Boy Scouts of America Files for Bankruptcy

There are stark parallels between the Boy Scouts of America and the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy.  The leadership of both organizations put protecting their reputations over the safety of children and youths and both maintained extensive records of abuse cases that remained hidden from the public.  Meanwhile, little was done to make sure pedophiles - which is something markedly different from being gay despite Christofascist and Catholic Church efforts to conflate the two even though the vast majority of pedophiles are heterosexual - did not find positions within the organization.  In the end, it was the deliberate cover ups and lies to the public and police authorities that have lead to the disgrace of the institutions and now a bankruptcy filing by the Boy Scouts much like numerous Catholic Church dioceses. The New York Times looks at this development.  Here are highlights:

The Boy Scouts of America, an iconic presence in the nation’s experience for more than a century, filed for bankruptcy protection early Tuesday, succumbing to financial pressures that included a surge in legal costs over its handling of sexual abuse allegations.

Founded in 1910, the Boy Scouts have long maintained internal files at their headquarters in Texas detailing decades of allegations involving nearly 8,000 “perpetrators,” according to an expert hired by the organization. Lawyers have said in recent months that former scouts have come forward to identify hundreds of other abusers not included in those files.

The bankruptcy filing, in Delaware, is expected to disrupt continuing litigation and establish a deadline for when former scouts can pursue claims.

Jim Turley, the national chair of Boy Scouts of America, said in an open letter that the organization was entering bankruptcy in order to equitably compensate all victims of abuse through a trust.

It is unclear how much of an overhaul the bankruptcy process will bring to the Boy Scouts, which reports having 2.4 million youth participants, but Mr. Kosnoff said the filing seemed necessary given the totality of the claims that have emerged. At a minimum, Mr. Kosnoff said he would like to see the organization clean out its management and end lucrative salaries for leaders, some of whom earn more than half a million dollars annually.

Even then, Mr. Kosnoff said that he finds it “difficult to impossible” for him to envision a new structure that would give him confidence that the nonprofit has sufficiently changed. He said the organization, which has operated under a congressional charter since 1916, may need to liquidate and allow some new organization with better controls come in to fill the void.

Other organizations, including Catholic dioceses and U.S.A. Gymnastics, have also sought bankruptcy protection in recent years as they have faced sexual-abuse lawsuits.

The Boy Scouts’ troubles have lingered for decades. In a 1935 article in The New York Times, the organization described having files on hundreds of people who had been leaders in the scouts but had been labeled “degenerates.”

While their records date back a century, the Boy Scouts fought the release of some of the files in an Oregon case in the early 2000s — a case that led a jury to hold the Scouts liable in 2010 for $18.5 million in punitive damages. The records in that case stayed private until a ruling from the Oregon Supreme Court in 2012 made them public.

Paul Mones, a lawyer in that case, said he recalled musing with his co-counsel at the time that the files may just be the tip of the iceberg that could ultimately send the Boy Scouts toward bankruptcy. But instead of trying to establish a compensation fund for victims over the years, he said, the organization continued trying to protect its reputation.

Mr. Mones said that the bankruptcy filing will deny other victims an opportunity to hold the scouts accountable in court.

Victims and their lawyers have argued that the files hid the problem and left scouts at risk. Mr. Pierce said he did not know until much later that there was a systemic problem in the Boy Scouts. He said that while the organization helped shape him and gave him many positive experiences, he now believes it must be abolished or radically changed.

“It provides pedophiles with access to boys,” Mr. Pierce said. “That has to stop. I don’t know if that means getting rid of the Boy Scouts or some new oversight.”

Once again, its a case of those irresponsibly seeking to protect an organization being the ones to destroy it. Yet, over and over again we see the same pattern. especially in religious organizations. 

Rush Limbaugh Likens "Pedophilia Normalization" to Gay Marriage

Leave it to Rush Limbaugh - that champion of the "sanctity of marriage" who is thrice divorced and on marriage number 4 - to attack gay marriage and liken the recognition of gay marriage to the "normalization of pedophilia."    Funny how one does not hear Limbaugh attacking the Catholic Church hierarchy for its obstruction of justice and world wide criminal conspiracy to enable and protect child rapists within the Catholic clergy.  It would seem that if any institution has "normalized" pedophilia it is the Vatican and Church hierarchy.  But then Rush's logic and reasoning may be diminished given the way he's fried his brain with Oxycontin and other drugs.  Politico looks at Limbaugh's latest delusional case of diarrhea of the mouth.  Here are some excerpts:

Rush Limbaugh said Monday that there is a movement to “normalize pedophilia,” and referenced the push for same sex marriage while also discussing the Jimmy Savile and Jerry Sandusky child abuse scandals.

“There is a movement on to normalize pedophilia, and I guarantee you your reaction to that is probably much the same as your reaction when you first heard about gay marriage,” the conservative commentator said on his radio program Monday, according to a show transcript. “What has happened to gay marriage? It’s become normal — and in fact, with certain people in certain demographics it’s the most important issue in terms of who they vote for.”

He continued: “So don’t pooh-pooh. There’s a movement to normalize pedophilia. Don’t pooh-pooh it. The people behind it are serious, and you know the left as well as I do. They glom onto something and they don’t let go.”

