Perversion files released

[Twocubdad]

My point exactly, BSA24.

[AZMike]

All of this would never have happened if we allowed Boy Scout leaders to marry.

[Horizon]

SeattlePioneer - in terms of legal requirement to report, it depends on your state. In California, the list of Mandated Reporters is long:

 

http://www.cdss.ca.gov/cdssweb/entres/forms/English/PUB132.pdf

 

(Page 2 of the .pdf has the list). For Scouting, I would assume that this is the section that covers it:

 

"an administrator of a public or private day camp; an administrator or employee of a public or private youth center, youth recreation program, or youth organization; an administrator or employee of a public or private organization whose duties require direct contact and supervision of children;"

 

So any Council employee would qualify as a mandated reporter. One could also question whether the administrator of a private organization whose duties require direct contact and supervision of children would include any registered adult leader of a Scout organization.

 

The State of Washington has a much shorter list, and does not appear to include youth organization leaders:

 

http://www.dshs.wa.gov/ca/safety/abuseReq.asp?2

 

 

[SeattlePioneer]

Hello Horizon,

 

Thank you for the reference.

 

I would suppose that this law was passed recently and I would be surprised if it were around during any of the recently reported incidents.

 

 

Furthermore, I think it's obnoxious to have 25 pages of regulations making a wide variety of people responsible for making half baked reports.

 

That's California, I suppose, a good state to stay away from.

 

 

 

[Horizon]

Yes - the mandated reporter laws are another thing that has changed, much like the laws are molestation in general.

 

But who needs a law to know that they should bring in the police? Penn State is the perfect example of a place where someone should have called the cops, and there are some examples in the files where the police should have been called as well.

 

As the State of Washington site says - anyone who observes abuse SHOULD report, but there are some people who are REQUIRED to report. We SHOULDN'T need to spell it out, but the Bystander Effect requires it.

[Peregrinator]

But who needs a law to know that they should bring in the police? Penn State is the perfect example of a place where someone should have called the cops, and there are some examples in the files where the police should have been called as well.

 

Isn't there a difference between reporting abuse that one observes and reporting abuse that one suspects? From what I have read about the Penn State issues, there was no mere "suspicion" that Sandusky was abusing boys. It was actually observed.

 

I think some people do need mandatory reporter laws to tell them what to bring to the police. Furthermore these laws provide cover for health care professionals who would ordinarily be bound by confidentiality.

[Abel Magwitch]

BSA and local councils had no obligation to report such cases, and usually mostly has gossip to go on as evidence

 

Frankly, I'm not interested in reading the accounts of the details, so I'm going on comments made in the press and on this board

 

...It's not at all clear to me that BSA has any LEGAL obligation to report SUSPECTED cases of child abuse

 

I fail to see why BSA employees have such an obligation, especially when they probably have little or no direct knowledge or evidence in their possession

 

Ah, but when you read some of the reports, is becomes clear that the BSA did in fact have knowledge and evidence in their possession. But one has to read the reports to see it and believe it. The BSA was indeed culpable in many cases.

 

How about a person who admits to you that he molested a child? Some of the files from my council specifically have the signed statements from the perpetrator themselves - a confession if you will that they admit to doing the crime. By not reporting this to the authorities at the time, it makes one an accessory to the crime does it not? And even just from the ethical and moral standpoint - if an acquaintance tells you personally that he did something like molesting a child; raping an adult; committing homicide; etc. just to get it off his chest, dont you feel that you have an obligation to report this to the authorities? If you choose not to and the guy continues with his deviant behavior on others, were you right to remain quiet? I dont think so. And what if a Scout wants to confide in his leader that he did something pretty bad. Should that adult leader ignore it? No.

 

Its a shame that the BSA finds itself in this position. But those at the corporate level have made these decisions and now the situation has come into the spotlight. The BSA has already admitted it made a mistake. What more is needed that the BSA was wrong in this situation it now finds itself in?

 

[Papadaddy]

Who are those responsible? James West, Elbert Fretwell, Arthur Schuck, Joseph Brunton, Alden Barber, etc. They are all dead. Who was responsible for modern YP policy? James Tarr, Ben Love? All we can do is highlight the current policies, and do our best to enforce them. That means, that NO ONE will take shortcuts. Call every reference. Two deep ALWAYS, and no one-on-one...EVER. No matter how well we know the Scout and his family. No matter how inconvenient or ridiculous it may seem. If you are unwilling to do that, and be the face of that policy to fellow Scouters and parent, then you need to resign or be relieved.

[DeanRx]

The 3 things that make this bad for BSA:

 

1) The public perception that BSA was / is loose with their youth protection. Not being defended very well in the media by BSA national right now. The appology from the nations SE was a start, but they could have highlighted CHANGES to the YPG program that has made things better in the past 20 years... maybe even point out that this was 20-40 years ago and that in many of the cases, the PARENTS did not want to press charges. Even by today's standards and IF you are in a mandatory report state, how many leaders are going to go against a PARENT's decision?

 

2) BSA knew this was coming and let the files be released on the planfit's lawyer's terms instead of BSA's terms. Why not self desclose? Show the GOOD that had been done in keeping these adults away from leader positions? Pre-empt the bad spin with some good spin about HOW BSA has progressed and is a youth organization LEADER in screening, training, and acting on suspected / reported abuses!

 

3) No other DATA given !! So, the pervert files are released. WHY? not give data on HOW MANY great volunteers you have nationally? Show what little percent of offenders the total population block was and compare / contrast against OTHER youth organizations or society as a whole? Use METRICS to make your case. Use METRICS to tear down the misconception that BSA is full of would be molesters...

