XPost: alt.society.liberalism, sac.politics, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh
XPost: alt.politics.homosexuality

"Leroy N. Soetoro" wrote in message news:XnsAA47B67F8869E6F089P2473@202.81.252.44...

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/alvin-townley-boy-scouts-extraordinary-impact-on-america-calls-us-to-consider-risk-of-litigating-it-to-death

Unfortunately, for many people today, it is the saddening and shocking revelations of sexual abuse that now rank first in their impressions when
it comes to Scouting. As an Eagle Scout and as a father, this not only
breaks my heart, but it infuriates and sickens me that young people have
been harmed by those willing to exploit this altruistic and important program.

Lord Robert Baden-Powell, the founder of the Scouts, was a fag and a
pedophile. Tim Jeal's "The Boy-Man", a 1990 biography, details
Baden-Powell's attraction to, and likely affairs with, teenage boys, as well
as his fondness for nude boy photos and requirements that Scouts in his care should bathe outside naked. When Baden-Powell died, his family promptly
burned his voluminous collection of photographs. Today he would have made
the top ten on a sex offenders registry list.

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/119802.The_Boy_Man http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/20/opinion/scoutings-gay-founder.html

"Baden-Powell, the founder of the scout movement, liked to look at photos of nude schoolboys with his friend, a schoolmaster and keen amateur snapper of
his pupils. This seemed perfectly natural to them, part of the healthy
outdoor life. Now they would get into serious trouble." https://www.theguardian.com/society/2002/may/28/childprotection

Scouting -- which Baden-Powell referred to as a "character factory" -- was a regiment to inculcate a deeply conservative, secular Christianity that
espoused a defensive nationalism, racial intolerance, and sexual
prohibitions. Scouting would turn out real men who would maintain the status-quo, and not challenge prevailing social standards. When World War I erupted Scouting was seen as the breeding ground of good soldiers.

As World War II began Baden-Powell's repulsive political and racial
attitudes, which inform the history of Scouting but are clearly separate
from it as well, became even more evident. In 1937 Baden-Powell was eager
for the scouting movement to establish official ties with Hitler youth
groups. In 1939 he noted in his diary: "Lay up all day. Read Mein Kampf. A wonderful book, with good ideas on education, health, propaganda,
organization etc. -- and ideals which Hitler does not practice himself."

While the Boy Scouts today are certainly not a neo-Nazi group, nor as paramilitary as they were in the past, many of Baden-Powell's original ideas still remain -- especially those that inform how "real men" are made in the character factory.

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