Op-Ed

Salacious Scouts: Make new sex partners and keep the old

Sharon Slater President of Family Watch International
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I am a reluctant witness against the Girl Scouts. I was a Girl Scout myself, and I know of many honorable women who have devoted years of service to this program. But leaders, parents, supporters and concerned citizens need to know that something has gone very wrong with the Girl Scouts.

On March 1, while I was participating in the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) at the United Nations, I was asked to leave a closed-door, “girls only” meeting sponsored by the Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA). As soon as the meeting ended, I entered the room, and from a stack on the back table, picked up a booklet, “Healthy, Happy, and Hot,” produced by the International Planned Parenthood Federation (IPPF). I was stunned as I flipped through the pages.

This offensive booklet promotes sexual pleasure to teens. It includes such statements as:

Many people think sex is just about vaginal or anal intercourse. But, there are lots of different ways to have sex and lots of different types of sex.

The booklet encourages masturbation and talking “dirty” and depicts both same-sex and opposite-sex couples. It also tells HIV-infected teens that they do not have to inform their sexual partners they are infected.

That same day I reported in the “The Family Watch,” (the official newsletter of Family Watch International, where I serve as president) that this vulgar booklet was available to the girls in the meeting. Various news sources picked up the story, and the Girl Scouts promptly issued an official statement in which they denied that GSUSA had distributed booklets and suggested that they had been left by a previous group using the same room.

However, this was the first day of the conference, and the few groups that used the room before the Girls Scouts addressed topics completely unrelated to those in the booklet. Since we broke the news story, two young women who were at the Girls Only meeting have contacted me to report that they also saw the inappropriate eye-catching brochures on the table, as well as in the hands of several of the teenage participants in the Girl Scout meeting.

It is important to note that the Girl Scouts have never stated that they believe the booklet is unsuitable and highly inappropriate; they have just said they did not actively pass them out.  What they really need to do is denounce the booklet to come clean.

A few days later, Family Watch UN representatives, Carol Nixon and Lynn Douglas (Family Watch had a team of 30 volunteers monitoring UN meetings at CSW), attended another UN Girl Scout meeting, organized by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS), of which Girl Scouts of the USA is an official member. One of the panelists from the European Youth Forum boasted at this event about how they partner with International Planned Parenthood to reach children though non-formal education programs (such as the Girl Scouts) to teach acceptance of gays, lesbians and transgenders at an early age (WAGGGS is an official member of the European Youth Forum.)

Even more concerning, the WAGGGS Web site proudly states that for this UN conference they brought in “young people from more than 20 countries and every continent” and that their UN delegation at this conference included a support team of “10 Girl Scouts from Connecticut and Vermont.” The WAGGGS Web site also reported that their UN delegation demanded “sexual and reproductive rights,” which they defined to include “access to comprehensive sexuality education (The “Healthy, Happy, and Hot” booklet certainly would satisfy this demand) and sexual and reproductive health services, including . . . safe abortions.”

In a written statement submitted by the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts to the UN, WAGGGS called on governments to ensure, among other things, that

  1. non-formal education programs be instituted for the “sexual development of girls and young women”;
  2. young women be provided with “opportunities to be involved in the planning, delivering and evaluation of sexual education”; and
  3. that support be given to organizations that “provide safe spaces for girls and young women to discuss sex and sexuality free from discrimination.”

These activities and statements would indicate that the Girl Scouts of the USA has made a seismic shift and is now promoting the radical feminist agenda, which includes advocating for abortion and unrestrained sex.

The Girl Scouts new “Journeys” leadership program trains girls to become feminist activists and provides shining examples held up for young girls to emulate that include feminists, lesbians, existentialists, communists and Marxists. A comprehensive review of the “Journeys” program detailing the many inappropriate elements was done by Chelsea Schilling of WorldNet Daily. This is a must read for every Girl Scout parent.

While the GSUSA response denied any association with Planned Parenthood, it seems someone forgot to tell Kathy Cloninger, CEO of Girls Scouts USA, who admitted on NBC’s Today Show in 2004 that GSUSA partners with “Planned Parenthood organizations across the country to bring information-based sex education programs to girls.”

It’s very clear that the Girl Scouts have much more on their minds these days than cookies and campfires. Parents beware.

Sharon Slater is the mother of seven children (three recently adopted from Africa) and was selected as the 2007 Arizona Mother of the Year. She currently serves as the president of Family Watch International, a nonprofit organization that works to protect the family at the international, national, and local level. She is the author of the widely acclaimed Stand for the Family: A Call to Responsible Citizens Everywhere. Family Watch International invites you to join them in calling upon the Girl Scouts of the USA to renounce their association with Planned Parenthood and withdraw from WAGGGS by going to http://www.standforthefamily.org/