Brigham Young University Adds Explicit Ban on 'Same-Sex Romantic Behavior' to Honor Code
Students say Brigham Young University is policing this behavior even more than its parent church does.
Brigham Young University administrators have put an explicit ban on “same-sex romantic behavior” in the school’s Honor Code, and students say it goes farther than the Mormon Church’s policy on same-sex relationships.
In 2020, BYU deleted a ban on “homosexual behavior” from the Honor Code, leading some LGBTQ+ students to celebrate. But soon afterward, the Church Educational System, which governs all the BYU campuses, clarified that the deletion didn’t mean “same-sex romantic behavior” was acceptable. Last month, it added the language prohibiting “same-sex romantic behavior” to the code.
“Though the ban had never really lost its effect, for some students the official restoration of it still felt like a gut punch,” Religion News Service reports.
The Honor Code tells BYU students to live “a chaste and virtuous life, including abstaining from sexual relations outside marriage between a man and a woman.” With the new language, it notes that “living a chaste and virtuous life also includes abstaining from same-sex romantic behavior.”
BYU is affiliated with the Mormon Church (officially known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), which opposes same-sex relationships. The church won’t perform same-sex marriages and expects the faithful to refrain from sexual activity with members of the same gender. It also opposes gender transition, and church leaders have said that LGBTQ+ activism comes from Satan.
But some BYU students say certain LDS congregations look the other way when a member is dating someone of the same sex, while the college is policing dating relationships.
“Depending on where you are, who your religious leaders are, you can actually date people of the same sex with very little church repercussions,” BYU student Gracee Purcell, president of the RaYnbow Collective, a group for the college’s queer students and alumni, told Religion News Service. “At BYU, that usually gray line within the church is a hard line. Anything that they deem homosexual behavior, or same-sex romantic behavior, is not allowed.”
That “romantic behavior” could include dating, holding hands, or kissing. If a student engages in any of these, “as in years past, each situation will be handled on a case-by-case basis to help each student feel the love of the Savior and to encourage them to live their gospel covenants and university/college commitments,” says a list of BYU’s answers to frequently asked questions.
LGBTQ+ groups for BYU students and alums opposed the prohibition but said at least the school is being up front about its attitudes. “I’m just glad people can now finally see explicitly what’s happening,” Evelyn Telford, a vice president of Understanding Sexuality, Gender & Allyship, told the news service. “There’s no way to get around it that they are openly being discriminatory to queer students.” But it will make queer students feel more isolated and under scrutiny by others, she said.
The LGBTQ+ groups will continue doing their work, and the RaYnbow Collective will hold its annual off-campus Back-to-School Pride event in Provo, Utah, September 16. Provo is home to BYU’s main campus, and the school also has campuses in Idaho and Hawaii. Ensign College in Salt Lake City is governed by the Church Educational System as well.
Despite BYU’s anti-LGBTQ+ policies, queer students come to the university because of academics, family connections, or other reasons, Telford said. And some may not recognize they’re queer until they’re in college. That was the case with her, she said.
“It’s such a personal decision to be at BYU, and your sexuality shouldn’t mean you don’t deserve a place there,” she told Religion News Service.
Purcell added, “The lack of representation and the increase in religious and societal pressures won’t stop queer students from coming. But it will hurt them.”
I still don't see how it's legal for an accredited university to have rules prohibiting sexual activity of their students
Want to be a religious school? That's fine, but you won't be accredited to teach any Gen Ed classes. Have your catholic pastor school, or your rabbinical school, that's fine. But you won't be making those into general education colleges.
https://bycommonconsent.com/2022/03/04/how-much-federal-money-do-the-byus-receive/
Private, less about $275,000,000 in federal funds, sure.
I want a refund on my taxes. I shouldn't have to pay for this
Yeah, the anti-tax people kind of have a point sometimes.
A lot of taxpayer money gets funneled to bullshit.
I have absolutely no problem with tax dollars going to towards the Pell Grant. Giving money to kids for an education is awesome.
I have a big problem when that money is for an education at a private religious school that openly and actively discriminates against protected classes.
I mean, we should just do what has been proven to work around the world and make college free to everyone who can get in.
Well, that's just lunacy. How would private schools embezzle federal funds?
Some of the blue states are near there with community colleges. I agree the program needs to be expanded.
This part is a slippery slope that I don’t have a pithy hot take for. I wish I did.
I mean, do I really want to wait from 1776 or 1791 until 2013¹ for the state to mandate that all marriage license-issuing court clerks be required to issue marriage licenses to any unmarried pair of adults, even if the pair was assigned the same gender at birth?
