More and more Eagle Scouts return badges to protest policy banning gays
Bill DeVos, a Scoutmaster in upstate New York, packed up his Eagle Scout medal, badge and knot, and mailed the awards to the Boy Scouts’ headquarters in Texas. The 56-year-old father of two Eagle Scouts said he didn’t want them as long as the organization kept its ban on gay Scouts and leaders.
“It is not an easy thing to give up your Eagle. It sounds silly, but it’s very emotional, you know, if you’ve been in Scouts as long as most of us guys have … it just means a lot,” DeVos, an architect from Rochester, told NBC News. “But it’s more important for it (the badge) to do something good for others … I can look at it and be sentimental about it, but it’s what it does for others that means more.”