Limbaugh was discussing an article written by Jon Henley of the United Kingdom newspaper The Guardian on Jan. 2. In the piece, Henley writes about the late-British television host Savile — who authorities say molested hundreds of young people.

Referring to Henley’s column, Limbaugh said: “They make the case that kids enjoy it, adults enjoy it; what’s wrong with a little love? The same things that were said about gay marriage. Look at the Elmo story, the puppeteer at PBS. Three or four young people, kids, were hit on by that puppeteer. Look how little attention that story got. In fact, that story was laughed off. It wasn’t a big deal at all.”

“Can you imagine if Jerry Sandusky had had this information at his trial? What do you think the reaction would be to Jerry Sandusky’s defense saying, ‘Hey, look, it’s normal. The kids love it, he loved it, nobody was hurt. And in fact, it’s just a different sexual orientation?’” Limbaugh said.

Limbaugh becomes more repulsive with every passing day in my view.  If he's the best the defenders of "traditional marriage" can muster, then "traditional marriage" deserves to die a rapid death.  The man is despicable.

NOM: Marriage Equality Will Normalize Pedophilia

While the folks at the National Organization for Marriage ("NOM") - a possible front organization for the Roman Catholic hierarchy - disingenuously claims to be all about "protecting marriage" its actions tell a different story. Maggie Gallagher and company are going out of their way to conflate being gay with being a pedophile. Moreover, the hate merchants are now alleging that full marriage equality for same sex couples will lead to a "moral wasteland" and the normalization of pedophilia. Can't you just feel the "love" flow? How do these bastards make this jump from loving committed adults of legal age for marriage to the acceptance of pedophilia? By saying that being a pedophile is "an orientation" just like being gay or lesbian is "an orientation" and that therefore, if same sex marriage is allowed or deemed a constitutional right, then so is pedophilia and the molestation of children. LGBT Nation looks at this sick and truly disgusting propaganda from NOM's so-called Ruth Foundation. Here are highlights:

In a January 5 blog post, NOM’s Ruth Institute promoted a column written by Douglas Farrow . . . Farrow’s column, titled “Why Fight Same-Sex Marriage?,” is riddled with ridiculous claims about the consequences of legalizing gay marriage: marriage equality will lead to “the bastardization of the citizenry,” cause “the sexualization of our children,” leave behind a “moral wasteland,” etc.

A large portion of Farrow’s column, though, is devoted to rehashing one of NOM’s most extreme talking points – marriage equality will pave the way for the normalization of pedophilia:

Pedophilia, for example, is an orientation, or so the psychologists tell us. And orientations are now constitutionally protected, not to say politically celebrated. How then can we continue discriminating against pedophiles, which clearly we do? [...]

[W]e cannot then avoid the implication that there exists no inviolable right to sexual self-expression or indeed to public approval of a so-called orientation. And if that is true for pedophiles—perhaps for consistency we should call them pedosexuals—it is true also for homosexuals and heterosexuals. There may be, or arise, real and present dangers to society that justify repression of one or both of the latter, as of the former; and the same is true for any other tendency or orientation. [...]

Some attack the second premise only from the perimeter, so to speak, arguing for a narrower construal of the word “children,” that is, for a lowering of the age of consent; but that only postpones the problem rather than solving it. Others attack it at its core. Children, they say, may benefit from sex with adults; it depends how the pedophile handles the child in question.

This view is certainly not new, but today it is voiced much more openly than ever it was, because it is the only view that is actually consonant with the unfolding logic of our jurisprudence and legislation. It is the only alternative to admission of error. Nevertheless, it generates profound discomfort, and even meets with firm resistance, because it penetrates to the very bedrock of natural law. Bringing into view the problem of pedophilia, hidden in the coils of the term “orientation,” is an uncomfortable reminder that we can and do tell people how to love. [emphasis added]

In other words, Farrow’s claim is that treating gay relationships as normal and equal inevitably results in treating pedophilia as normal and acceptable because homosexuality, like pedophilia, is a sexual orientation that violates natural law.

NOM has promoted several variations of this argument on multiple occasions, despite the group’s insistence that its “battle is not with an orientation.”

Along with Farrow’s column, NOM’s blog post included links to several other articles posted on the Touchstone website, including a post that called homosexuality a “moral error” and another that compared homosexuality to necrophilia and incest, as well as pedophilia.