Lots of Americans still resent that those clerks are funded by their tax dollars.
Get in line, I still want my money from the 2nd Iraq war. I was too young to vote against it and protested it. Yet to see my refund.
Hmm. I'm not sure if student aid should be counted there or not. Grants to the university itself should absolutely be forbidden, but if a student chooses to go there, should we deny them assistance? Maybe.
I feel, generally, that tax dollars should not go to private companies or institutions.
Lots of things people think are public are legally private. Most transit agencies, the people who print the US dollar, some state universities… etc.
Usually the bylaws of these private entities are formed to stipulate that the governor or someone picks the equivalent of the CEO.
If you're funded by tax dollars, you should be a public entity.
That way the work still gets done, but money isn't being wasted maximizing profit for owners.
I know. And I think that is a failed model. Of course if your goal is to make certain people rich it's a very successful model.
I’ve been parts of these discussions. There are certain things governments just can’t do the way they are currently setup.
An easy example I’m familiar with; some States’ rules are onerous enough that you couldn’t operate a transit system under them.
Sounds like a "problem" created by people with an interest in the state not performing that role. There are many ways to privatize a state asset.
No, it is an organizational problem. It is functionally the reason that startups tend to stagnate when bought out… even if the host company ‘leaves them alone’.
A really simple example for transit: due to past corruption and or pay-to-play issues, most states (especially Democrat states) have pretty firm procurement guidelines. There are exceptions for emergencies, but the usually require the Governor’s office to chime in and aren’t intended for day-to-day items. A threshold of $100k isn’t unheard of for a forced sole-source procurement. I don’t want to waive that rule for government in general, but a transit agency that you want to actually meets service needs to not be waiting on the Governor to do so.
That specific issue is obviously solvable with a rule change… the meta issue is that State governments tends to create rules/laws without understanding how it breaks things
I think one must be very credulous of the motives of politicians to accept that self-imposed state paralysis was an attempt to fight corruption and not an attempt to make the case for privatization more compelling. Neoliberal dismantling of state capacity has been a bipartisan goal for the last 50 years.
Who do you think makes money off of these ‘private’ transit agencies?
You aren't being very reasonable here. There is not a way to make everything public. At some point you need the private sector. Do you expect the state of Florida to start digging up silicon, to make ICs, to make cop walkie-talkies?
Where the lines are and how best to structure this stuff is always going to be a challenge. If nothing else because it doesn't lend itself to a first principles approach but instead an empirical one. We don't know which should be down inhouse and which should be outsourced until it is tried. We see huge successes and huge failures. I think you would agree that your sewage system in your area does work, I can assure you private sector built/designed/and does most of the maintenance for it.
Publicly-owned extractive industry is incredibly common. Publicly-owned utilities are incredibly common. Publicly-owned manufacturers used to be much more common, but still exist.
Not in any country you would choose to live in.
True.
Why do you think that might be the case?
I wouldn't mind living in Norway or Denmark, but to each their own, I guess.
The neoliberal consensus, mostly. The legalized corruption and graft of privatization.
Student aid should count. That's money that could go to students seeking education in state schools, not religious schooling. This is just like bullshit voucher programs stealing tax payer funded school funds to be sent to religious schools.
If kids or their parents want to go to church school, they can pay for it themselves. Not the tax payer.
Accrediting agencies in the US are privately operated, too. There's a layer of independent oversight between the Department of Education and the schools themselves.
Whether that's good or bad is far beyond my knowledge, but that's how it's legal. It's just one private organization giving a thumbs up to another private organization.
It's also not a great marketing move.
"Come to university but don't sleep around", na mate I'll go somewhere else.
Finding out who you are is the whole point of going to university, otherwise you might as well take an online course.
Idiots.
They don't want kids coming of age. They're a religion. That's stupidly normal for religions, to keep children as innocent as literal children for as long as possible. The only coming of age is supposed to happen on the honeymoon, because you know, that's not dangerously emotionally underdeveloped territory at all and totally never results in horribly incompatible people ending up forced together...
The parents are making the decision.
I understand what your getting at, but the point of going to a university is getting an education. All other activities are secondary to this. If you have other goals, you can do those just as easy without going into debt, and taking a spot from someone else.
It could be more than one thing. The point of me going to work is to make money but I can also enjoy the company of my coworkers.
I don't see what accreditation has to do with rules like this.
Religious grounds. If you don't like it, you don't have to go there. And it's private, so no federal funds that come with strings attached.
If a religion said black people are a sin and should be avoided… and then started a school with rules banning any contact with black folks, would you treat it the same? Religious grounds, private school, just don’t go there?
Wait, isn't that just BYU 30 years ago?
