According to a story in the Salt Lake Tribune on August 8th,
“Brigham Young University’s intolerance of homosexual behavior should keep the private school out of the Big 12, a group of national LGBT advocacy groups says in a letter addressed to Big 12 commissioner Bob Bowlsby.”
This story comes at a time when Utah and the nation are in the process of wrestling with the meaning of religious freedom. Elder Ronald A. Rasband, speaking to BYU students in September of last year said,
“I suspect that for some of you the phrase “religious freedom” feels more like “freedom to discriminate” … We believe in creating a space for everyone to live their conscience without infringing on the rights and safety of others. When the rights of one group collide against the rights of another, we must follow the principle of being as fair and sensitive to as many people as possible. The Church believes in and teaches “fairness for all.”
DeShanne Stokes, writing in the Huffington Post on August 3rd, sees things quite differently: “religious freedom is not under siege. It never has been. Such debates are designed only to distract us, to redirect the flow and content of social discourse on terms favorable to the privileged. “
So where do the concepts of religious freedom and fairness for all come into play with this question, and is there a role for a community of common interest to play?
Let’s start with a basic understanding that in this country a person who has reached the age of legal majority has a right to have consensual sexual relations with another person of requisite age. Those individuals have the right to make that choice free of government interference. That’s about as elemental a part of “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” as I can imagine. Any given religious group may have views about the appropriateness of the act based on their understanding of God’s commandments, and are free to preach such to their adherents.
I assume we can also agree that an individual also has autonomy to make a decision to voluntarily forego that right, even if only for a specific period of time.
BYU students sign an Honor Code which includes a commitment to “live a chaste and virtuous life,” which is specifically interpreted by the University with regard to LGBTQ students: “Brigham Young University will respond to homosexual behavior rather than to feelings or attraction and welcomes as full members of the university community all whose behavior meets university standards. One’s stated same-gender attraction is not an Honor Code issue. However, the Honor Code requires all members of the university community to manifest a strict commitment to the law of chastity.”
This Big 12 letter brings up questions of “rights” in at least three directions: first, do the proprietors of a private university have the right to set behavioral standards that students seeking admission will be required to follow; second, does an individual student have the right to sign away personal freedoms as part of an Honor Code; and third, do outside groups have the right to seek to deny association by organizations of whose standards they disapprove with other professional groups? I think the answer to all three is “yes”.
So where does that leave us? The real point is to distinguish between what a person or group “can” do and what they “should” do.
Yes, the university can set its own behavioral standards, and stick to them. Additionally, though, what they should do is to be more vigorous and determined in their efforts to welcome as full and valued members of the university my LGBTQ brothers and sisters. There is ample opportunity to improve the current situation, to make a daily reality of the words contained in the explanation of the Honor Code.
Yes, an individual student can make a commitment to waive personal freedoms. Additionally, though, what they should do is to keep the commitments they have made. But can we honestly acknowledge that during the course of a four-year college career, an individual’s experience with what it means to be gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender or queer in identity and/or gender can evolve? And that a student who had willingly signed the Honor Code could come to decide that the right course for them, for example, would be to date someone of the same gender, and yet their opportunity to act with integrity could be limited by their ability, financial and otherwise, to transfer to another university with different standards of behavior for LGBTQ students?
Yes, an outside group can work to deny professional association of the university whose standards they dislike, and they can try to bring negative publicity to the school in an effort to change policy. What they should do is care more about the individual students than about generating headlines. If the students who want to leave the university and its honor code are assisted to do so, the students who remain presumably continue to desire to conform to that code and the outside group does not represent their desires.
I would hope the energy spent on press releases and boycotts could instead be turned to enabling individuals whose understanding of their lives and objectives have changed so that these persons can find access to the assistance and resources to change their circumstances.
Does it really matter who plays football with whom? If we hope to preserve a right or freedom for ourselves, we need to defend that right for others. Can we make the focus of our caring be the lives of individual young adults who are grappling with some of the most complex life decisions they will be called on to make, saving lives rather than scoring publicity points?
Tom Christofferson
Tom Christofferson lives in Salt Lake City and describes himself as a happy gay Mormon.
All posts by Tom Christofferson
I just don’t get this church messaging. Given prop 8 and other similar efforts, the church clearly is behaving as if religious freedom is freedom to discriminate. Given church behavior, statements like the one you describe have no credibility to me — and I’m a life-long member from a long line of Mormons. If I think the church is using religious freedom as an excuse to discriminate, it’s not at all surprising that mainstream Americans think so. In a pluralist society that only works when people respect the rights of others, people are going to push the church to do so. As a side note, I see no way that BYU can make LGBT students feel like full and valued members given the recent policy. Full and valued members get to baptize their kids.
