Sunday, February 23rd, 2020
Stephan: I was a Boy Scout, even an Eagle Scout, but only parenthetically a Boy Scout. I had the enormous good fortune to join Troop 3 at Calvary Church in Cincinnati, Ohio, run by Bill and Nancy Bumiller. They cared very little for the quasi-militaristic Boy Scout structure and focused instead on teaching boys woodscraft and survival skills. It changed the course of my life. But there was another troop nearby and I still remember the whisperings amongst boys from that troop about a scout master in the troop who was clearly a pedophile.
Robert Baden-Powell the founder of the Boy Scouts was an authoritarian closeted aggressively "Christian" gay man, who by numerous accounts contemporaries report loved to watch naked boys play at a swimming hole. So maybe, like the Catholic Church, sexual interaction with boys was baked into the organization's structure. Not that all gay men are pedophiles, that is a grossly unfair canard. But the data does suggest there seems to be a correlation between authoritarian explicitly religious homosexual men who choose to spend a lot of time around young boys and pedophilia.
Whatever the reason for it, that the Boy Scouts have been devastated by child sexual abuse is a reality that is now being faced, as this report recounts.
A ranger closes a Boy Scouts of America camp gate on May 9, 2018, outside Payson, Utah.
Credit: George Frey/Getty
The Boy Scouts of America filed for bankruptcy Tuesday as the century-old institution faces spiraling costs from hundreds of sexual abuse lawsuits. The group’s bankruptcy filing in Delaware listed whopping liabilities that ranged between $100 million and $500 million and assets of $1 billion to $10 billion.* In response to the deluge of suits, the youth organization that says it currently serves more than 2 million youths began positioning itself for Chapter 11 bankruptcy as far back as December 2018, but the actual filing didn’t take place until this week.
By seeking bankruptcy protection, the outdoor and youth leadership group, which claims more than 110 million participants since its inception, puts a halt to the litigation and will give the Boy Scouts a window to negotiate settlements with those who have sued, potentially rolling all claims into a single final resolution. It’s a similar approach used by USA Gymnastics […]
The link to the full article has been corrected.
Maybe in the past homosexual men (and women) were attracted to men or women only organizations (religious or otherwise) because of past intolerance and it offered a safe hiding place? I don’t know. The old saying about how a few bad apples can spoil the whole basket is as true as it ever was. As to Medicare for all, it’s a pipe dream.
Tom in NY
You could not be more wrong Tom in NY in what you say about healthcare. I say that not in a partisan way, but on the basis of facts. Our healthcare system ranks 37th in the world, and yet we pay anywhere from 2 to 6 multiples more than any other developed nation on earth. You need to do some serious research. Go to https://igc.academia.edu/StephanSchwartz and you will find a dozen papers that will, in turn, lead you to hundreds more proving what I am saying.
I will look at the link you sent me, thank you.
I just worry we will eliminate a “for profit private medical bureaucracy” and replace it with a government run bureaucracy. While an expanded Medicare is not a “for profit” it will likely be just as inefficient as most other government run programs It will also be quite expensive since government employees are all unionized and have expensive benefit packages. I am not impressed with the way the government runs anything.
Having only one choice does not sit well with me either. No competition seldom if ever leads to lower costs, quite the opposite.
And I don’t think you can sue the government. Or can you? If you cannot does that eliminate malpractice suits? Just taking malpractice suits out of medicine would dramatically lower costs for everyone without changing anything. You would certainly anger the wealthy ambulance chasing lawyers however.
I live near the border with Canada. Many Canadians come to the states to get medical procedures done because the wait is so long at home. The also flock over the border to buy clothes, gasoline and other necessities because they pay up to 35% more for everything back home to pay for their “free” healthcare. And Canada’s system is a considered a model to follow …
Tom —
The government’s administrative costs for Medicare are about $132 per person compared with over $700 for private plans. One reason Medicare costs are so much lower is that it reaps economies of scale. It also benefits from not needing to do much marketing, and it doesn’t earn profits. As for Canadian Healthcare. Canada ranks 7th the US 37th, and they spend less than half what we do per person. Here is a reasonably good take on Canadian healthcare: https://www.businessinsider.com/american-misconceptions-about-canadian-healthcare-2019-11