NOM is a truly foul organization and I sincerely hope that the courts will soon force the release of the names of those who are backing this hateful campaign seeking to denigrate others. I also wonder how long it will be before NOM is awarded a hate group designation by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

Southern Poverty Law Center Vs. Family Research Council

Chris Matthews had Tony "White Supremacist Lover" Perkins and a representative of the SPLC on Hardball this evening in the wake of FRC being registered as a hate group. As is to be expected from Perkins, a pathological liar when it comes to denigrating gays, Perkins lied and pulled made up statistics apparently out of his ass on DADT repeal while trying to paint the SPLC as a liberal organization resorting tot "name calling" trying to defend the growing public opposition to the "gay agenda" Perkins sees through the Kool-Aid vapors. A You Tube clip of the exchange is set out below. Worse yet Perkins also pulled out the discredited canard that gays have a high propensity toward pedophilia and cited the American College of Pediatricians ("ACP"), a Christianist funded "medical association" that is used by FRC and other anti-gay groups to confuse the public. Box Turtle Bulletin said this about ACP:
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Despite the name, ACP is not a institute of higher learning. Nor is it a professional organization for pediatricians. This is an advocacy group dedicated to political goals which is using an authoritative sounding name to fool the unaware. Yes, their officers and their board are all pediatricians (usually older gentlemen in the South), but their “Pediatric Psychosocial Development Committee” reads like a members roster of the virulently anti-gay National Association for Research and Therapy of Homosexuality (NARTH).
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Perkins' goal is to confuse viewers and convince sheeple to keep sending him money. The real pediatricians group, the 60,000+ member American Academy of Pediatrics, is gay-friendly and has even endorsed gay parenting. Once again, of Perkins' lips are moving, he's lying. He truly makes a cheap whore look virtuous in comparison.

"No on 8" Afraid to Mention Children of LGBT Families

As the post mortem continues concerning the Proposition 8 debacle in California, it turns out that one possible failing in the campaign to stop Proposition 8 was that it failed to feature ads with LGBT families. Why this failure? Because of the fear that the Christianists, Mormons, and Catholic hierarchy would smeared gays with allegations tying homosexuality to pedophilia. This technique of using the gay haters of using the "p" word (as one blogger referenced it) is beyond despicable because real mental health experts have long known that being gay has NO correlation to pedophilia. Far more molestations of children are done by HETEROSEXUALS, but truth and honesty have never been a hallmark of the Christianists and their allies.

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I find the allegations of pedophilia utterly ridiculous and it shows the true foulness of our Christianist enemies that they knowingly make the claim even though they know it's false in the hope of deceiving the ignorant and uninformed. Having been married, fathered children, and passed as straight for 24 years, I never cease to be amazed at the deliberate and dishonest effort to depict gays as pedophiles. Meanwhile, straight men - who do most of the child molesting - take their young daughters and their young female friends all about, go on camping trips (e.g., Indian Princesses), and no one ever raising the least concern that something amiss might occur. Put a gay or lesbian in the mix, however, and suddenly that individual is viewed as a predator. It's sick and it's disgusting. Here are some highlights from the San Francisco Chronicle:

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Stringfellow, who organized No on 8 religious events in the East Bay and San Francisco, said the No on 8 campaign's talking points initially didn't have language to address religious groups. In addition, he said, No on 8 campaigners were told by strategists not to discuss children, an issue that has particular significance for family-oriented religious groups.

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Missed opportunities Stringfellow believes the campaign was afraid it would get smeared by allegations tying homosexuality to pedophilia. But he believes it was wrong to avoid the subject of children because gays and lesbians are just as capable as straight people of being good parents. "When the Yes on 8 folks talked about children, we really didn't have anywhere to go with it," he said.

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Stringfellow said the No on 8 campaign was wrong to downplay lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender couples in advertisements. "It's not going to be normalized if you hide over here in the corner," he said. "There's nothing wrong with talking about love between two individuals."

Child Porn Found on 20,000 Computers in Virginia

This article from the Fairfax Times (http://www.fairfaxtimes.com/news/2008/feb/26/child-porn-found-20000-computers-virginia/) is a bit frightening for several reasons. The first is the fact that there are probably at least 20,000 pedophiles in Virginia who may at some point act on their sick urges (when my children were younger, I always thought I'd kill any adult who ever molested my kids). The second is that given the lawless regime of the Chimperator when it comes to spying on citizens, who is to say that evidence could not be planted on a computer of those deemed "enemies." If the authorities can secretly download information from a computer, it would seem just as easy to place illegal materials on one. Perhaps Virginia's legislators should spend less time pushing an anti-gay agenda and more time going after child molesters. On a different note, however, I'd love to know how many of these computers belong to straight married men who go to anti-gay churches and/or who are Republicans and/or are Baptist clergymen. Here are some highlights:

Using a national online system that enables them to remotely download incriminating images directly from a suspect's computer, members of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force have identified nearly 20,000 computer hard drives in Virginia that they say contain hardcore child pornography. Virginia Del. Brian Moran (D-Alexandria) reported last week that the Town of Herndon ranked number four in overall Virginia localities behind only Virginia Beach, Norfolk and Richmond in the number of computers known to possess child pornography statewide.

Jesse Ferguson, legislative aide for Moran, said that by using the nationwide software system, child pornography can easily be downloaded from the computer hard drives of individuals who utilize peer-to-peer file-sharing networks such as Napster or Limewire. Investigators initiate downloads and then identify Internet protocol (IP) addresses. Law enforcement officials can then obtain physical addresses from Internet service providers.

When all the evidence has been collected and reviewed, and a physical address has been identified, local authorities can then decide to apply for a search warrant to search the property in question and seize the offending computer. "Approximately 30 percent of people who possess child pornography also victimize children," said Moran's office, citing a statistic from the U.S. Department of Justice.