despite the “millions of dollars” being tossed about) and
the activist’s group has suspended its boycott.

Should the Boy Scouts decide to end their ban – it may be
announced as early as next week – it will be a huge civil liberties
win pursued not through the government, but through voluntary
cultural engagement. It is a culmination of the efforts of
thousands – even millions – of individual actors applying pressure
when and where they can, not through legislative, executive, or
judicial declaration.