NYT: Sex-Abuse Claims Against Boy Scouts Now Surpass 82,000

[mysteryowl]

Sex-Abuse Claims Against Boy Scouts Now Surpass 82,000

The deluge of sex-abuse filings, coming ahead of a bankruptcy deadline, far surpasses the number of claims filed in Catholic Church cases.

More than 82,000 people have come forward with sex-abuse claims against the Boy Scouts of America, describing a decades-long accumulation of assaults at the hands of scout leaders across the nation who had been trusted as role models.

The claims, which lawyers said far eclipsed the number of abuse accusations filed in Catholic Church cases, continued to mount ahead of a Monday deadline established in bankruptcy court in Delaware, where the Boy Scouts had sought refuge this year in a bid to survive the demands for damages.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/11/15/us/boy-scouts-abuse-claims-bankruptcy.html

Child sex abuse is far more prevalent than anyone suspected.
Utterly tragic!!

The abusers are people we all know, without knowing.

[Archae]

1. I'm not surprised at all.

ANY large group that works with kids should be extra vigilant, and should quit covering for their "leaders" who are perverts.

I've been reading about the Baptist churches here in the US, Southern Baptist and others, who did the same thing as the Catholic church did.

Covered up the perverts, and they kept offending.

[mysteryowl]

2. Yes, and to take note that the perps are:

--fathers
--brothers
--friends
--colleagues
--churchgoers
--neighbors

on and on...

The abusers are people we all know, without knowing.

[jb5150]

3. I was in the Boy Scouts 40+ years ago ....

and saw a lot of shady shit, and many of the adults that were involved were very active in the church, and that includes the Mormon church.

[Vivienne235729]

4. Oh wow. In the Mormon church? Seems so straight laced, it's hard to imagine

But pedophiles are in every race, religion, culture, etc. Sadly....

[jb5150]

7. Sometime the religions that seems so "straight laced" ...

are just a lot better at covering it up. My Scout Troop was attached to the Methodist church for several years, and then later attached to the Mormon church, and I saw things that were questionable (as well as stuff that was straight out emotional/sexual abuse) at both . I considered being part of this lawsuit, but I decided that after all this time I just didn't want to deal with it, but I did search their database to see if I recognized any of the names ... I didn't, but I do remember one name very well. I guess the fact that I remember his name all these years later means it still bothers me.

[Vivienne235729]

11. So sorry to hear your experiences were tainted like that and you has to go through it.

That is just horrible. There are monsters everywhere. Even in broad daylight. I hope you find peace with it eventually.

[Karadeniz]

5. But the BSA was so holy, they couldn't have any homosexual in their midst.

[jb5150]

9. Exactly ...

and it turns out that almost all pedophiles identify as heterosexual .. and many/most of them were married with children of their own.

[shrike3]

6. So sorry to hear this. Always awful when it happens.

[mr_lebowski]

8. Scout 'leaders' is a vague term ... I can promise you there's a hell of a lot of the

15-18 y.o. boys diddling the 12-14 y.o. boys in Boy Scouts too.

And the older, higher-level Scouts are seen as having 'authority' in the Scouts. Hence they are also Scout Leaders of a sort.

I would be rather surprised if a number this large did not include a lot of instances of that sort of thing going on as well.

[BGBD]

10. It's almost like

pedophiles are attracted to groups where they can be alone with children in the woods.

[mysteryowl]

12. Unfettered access

and the children have no where to turn for help, if they wanted to.

[MineralMan]

13. If this does not put an end to the BSA now, nothing will.

It should. There should be no BSA any longer. It's quasi-military, quasi-patriotic, quasi-religious attitudes have always been misguided. The organization should disappear from the face of the planet, in my opinion.