Some good points here. But is putting pressure on institutions that are perceived to have discriminatory and harmful policies(acknowledging that they have the legal right to make those policies) only about publicity and scoring points? Or is it about trying to encourage and, yes, put some pressure on institutions into rethinking their positions? Is it wrong to use the court of public opinion to weigh in on the institution’s policies and not just allow a free pass because it happens to be private?
Augusta National had been an all-male golf club for 80 years. After much public pressure that often threatened to overshadow one of golf’s most prestigious tournaments – the Masters – this private club finally changed its policy and admitted women for the first time in 2012.
One reason society, including both public and private institutions, has been able to evolve with respect to civil rights and equality is because of pressure civil rights advocacy groups have brought to bear on institutions who lagged behind the rest of society. Without that pressure, including the tool of public opprobrium, where would we be today?
To respond to the opening post more directly: I think two things have to happen in order to relieve oppression/reduce discrimination — institutions (laws, policies, etc) have to change and people’s attitudes and interpersonal interactions need to change. One without the other doesn’t really work. It’s better to have a nice husband than a mean one, but even if he’s nice, it’s better to not be his property. It’s better to be a kind slave owner than a mean one, but it’s even better to not be a slave owner at all. The message I’m hearing from the church (and perhaps the post) is that the problem is that people aren’t being nice. If church members could just be taught to be nice enough, the problems would go away. I think that’s just not true — in part because existing policies limit how nice people can be. For example, we’ve all been raised, and raise our children to avoid evil influences, to be in environments where they can feel the spirit. How do you go from that messaging to telling a parent they should encourage their kids to make LGBT friends, and to hang out with them around the house. But, even if that’s not the case and everyone becomes perfectly nice, the underlying structures are still there. Slavery still exists. Women are still property. LGBT people are mandated to be celibate. I certainly think we should be kind and do the best with what we’ve got. But when what we’ve got feels like oppression, people of good will are going to act. That’s not religious persecution. That’s what has to happen for pluralistic societies to work. Finally, I don’t think we can assume that LGBT students at BYU are happy with the status quo. Life is complicated and people often end up in situations that aren’t perfect. I don’t stay in my job because I’m on board with everything my employer does. I respect the tone of the op. I think we’re way too into attacking and political posturing. I think civility is important. Taking care of people is important. But that’s only half the battle.
In the case of an lgbt identifying BYU junior, who no longer wishes to abide by the strictures of the Honor Code, and would rather continue their education at Stanford, are you suggesting that BYU should provide financial assistance to get this student enrolled, financial assistance to get this student moved to California, and financial assistance to make tuition, fees and living expenses comparable to the costs they would have had if they had stayed at BYU?
I have the same question as Michael 🙂
I’m trying to understand the overarching message of the article.
Are you saying that it would be better to work toward a goal of helping students find a way to exit BYU if their goals have changed than working to change BYU’s policy?
Because I do agree that it is VERY difficult for students to leave for all the reasons that Michael mentioned above. Especially mid-semester when rental contracts and such are involved.
And this would be a very interesting approach to the entire dilemma that I have never heard mentioned or discussed at all before.
I’m suggesting that those who are interested in LGBT BYU students’ welfare, could more directly impact their lives by, for example, working with the Point Foundation to create scholarships that would help students who no longer wish to sign the Honor Code transfer to other schools, than by trying to make sure BYU can’t play football with Texas Christian University.
Great discussion and interesting argument! However, some would say that it less about BYU enforcing people being chaste (the law of chastity) and more about (1) removing all forms of relationship if you are a gay LDS student (the honor code leaves open much of the definition of same sex “behavior”) and (2) the overzealous policing of the “more than chastity” policy.
Most people agree that people can be racist, even though legally they can’t discriminate by race. Yet, we cringe when the KKK voice their opinions in the name of religious freedom. Similarly, gay rights are legally provided, but BYU has chosen (and doesn’t discourage their students) to discriminate against gay people. When we allow and encourage every student to become their own policing force, we should not be surprised that some take on an ideology beyond what the LDS Church (and BYU) believe (think of a “community watch” person taking a prejudice too far, causing harm to someone because they are black). Yet, that is very similar to what BYU does.
When inside voices are labeled the voices of apostasy, and shunned and excommunicated, the only way to save the lives born into a hostile environment is through the voices from the outside.
As we have seen in similar instances, the church might not answer even one tenth of the demands, it always gives in a little.
Just as President Hinckley said in an interview that we don’t have women in the priesthood because the members aren’t agitating for it, we need to show the leadership that this issue is important enough to agitate for.
@Bitherwack, currently it will always be true that there’s no agitation into he church for female ordination. Anyone who starts to seriously agitate is ex’d.
I fear the same will be true with LGBT issues. People on the inside can’t effectively agitate for change, which is why we absolutely need pressure from outside organizations to open meaningful discussion.