Exactly. We figured it that wasn’t right then in the same way this isn’t right now.
I forgot what Christian school did it but they banned interracial dating for a while as well.
I would.
They certainly shouldn't be receiving taxpayer money, but if people want to go to a place like that then they should be allowed to. If it teaches the material relevant to their discipline in a satisfactory way, I don't see why accreditation agencies should look past that.
If you sit at a table with 10 Nazis, there are 11 Nazis at the table.
The paradox of tolerating the intolerant...
I don't understand how your scenario fits this situation.
Take everything Nazis believe. Now just say it’s a religion. Now they start a school to spread their beliefs.
According to you, that’s totally ok… hence the statement.
The paradox of tolerance to a T
Well first off, we're not talking about Nazis.
An accreditation agency shouldn't be the ones who dictate what is done by colleges beyond academics. They're not accrediting 'social acceptance.' They're accrediting academic merit.
"Yeah they have a great x program, but we're not going to accredit them because of their rules against same-sex PDA."
This is just you being upset that everyone isn't on board with censoring those you don't like.
What is the difference between discriminating against blacks or Jews or women vs discriminating against gay people?
Being gay is not a choice. Someone liking people of the same sex is no more controllable than you liking members of the opposite sex. Do you actively choose to like women and dislike men (or vice versa if you’re a women)? Are you saying someone could tell you something and somehow convince you to find men attractive?
This isn’t censoring an opinion, this is basic human rights.
Lol, I don't think you're arguing with the right person.
None of what you're telling me is new. You're just ignoring my point and saying something.
None of this has to do with academic merit, which is what accreditation agencies are for.
You brought up accreditation. I just asked if it should be allowed.
Here’s the theoretical: someone makes a religion based on Nazi values and makes a new school that teaches those values and enforces it too (so no Jews, Christians, gays, etc. and students and faculty cannot associate with said people).
Should that be allowed? I’m not asking if it should be accredited or not. Just should it be allowed. ie you are made ruler of the world and you get to decide if that should be accepted practices the the culture, values, and practices of the world you rule.
Should it be allowed, like, legally? Absolutely. As long as it isn't receiving public money, they should be able to conduct their private business with who they want.
Do I like it? No. But just because I don't like something doesn't mean it should be forbidden.
And there in lies the paradox of tolerance… which ultimately leads to the intolerant taking over.
So if a private university teaches proper math classes, and also has a mandatory training class on war and tactics for establishing a non-white ethnostate, you'd be cool with people going there?
Shit with you in charge, the Nazis just needed to provide good education in the concentration camps and it'd be above board, wouldn't it?
Sorry, I'm not going to entertain that hypothetical.
Keep believing what you want to believe. This has gotten old.
Unlike Baylor where they get federal funds but ignore federal rules anyway.
We talking about the Baylor football rapists?
https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/2023/08/11/us-affirms-baylor-exempt-protecting-gay-students-harassment
BYU should never receive any federal funds at all, in fact, they should be paying the government taxes.
Religion is disgusting
The church robs your parents with intense pressure to donate too much with the expectation you'll just end up at BYU. Lots of people are there because it was their only realistic option
Yeah, which is why nobody should support Mormonism.
no need to do the whataboutisms here, just jump to the logical 'all religion is bad, m'kay'. it really is a nasty vestige of humanities upbringing... like slavery, but with more steps.
In "Thus Spoke Zarathustra," by Friederich Nietzsche, the "prophet" went into the forest to meditate on the death of god, and met a monk. He spoke to the monk, and only after leaving did he contemplate: "Has he not realized that god is dead?"
He never told the monk. He lets him believe what he wants, because god is dead, and religion will die soon enough without ruining the lives of those who depend on it - those who cannot accept the truth.
Nietzsche also said that many "should not read my books, if they can." The realization of god's non-credibility cannot be forced, one must come upon it on their own...
i am realizing now one of my favorite ideals (not sure where i heard it) seems derived from that; 'you cannot logic someone out of something they did not logic themselves into'
Jonathan Swift appears to have authored its first incantation in 1721:
If they don't want to have rules that our society finds acceptable they don't have any right to just exist. This isn't a person were talking about they are an education institution. A school cannot by definition have a religion because it isn't a person. I don't particularly care if the people wo made the school are themselves religious; that should not give them the right to use their new founded institution to enforce those beliefs on other people. If you want to teach people I think you should be held to certain standards, and one of those standards is that you shouldn't restrict the freedom of your students.
Having sexual morality rules is absolutely restricting their freedom. People have a right to privacy that such rules inherently violate.
Federal funds go there and even if they didn't they are still tax free.