J.L. Tarr, a US Chief Scout Executive in the 1980s, was quoted in an article regarding sexual assault cases against Scout leaders across all 50 states: “That’s been an issue since the Boy Scouts began.”
Some secrets aren’t so secret. There were some things people just didn’t want to talk about publicly until now.
At least it’s only BSA that is going under. The local scouts and the worldwide organization are all separate institutions, so scouting will go on.
As a former Boy Scout and Cub Scout, I can recall the leaders of our group, both male and female, being a bit off. I did learn a lot of great skills and earned a fair amount of badges. It’s not a time in my life that I regret, necessarily. However there wad more than one scout leader that gave me the heebie-jeebies. I don’t know how else to put it apart from the sense he just seemed off.
Had the same experience at a Christian summer camp where the counselor, who was at least 10 years older than us ( we were around 10 years old) felt it humorous to do puppet shows with his genitalia and invite us to partake. The girls at the camp shared similarly creepy stories about their female counselors.
It’s just a matter of common sense that if you are attracted to, or have perversions towards, a certain group of people you gravitate towards them and are going to find opportunities to put yourself in their lives. Thank God I didn’t have any traumatizing experiences, apart from my bunkmate barfing all over my sleeping bag.
Are the scouting programs that exist in Taiwan (at TAS for example) directly connected to the American groups by affiliation? Or are they (like the banks here) kind of like a local franchise that just use the name?
Good question. The uniforms seem a tad different, they tend to work with/through local schools (greater accountability), and the TW leaders I personally know are outstanding and of impeccable character.
Not directly. BSA and Scouts of China (I know) are separate organizations but are affiliated with the World Organization of the Scouts Movement.
Funny, the mayor of Keelong is the chairman and Tsai Ingwen is “Chief Scout.”
It looks like the WOSM recognizes one national scouting organization, so if the BSA is really gone another group may take its place.
Edit: It looks like BSA is filing Chapter 11, so they aren’t liquidating everything. I was thinking they’d lose their assets and trademarks, but that’s not the case.