Their stated goal is what you say.
That is your (rather fanciful) interpretation.
What the ACLU does is defend CIVIL LIBERTIES. They have often sought to defend those with whom they themselves were not in agreement but who they felt were being unjustly or illegally targeted for discrimination. Most commonly they do this for unpopular individuals, groups, & causes. Generally speaking, unpopular people require defending most often because, whereas they are often within their rights legally, they are nevertheless unpopular for reasons which may include race, ethnic background, status, ideology, or other belief.
Popular groups & individuals rarely experience significant bad effects socially as a result of having been targeted for discrimination. Amazing how that works.
And a blessing on muslims everywhere, whether cab drivers or no. Mazel Tov!
Mark A. Baker
The ACLU was founded to defend Civil Liberties and perhaps in their earlier days that is what they did but in their present form it is a radical left wing group. Their activities tear down traditional American groups such as the Boy Scouts by denying them public funding.
THE BOY SCOUTS - I will use the Boy Scouts because they best illustrate what the ACLU is all about. They are on a crusade to make life difficult for the Boy Scouts for two reasons: #1 the Boy Scouts, ever since its founding has required that a boy believe in God and #2 they want one's sexual orientation to be kept a private matter if a boy or a Scout Master is gay, i.e. don't ask, don't tell. They are doing this to try and uphold a particular standard of conduct on which the Organization was originally founded more than a hundred years ago. The ACLU insists that those who do not believe in God or who are openly gay be allowed to take part in the Boy Scouts even if they do not believe in these two platforms of scouting and insist of making it an issue.
For years now, they have fought the Boy Scouts by cutting off their funding, restricting where they can hold their meetings or hold their camp outs and by doing everything they can to make life difficult fot them. The ACLU is of a mindset that they are enforcing the constitution and supporting people's civil liberties by going after the boy scouts. There seems to be no recognition or care that this group has been a major factor in building up the character and moral fiber of men over many generations, not to mention teaching them many key survival skills. I think the good which an organization has done should be taken into account before a sustained attack against if is launched.
The Boy Scouts is just asking that a boy profess a belief in God and if he is gay, just don't bother mentioning it. If a boy does those two things he will be fully accepted into the group. If a Scout Master is gay, he must keep it to himself or he will be removed from his post. The issue is that the Boy Scouts are founded on certain principles and want to keep those in their current bylaws. The Organization has done a lot of good for a lot of boys over many generations. I can appreciate that a gay or athiest Scout would not want to have to lie about who they are when they first join. This is a non optimum state of affairs. There are several options which can be taken, non of which is 100% optimum.
1. A boy lies in the beginning, says he believes in God when he does not, and just doesn't mention his sexual persuasion. He's in and enjoys the full benefits of Scouting.
2. The boy insists he does not believe in God or makes his gayness known and he is not admitted.
3. A special branch of Scouting is started for gay and/or aethiest Scouts.
4. The current Boy Scouts alter two major planks of their platform to accomodate gay and/or aethiest Scouts.
5. The Boy Scouts is shut down.
None of the options is an ideal solution, they all have a downside to them. No one is going to start a gay and aethiest scouts so #3 is not realistic. If scouting closes down, neither gays, atheists, believers nor straights will benefit from scouting so #5 must be avoided.
It condenses down to either major changes being made in the organization, individual boys being completely denied scouting or being able to rise to Scoutmaster or individual boys telling a white lie when joining and then benefiting from scouting.
Another factor is that the Cub Scouts start at age 8 before a boy knows his sexual orientation or knows whether he believes in God and at even age 11, when Boy Scouting starts, most boys still may not know their sexual orientation of know whether they believe in God. Certainly, if a boy says he believes in God or does not broadly announce he is gay at age 11, I do not think he will be severely damaged emotionally or psychologically. As he ages, he may change and he is allowed to do so as long as he keeps those changes to himself.
The ACLU wants either #4 or #5. They are not insisting on directly shutting down scouting but they attack them by cutting off their access to public funding and restricting the areas where they can opertate from. Has society really benefited from the ACLU enforcing their views on scouting? All of these supposed benefits of their existence are merely assumed to be of value when in actual fact many of their activities have harmed society.
Just remember this, the funding they would cut off will make it harder for scouting to operate and leads towards a total close down of the Boy Scouts. The ACLU fights hard and incessantly to keep public funding from the Boy Scouts. They never mention anything of all the good which the Boy Scouts have done in the past. They want it to either bend its knees to them and change their bylaws or have their costs of operation increased to the point where they are forced to close down What is the return benefit to society for this unrelenting and continuous legal action of denying funding, meeting sites and camp sites to scouting? I see no tangible benefit to society at all. If some benefit to society existed in the ACLU's actions, I would support them but I just do not see any real positive tangible benefit.
If the Scouts are closed down, our society will suffer a great loss. The boys in question, atheists and gays, will not be able to partake of scouting anyway because it will now be closed down so why not allow the 90% of the boys to enjoy the benefits of scouting and inconvenience the 10% somewhat and then let them enjoy the benefits too? Why deny it to 100% of boys in the guise of supporting civil liberties and upholding the constitution?
SPEAKING OF UPHOLDING THE U.S. CONSTITUTION - Added May 23rd - Speaking of upholding the constitutiion, the U.S. Constitution assigns the safeguarding of our borders to the Federal government. The Federal Government, whether Democrats or Replublicans are in power refuse to do it because they are afraid it will cost them millions of votes. The Federal Government is not following the constitution and people living on the borders are paying a heavy price for this. Per the ACLU's mandate, they should be down their in the border states representing the civil liberties of the disenfranchised citizens whose land and homes are been pillaged and robbed. Is the ACLU down there doing their jobs? No, of course not, those landowners down there are white, they have money and are part of the system. As per Mark, they are a popular group and are not being discriminated against. THE ACLU VIEW ON THEM IS "THE HELL WITH THEM, THOSE WHITE FAT CATS WHO OBEY THE LAWS, THEY DO NOT DESERVE OUR SUPPORT TO PROTECT THEIR CIVIL LIBERTIES! That is not part of our agenda to protect white fat cats, "red necks", Christians (or whatever they are labeled)".
I hate to use something from Hubbard; on most threads on ESMB I would be tarred and feathered, maybe not on this one - we'll see. The ACLU is tending towards rewarding the downstats and ignoring or making life difficult for the upstats. I think Huubard was right in saying that rewarding Downstats begets more Downstats. A couple more generations of this kind of thinking and our beloved U.S.A. will go the way of the Roman Empire, exist for a while longer in an altered form and then disappear completely. If we go, then who will fight the challenge of the next powerful group who arises, the next Nazi like challenge. The Aussies are the only ones with the balls to do it but they just do not have the population or a large enough economy to replace the USA as a world leader if the USA goes down the tubes. If you look to Europe for leadership and defense, you are being very naive. That is a culture of short work weeks, taking lots of vacations, visitng lots of museums and art galleries and letting the Government take care of your needs.
Lakey