 

Did BSA national do any of this? Nope. They issued a statement saying, "we're sorry this happened." That needed to be done. That's a great start. But, there is much more that could (and should) be done to mitigate the negative perception scouting is going to get from this release.

 

Will this cause a drop in membership? Maybe. Will it force changes to addmitance policies? Maybe - I hear on these boards some Methodist churches are questioning their involvement as CO's because of this AND because of other membership standards. Only time will tell...

[BadenP]

 

The saddest scenario for me about this whole mess is I had some friends over for dinner the other night and in my den they saw some of the scouting awards I have received over the years, and a couple mentioned to me, "Why are you even involved with an organization that does nothing to protect their youth, I am very glad we never allowed our sons to join boy scouts." Some of the others chimed in agreeing, none cared about YPT saying it was way too little and way too late. My two sons were there, both Eagle scouts, tried to defend the BSA but the others told them "You two were just lucky I guess." If this is or is becoming the publics image of the BSA this may be one battle the BSA is gonna lose bigtime and seriously jeopardizes its future.

[qwazse]

The missus told me that my father-in-law said something of the sort. I think the stories hit closer to home because his son was a scout for a while at that time.

 

What folks don't realize is how lucky they are if they or grampa or uncle or auntie haven't molested their kids. I know more adults who are picking up the pieces after that sort of history than after one being molested by an SM or church youth leader. (Actually, except for this forum, I've never met someone who was molested by an scout leader. I have met one or two who were abused by other types of youth leaders. I can't imagine the folks who would be willing to open up to me about that sort of stuff would be less willing if the abuser were a scouter, so I believe the stats.)

 

That said, there's this expectation that a big organization would clean house far better than our messed up families. I wish we could live up to it. Maybe we are now?

[fred8033]

BadepP wrote: "The saddest scenario for me about this whole mess is I had some friends over for dinner the other night and in my den they saw some of the scouting awards I have received over the years, and a couple mentioned to me, "Why are you even involved with an organization that does nothing to protect their youth, I am very glad we never allowed our sons to join boy scouts." Some of the others chimed in agreeing, none cared about YPT saying it was way too little and way too late. My two sons were there, both Eagle scouts, tried to defend the BSA but the others told them "You two were just lucky I guess." If this is or is becoming the publics image of the BSA this may be one battle the BSA is gonna lose bigtime and seriously jeopardizes its future.

"

 

It's time to confront such statements. Don't let them stand. I'd respond that you'd better keep your kids home 24 hours a day and protect them from your own relatives too. I'm not apologetic about BSA's files. They could have done better but society as a whole could have done better. BSA had a national database trying to keep abusers out before anyone else. YMCA? Schools? Sports? In the caes, police were often notified or the 1st source of the info. Parents often didn't want police notified as it was before society wised up to the "He said. She said." issues. It was before the national awareness on the issues too.

 

[WasE61]

I realize that there are a lot of "defend BSA to the death" attitudes abounding here.

 

But does anyone ever thing about what we parents are asked to do?

 

You all have to admit that we non-participants take a tremendous leap of blind faith turning our boys over to you for days or even weeks at a time with no communication.

 

We don't know anything real about you. Only what you portray when you are in uniform.

 

We know that in an critical situation, you are our boy's only hope of survival.

 

We know that our boy's cannot defend themselves from you.

 

We know that there are pedophiles among you. We don't know who they are, or how much contact they have with our boys.

 

We also know that, in general, none of you will turn over (to the police) any of your brethren that might be molesting our boys. That when given the choice, you will more than like protect your organization rather than our boys. You've been doing it this way for 100 years.

 

I don't know what BSA will (or can) do to reverse this. As a private organization, you could have done anything you wanted.

 

I don't want my boy in Scouts. But it's not my decision to make.

 

(Ironically, I have not read a single post where anyone with the SM or ASM badge has said ... "the next time I even hear of something like this, I'm going to the Police, because that's the right thing to do, BSA protocols be damned.")

 

[Brewmeister]

Unfortunatley unless you never leave your son's side there is nothing you can do to have complete assurance of anything. Evil is something that must constantly be fought.

 

What I will say is that from my experience as a youth sports coach, Lego League coach, and awareness of Girl Scout protocols, the BSA's YPT guidelines are the best I have seen.

 

I still haven't given up on humanity.

[DeanRx]

At the risk of feeding the trolls...

 

WasE61-

 

1) You have an extremely narrow view of BSA's policies. We are now REQUIRED to report to authorities ANY time there is suspected misconduct of a sexual nature - period. Its been that way for over 20 years now in BSA.

 

2) If you are that concerned about our "good old boys" network - then either pull your son from the program OR get involved in you kid's life and VOLUNTEER to attend an outing with him!! Also one of BSA's policies - any and all activities are open to ANY parent at ANY time.

 

3) If I am your boy's "only chance at survival" in a "critical situation" and you have doubts in my or other leader's abilities... then don't blindly sign off your trust to us. You are the parent - take some parental responsibility!!

 

4) The cases being discussed are from 20+ years ago and back. Many changes and improvements have been made BECAUSE of not in spite of BSA having these files. Go grind your ax with the dead men who were in charge two generations ago when these acts took place, not with the current crop of volunteer leaders who now subject themselves to being held suspect until proven otherwise all because of what some pervert did to a lad 30 years ago!

 

You act as if you have no choice in the matter. Sounds like this is an issue between you and your ex, I'm guessing? Well, man up and tell her you don't want the lad in the organization then.

 

Better take a hard look at whatever OTHER youth group you place your son into to replace his scouting activity, because I'd bet dollars to doughnuts that the other organization doesn't do HALF the youth protection that BSA does - to include keeping a file on known or suspected abusers that have been removed from the program !!

 

Dean