By David Futrelle
Men’s Rights Activists claim to care a lot about the sexual abuse of boys. And they do, to some extent — at least so long as the perpetrators of that abuse are women. Any time news breaks of a female teacher having an “affair” with a male student, you can expect to see multiple posts in the Men’s Rights subreddit about it.
When the abusers are male, though, MRAs aren’t much interested. Last week, NBC News reported that
The Boy Scouts of America is considering filing for bankruptcy in part because insurance companies are balking at paying settlements to almost a dozen men who claim they were sexually abused as boys by a notorious scoutmaster.
The news inspired several discussions in the Men’s Rights subreddit. But there was no real anger at the organization for its decades-long failure to protect the boys in its charge from predatory scoutmasters, leading to literally thousands of cases of abuse.
Indeed, most of the commenters in these threads — apparently not bothering to read past the headlines of any of the articles linked to — seemed to have missed the main reason for the potential bankruptcy filing altogether, and instead convinced themselves that whatever financial troubles the BSA is having stem from the group allegedly kowtowing to evil feminists by opening the doors for girls to join — and leading membership to plummet. (Never mind that membership in the Boy Scouts first began to decline in a big way in the early 1970s, nearly a half century before the group first started admitting girls.)
“As an Eagle Scout, it was sad to see the BSA fizzle to extinction,” complained a Men’s Rights Redditor called VaultGuy1995.
The heads of the BSA succumbed to the push of the feminists and now it probably won’t ever come back. If I have sons I wanna teach them as much scouting stuff as I can, because the BSA no longer has their best interests at heart.
As opposed to the days when sexual abuse was rampant in the organization?
Others were blunter, suggesting that feminists see the possible collapse of the BSA as a “Mission Accomplished!”
“I’m sure that was the goal from the start; no environment for men,” rooster-one4 agreed.
“Whatever feminism and sjw culture graces automatically disintegrate,” someone called perplexedm sniffed. “It is a great way to destruct organized, positive structures and bring in anarchy.”
“Feminists officially eroded Boy Scouts,” TheShShCreature added sarcastically. “Nice job.”
“Get woke, go broke,” declared frankattack1.
Very sad, but unfortunately things are going to get worse before they get better.
We started with two decent organizations, Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts. Soon we’ll have neither. Progress.
(Of course, not all Men’s Rights Redditors think it would be such a tragedy if the Girl Scouts were to fold. “I thinks it’s dangerous to teach young girls self esteem and leadership skills,” someone called GreyStomp remarked in response to frankattack1’s lament.)
A few commenters went so far as to suggest that the real problem with the Boy Scouts today is that they are too vigilant in trying to protect boys from predators.
“[A]ll the changes to prevent lawsuits made it that much harder to have the basic scout program,” complained someone called vinyardmike, who said he was a former scout and scout leader.
No more on on one contact means a scout leader can’t give a scout a ride home and a scout leader can’t wait with that one last scout for his parents to pick him up after an event.
These days, he continued, the “organization … treats all leaders as pedophiles.”
“[T]he regulations that one needs to pass to become a leader [have]increased,” added someone called goodfoobar, “meaning that it has become that much harder to find new leaders.”
Possibly. But these rules also make it harder for sexual predators to find Boy Scouts to abuse. And given the exceedingly poor track record of the Scouts on this issue that seems just a teensy bit more important.
Maybe it’s just me, but complaining about rules put in place to protect boys from sexual predators really doesn’t seem like the best way to protect boys from sexual predators.
This is hardly the first time that MRAs have shown a distinct lack of interest in protecting boys from male predators. In October, after former Iowa youth basketball coach Greg Stephen pled guilty to multiple child exploitation and child porn charges after admitting to sexual exploiting some 400 boys, I discovered that there had never been even a single post in the Men’s Rights subreddit about this exceedingly disturbing case. Had a woman done the same thing there would have been hundreds of posts.
It’s almost as though MRAs aren’t so much interested in protecting boys from predators as they are in using cases where predators are female as an excuse to rail against feminism and women in general.
We Hunted the Mammoth is independent and ad-free, and relies entirely on readers like you for its survival. If you appreciate our work, please send a few bucks our way! Thanks!
Can’t have girls believing their people and teach them confidence. It’lll lead them to read, have thoughts, ideas and make choices that aren’t in men’s best interests. I wish that was irony from them..
But that last statement is tragic and disheartening. They claim they’re for family and traditional values but couldn’t care about male victims of abuse… when they use those same victims and statistics whenever feminists bring up abuse.
