BYU announces honor code changes

[deacon blues]

https://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/ ... b61da.html

"The changes come after students protested last spring for changes to the code and how it is enforced. Since then, BYU has released a handful of incremental changes, with the most recent update posted about two weeks before the start of the academic year."

I'm curious, does this mean gay students at BYU can hold hands now? It appears to mean that.

[Mormorrisey]

https://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/ ... b61da.html

"The changes come after students protested last spring for changes to the code and how it is enforced. Since then, BYU has released a handful of incremental changes, with the most recent update posted about two weeks before the start of the academic year."

I'm curious, does this mean gay students at BYU can hold hands now? It appears to mean that.

I will be curious about that as well. I suspect no, but we'll see. I think it will help those leaders be a little more compassionate who were leaning that way anyways, and conversely hardliners will just shake their heads and it will be business as usual. Leadership roulette here too.

[Brent]

The new handbook puts a great deal of weight on Bishops for "Membership Councils" and this Honor Code business seems to say "We'll take it care of it case by case" meaning that if you're careful and discreet you're going to be OK. My reasoning is that although being in a same sex marriage is verboten the rule seems to allow for discretion on the part of the Bishop--i.e. he isn't forced to act other than denying you a Temple Recommend...I think. This allows Bishops to turn their heads and keep families together without violence to the dynamic of the ward. I have yet to even hear a mumble about a married gay couple that is anything but helpful,loved by, and loving to the ward.

[Jeffret]

I'm curious, does this mean gay students at BYU can hold hands now? It appears to mean that.

They probably didn't mean to really imply that. Though at least one Honor Code Office counselor apparently stated that kissing was acceptable.

I suspect that it means that if one totally straight women gives another totally straight woman a kiss, that's not a problem. If she kisses back that might be a problem. And if two men give each other a kiss it's a major honor code violation.

[Hagoth]

https://www.heraldextra.com/news/local/ ... b61da.html

"The changes come after students protested last spring for changes to the code and how it is enforced. Since then, BYU has released a handful of incremental changes, with the most recent update posted about two weeks before the start of the academic year."

I'm curious, does this mean gay students at BYU can hold hands now? It appears to mean that.

I think they just made it fuzzier. They will handle things on a "case by case basis." Maybe that just means they can appear to be open minded but crack down as hard as they want behind the scenes. Kind of like how the November '15 policy was "removed" publicly, but really just offloaded to the local leader roulette wheel.

[Thoughtful]

This very shortly after several employers said they wouldn't recruit from BYU due to their LGBT stance.

[Just This Guy]

Purely speculation here:

Any posibility that BYU is getting unwanted attention from the Title 9 office or any major lawfirms? It looks to mee that they are working to setup a way to have their cake and eat it.

By removing the ban on homosexual behavior from the honor code, they can avoid the school looking bigoted*. However, they can still direct bishops to revoke the ecclesiastical endorsement. So the kids gets kick out of school, but BYU can now say: "Hey it's not us, we didn't do it. It was the bishop who did."

LDS Inc. throwing the low level leadership under the bus to get their way.


*Work with me here....

[RubinHighlander]

LDS Inc. throwing the low level leadership under the bus to get their way.

Why not! RMN threw god under the bus with the POX. Pushing all this down to the local level takes the heat off the top brass. But it could also cause some small fires that can potentially get bigger and create bad press. Local leader roulette will always have hard liners who get off on messing with the eternal destiny of members over these controversial things. I guess that's really nothing new though; In the past I've deal with local leaders Fing with my eternal blessings by making me wait longer that reasonably necessary for things like having my adopted daughter sealed to me and other things. What a sad unfunny joke!

[Jeffret]

By removing the ban on homosexual behavior from the honor code, they can avoid the school looking bigoted*. However, they can still direct bishops to revoke the ecclesiastical endorsement. So the kids gets kick out of school, but BYU can now say: "Hey it's not us, we didn't do it. It was the bishop who did."
...
*Work with me here....

Essentially, yes. Pragmatically, over the long run, the story may end up quite different.

I'm not going to discount any of the LGBT people explaining how the Church's / BYU's actions are like getting jerked around and repeatedly slapped in the face, gut, everywhere. That's certainly true.

The reason to have policies is to have clear, consistent expectations and responses. That's why the Church publishes the CHI. It's also why corporations and pretty much every sizeable organization does the same thing. Having the stated policy is the first step. The Church and pretty much all corporations and organizations still mess things up in writing good policies and enforcing them.

The Church could just make statements about how they don't like gays and transgender people, they think they're icky, and a threat to their way of life and beliefs. But, they want to control how they're treated. Without the policy, some local leader could just as well ordain a trans man, ordain a women, or marry a gay couple.

I think BYU's non-clarifying clarification really does clarify something about what's been going on. My semi-joking comment above was along these lines. BYU tweeted, "The Honor Code Office will handle questions that arise on a case by case basis. For example, since dating means different things to different people, the Honor Code Office will work with students individually." Keeping mind that they're not really trying to make things easier for LGBT students, what is this comment really about? I'm betting that they've been getting lots of students turned in for same-sex PDAs -- between straight students. Within the society in which BYU exists, some level of displayed affection is acceptable between women (and girls). Or between family members. So, if two women kiss, is that a prohibited same-sex kiss? Well, as BYU states, "dating means different things to different people". If the couple are dating, then maybe it is. If they're not, it might not be. Within the patriarchal society, physical affection between women is often considered acceptable or even titillating but physical affection between men is considered prohibited, unless it is accompanied by violence or severe situations (on the football field, thumping him on the shoulder, a tragic loss, etc.). BYU's prohibition on same-sex activity has been catching straights, who weren't supposed to be involved.

