Critic of Boy Scouts Gay Ban Gains Eagle Scout Badge

A Maryland youth who put his Boy Scouts membership on the line last year when he spoke to news media about his homosexuality and demonstrated against the organization’s then-prohibition of gays received his Eagle Scout badge Monday, six weeks after the group officially opened its doors to gay youth, writes The Washington Post.

Pascal Tessier, 17, received the national nonprofit youth group’s highest rank Monday at a regular meeting of his longtime troop in Chevy Chase, Md. Activists on the issue believe he is the first openly gay Scout to receive Eagle status since the Boy Scouts of America’s new policy allowing homosexual youth took effect Jan. 1.

“It’s just really amazing, and it honestly hasn’t really sunk in yet. We didn’t know if it was going to happen at all,” the high school senior said. But he criticized the Scouts for maintaining a ban on gay adults serving as troop leaders, which will affect him when he turns 18 in August.