I’m an Eagle Scout and Assistant Scoutmaster myself. The safety regulations aren’t even all that stringent. All I had to do as far as training goes is do an online youth protection training that takes about an hour and lasts for two years. Head Scoutmasters might have to do a bit more, I’m not totally sure, but I doubt it’s anything incredibly taxing. The actual practical rules aren’t that difficult, either. The big one is that you’re not allowed to have just one adult present with Scouts, which I think is more than fair. It can be a little annoying at summer camp when you’ve got a Troop without many Scoutmasters, but it’s not really that difficult to get everyone divided up properly.
Uh, Dave, I don’t know the exact date it happened, but when I was a teen girls were allowed to join Boy Scouts. I don’t know that they did in large numbers, but there certainly were girls in Boy Scouts in the 70s, at least in the area where I lived (Oklahoma, so not a hot bed of progressivism). I think the move into Boy Scouts has been large lately, at least from the news I’ve seen, but I know there was a huge discussion of this issue back in the 1970s, when I was in Girl Scouts.
Wait, what? The BSA have been sued enough times they’re at risk of being unable to afford insurance anymore?
@iknklast – Your experience is probably down to the fact that the BSA is extremely decentralized. Individual troops have a huge amount of autonomy and can basically do whatever they want. (In some ways this is good, but the notorious lack of oversight is partially why this predator was able to operate undetected for so long. Less seriously, there’s also a problem with general quality control.)
Funny how none of these urinal cakes want to put the blame for the whole scandal where it actually belongs: On the heads of those who knew about the abusers and still let them have access to the kids.
And how about also learning to distinguish between molesters and queer scout leaders?
Too obvious, I guess.
Also:
Awww, that’s so cute. A catchphrase that sucks ass and actually makes no sense! What’s the corollary? “Stay asleep, be a creep”? Still won’t make you any richer, fool. Being “politically incorrect” actually carries zero benefits, unless maybe you count the ugly pleasure of being mean to people you see as being lower on the pole than you.
Including kids who are too young and small to fight back or even put a name to what’s going on.
Seems appropriate.
Now, I may be no expert on how the Scouts operate
But I’m pretty, awfully positiveit hasn’t got a thing to do with women wielding hate
Barely a note of the real issue with mental health on the line
Still the long-uncaged MRAs dodge logic in a long haze and blame the wrong thing for decline
Now, I’m no professional when it comes to raisin’ kids
But I’m really, soundly sure that sudden molestation ain’t a thing one should claim to have did
Some say it’s a distraction to ensure the kids are safe and sound
And I’ll briskly say right here when I have the company’s ear that’s not someone I wanna be around
Blast off into nightly stars
Come back covered in sad, sad scars
Nothin’ a kid should go through
Excuses made, excuses passed
Usin’ stereotypes as a discussion’s ballast
That’s what they choose to do
God, I say, I’m through
@Troubelle:
Ever heard of David Hahn, the radioactive boy scout? This young man tried to build a mini nuclear reactor in his mother’s house! He had earned the Boy Scouts’ Atomic Energy badge, which was swiftly discontinued after David managed to irradiate his neighborhood.
Here’s my inept ode to his memory:
David Hahn was a fresh-faced teen Boy Scout
Whose enthusiasm for splitting the atom, wasn’t ever in doubt.
Geiger counter in hand,
He scoured his native Michigan land…
For radioactive rocks
And especially old radium-dial clocks.
He came to a tortuous forty-something sad end,
Alcohol poisoning, not on the mend.
See, I can write verse, too!
I think it’s the Xanax and gin and tonic my system is awash in right now. I’ll quit while I’m behind.
@Dormousing_it
I’m quite aware of the fellow–read of him in a Bathroom Reader when I was a tyke, and watched a bit on YouTube about him more recently.
“I think it’s dangerous to teach young girls self esteem and leadership skills” is also the statement that Dwight Schrute made to Toby from Human Resources when he asked Dwight to buy some of his daughter’s Girl Scout cookies *in exchange for* a good employee review. (The Office)
I shuddered when Dwight said it, but if you watch The Office you’ll know that he’s the backward troglodyte. Methinks that the sentiment — if not the word-for-word statement — must be common AF among the lady-haters.
@Dormousing_it
I do radiation protection for a living. As a result I’m a bit more cavalier about the handling of radioactive materials than the general public. Because I know what is safe and what isn’t.
This guy knew enough to be dangerous and not enough to be safe.
Maybe the BSA should get itself bought out by the Catholic church? They manage to stay in business.
@Talonknife:
Hell, that makes sense even without taking abuse into account. With a single adult, what if they’re incapacitated?
@ Moggie
Good point about a sole adult becoming incapacitated, not a good time to find out if the Scout is up to date on first aid.