But, that problem goes the other way around, also. "Dating means different things to different people." When we were at BYU many years, it was amazing the number of (straight) couples that were "just friends" in the morning, engaged in the afternoon, and married in a couple of months. They weren't dating before, but suddenly they're engaged. Even for my wife and I it wasn't exactly clear what dating meant. We went on one date and then we started spending most of our free time together, including homework time, class time, and church time. We've done far more "dating", as in setting a time to do something together, after marriage than ever before.

Of course, the Honor Code Office will be inconsistent in how they apply the restrictions between straight and gay couples. Straight couples will allowed to not be dating until engagement, but gay couples will be ruled to be dating much more quickly.

But, if they start allowing some displayed affection between students of the same sex and some not-really-quite-dating same-sex couples, that moves the bar. And without a defined policy in place, it gets harder to enforce restrictions.

Pushing it to bishops allows the HCO to wash their hands of it, even if only officially. But it also leaves it open for bishops to be much more lenient. Some will also be stricter. Some bishops will be relatively accepting of anything except sex and marriage. If they accept that, then what is acceptable on campus shifts.

They're recognizing that they haven't been doing a good job of what they intended. They've struggled to discriminate in the correct way. This new approach of "We'll only kind of discriminate" won't really work for them any better, but it will provide better space for LGBT acceptance. The easiest solution is just not to discriminate.

[Jeffret]

A semi-related, illustrative anecdote.

I know a couple who were naturists from their teens, probably even before they knew the term. While students at BYU years ago, before they were married, they would undress and engage in non-sexual activities together. Someone turned them in to the HCO and they were called in to talk to their bishop about it. He talked with them and accepted that their activities were non-sexual and they weren't breaking the law of chastity. The HCO wanted to expel them. The bishop went to the HCO and told them that 1) they didn't have a policy against what these students had done, 2) the HCO had delegated questions of worthiness to the students' ecclesiastical authority via the endorsement, 3) he continued to endorse these students as completely worthy. The HCO backed down and allowed them to continue their education.

This was well before the HCO experienced such an increase in power, so I don't know if the situation would be the same these days. However, the HCO is also under greater scrutiny than it used to be.

Removing the policy from the HCO and delegating it to bishops mean they don't have control over it. Some students will have greater acceptance than the HCO would've allowed and the societal standard will shift, particularly among the students who are generally pretty accepting of LGBT diversity.

[moksha]

And if two men give each other a kiss it's a major honor code violation.

The scene plays out this way: Everything goes quiet on the entire campus as all eyes turn to the kissing couple. Then some elder at the back of the crowd yells, "Git a rope". A righteous mob gathers around the couple with wild eyes and frenzied expressions. They begin chanting, "The Honors Committee will hoodoo you, the Honors Committee will hoodoo you". Suddenly the scene starts spinning and you find yourself back in normality far from the BYU Campus.

[2bizE]

Do we know if these changes apply only to BYU? Do they also apply to BYUI and BYUH and LDSBC?

[Corsair]

My deeply cynical attitude is that BYU is making the Honor Code Office changes to keep everyone else in the NCAA conferences happy. Having other schools refuse to play BYU in major sports would dramatically hurt the image of the LDS church and ultimately it's bottom line with BYU college sports revenue. I am not certain that the HCO will actually change its functional operation very much.

Here is the test for BYU which will likely happen before the year is out. Same gender couples will start walking across BYU campus holding hands. Maybe they will have some chaste goodbye kisses. Will the HCO stop them? Will there be some reported violations? I am very interested in how this social experiment turns out.

[StarbucksMom]

This made msnbc news. From what I read there and here, gay couples can date and follow the same pre marriage rules as straight couples. I think this is a pretty big deal, and paves the way for more changes in the future. (yes some bishops will have a hissy fit, but what else is new?) Not sure how this got passed through, but it’s definitely a positive step forward.

[Jeffret]

I think this is going to be a positive step forward and long-term will be a big deal. I do think gays will be able to kiss and hold hands on campus and off. They may even be able to engage in NCMO (it doesn't explicitly violate the law of chastity and it doesn't lead to marriage). It's still dangerous and scary for gays to engage in these sorts of things, any sorts of PDA, even the simplest, in public and this will continue to be true in Provo and on campus, but I don't think they'll be jeopardized by the HCO and the police will generally do what they can to protect them.

The Mormon Church is very unusual among the anti-gay organizations. In spite of all they've poured into the fight, they've been pretty consistent that what concerns them is marriage and sexual intercourse outside of marriage. Their hate and their fear has some limitations. As best I can tell from the new CHI, that's basically what they're saying -- no marriage and no sex outside marriage, but otherwise gays can participate. Now, of course they want gays to not be gay and to try really hard to overcome their made-up same-sex attraction, but it ain't happening and they've kind of accepted it with the laws in Utah. The new HCO basically lines up with this also.

[oliblish]

Here is a youtube video of the changes explained by a BYU professor. "The honor code no longer prohibits that..."

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiVLml ... OiiBwpZQ2Q

[Red Ryder]

Saw this on MD&D

With all of the conflicting opinions on here and elsewhere, yesterday I called the Honor Code Office at 801-422-2847 and asked a nice lady named Kim if it was now okay for gay people to hold hands, kiss and date on and off campus. Kim told me the Honor Code Office has been flooded with questions about this and BYU’s position is that same sex kissing, holding hands and dating are not in violation of the Honor Code. If anyone is still confused about what this means then please call the Honor Code Office yourself at 801-422-2847. This should provide some clarity to all of the confusion surrounding this issue.