We seem to have a successful Scout movement in the UK, with waiting lists for most troops. And they’ve been co – ed for about twenty years or more as far as I know. And safeguarding is taken very seriously.
‘Go woke go broke ?’ Piffle !
If only the Catholic Church could be bankrupted as well.
OK, now that I’m no longer under the influence of anything…I was a Girl Scout once, and I don’t remember anything in the way of leadership or self-esteem being taught.
We did the stuff to earn the badges and we did seasonal crafts.
OFC, we sold cookies. We went to Girl Scout camp in the summer, and hiked, and learned about fire safety. The adults at the camp forbid us to RUN. Liability issues, I suppose. You try getting a bunch of children not to run.
Of course this was circa 1978, and just because I don’t remember it, doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. It could be the leadership and self-esteem were soft-pedaled to us when we were earning the badges, and I was too young to realize it.
The only badge I still have is one I got when I was a Brownie. All it has is ’76 on it. I guess it was some patriotic thing, for the American Bicentennial. I don’t remember.
BTW, the 70s uniforms sucked.
Yeah, between video games and the internet, I think the Scouting movement in general has a bigger problem then female membership (which is actually the opposite of a problem, in fact it’s only invigorating what was a sad, dreary paternal organization).
I can’t speak for the American counterpart, but I was a Cub Scout in Canada for three years. Reminiscing on it now, I certainly had a lot of fun with my schoolyard chums playing dodgeball and this circle key game thing which I’m sure has a name, but we just called it “the key game”. But if there was any reason I didn’t continue, it was because none of my friends were, and being the anxious kid I was, didn’t feel like having to make new friends with total strangers who probably went to different schools than me.
Hitting my tween years didn’t help either.
Yeah, got some fond memories of it. I will say this though: it was verrrrrrry colonial. I mean straight-up “pledge to serve God and Queen Liz, then sing God Save The Queen” kind of colonial. While we didn’t really go that far, it’s still part of the Cub scout pledge that you have to honour God and the Queen, as Lord Baden-Powell intended. While our meetings always took place in the basement gym of our school, any special functions that needed more space were always done at a nearby Anglican church. Of course, I had no inkling of any of that; I just wanted to earn merit badges and play dodgeball. It’s only in retrospect do I recall how strangely doctrinaire it all was.
And of course there was Cub Camp. Taking the trip up north in Baloo’s pick-up truck, singing “I Saw The Sign”. Sometimes I miss the 90s.
I forgot to mention…maybe 40 years ago, leadership skills and self-esteem weren’t yet being taught in the Girl Scouts. The 70s weren’t a child-centered time in the US, and maybe the adults were worried we’d all grow up and burn our bras.
I know the bra-burning is a myth.
@Moggie– The BSA was practically a Mormon organization until very recently.
https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/05/09/609697466/mormon-church-will-sever-ties-with-boy-scouts-create-own-youth-program
@Nequam
I’d argue that the Mormons breaking off is a bigger contributor than feminists or abuse cases.
I remember my parents being relieved when I didn’t want to be a Cub Scout in the 1960s. I remember three things put me off. Firstly, I didn’t want to promise to “love God”, something I couldn’t honestly do. Secondly, the local scouts seemed very middle-class to me, as a painfully class-conscious working-class kid (this was when I was still ashamed of my background). Thirdly, although one didn’t hear the word paedophile in those days, kids were aware that there were creepy guys to avoid, and that they tended to be P.E. teachers, priests, or scout masters. It kind of amazes me, looking back, that all kids knew this.
I was a Boy Scout back in the late 60’s… for about a month. We went on campout and we threw the scout master’s sleeping bag in the lake. They disbanded the troop (so what if the scout master was still IN the sleeping bag….???)
A Scout is:
TRUSTWORTHY
LOYAL
HELPFUL
FRIENDLY
COURTEOUS
KIND
OBEDIENT
CHEERFUL
THRIFTY
BRAVE
CLEAN
REVERENT
I can comfortably say I am all of these things… though (obviously) not due to the boy sprouts….
@ Dormousing:
Nuh-UH!! One of my friends’ first tattoo is of a burning bra!!!
“Clean”? Kids? That’s unnatural!
One of the things I remember about “Clean” was how much emphasis was placed on avoiding sexual (especially gender-nonconforming) contact….
“Clean” = “cis-hetero, abstinence until marriage”….
….
Also no dancing and no makeup.
No, wait, that was the fundamentalist church, not the boy scouts.
HMMMM…
https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/21/opinion/sunday/why-do-we-teach-girls-that-its-cute-to-be-scared.html