Look, some of us need a no more elaborate pitch to buy Girl Scout cookies than those two glorious words: Thin Mints.
But if you like a side of social justice with your Peanut Butter Patties, chew on this: by loading up on the sweet stuff this year, you are also voicing your support of the Girl Scouts’ commitment to inclusion—and countering a cookie boycott launched in protest of that inclusive spirit.
The story began last fall, when a local Girl Scout troop in Colorado denied admission to a seven-year-old biological boy who identifies as a girl, including growing her hair long, wearing typically girl clothes, and playing with Barbies and other toys marketed (oh, boy, are they marketed) to girls. Her parents support her decision to identify as a girl—”I consider Bobby to be born in the wrong body,” mom Felisha Archuleta told CNN—something experts, including the American Psychological Association, advise parents of transgender children to do.
While the child was initially turned down by the local troop, the Girl Scouts of Colorado subsequently reversed that position. “Girl Scouts is an inclusive organization and we accept all girls in Kindergarten through 12th grade as members,” the organization said in a released statement. “If a child identifies as a girl and the child’s family presents her as a girl, Girl Scouts of Colorado welcomes her as a Girl Scout.”
But not everyone is ready to welcome Bobby with open arms. Earlier this month, a video appeared on a website called honestgirlscouts.com, in which an unnamed teen Girl Scout called for a national cookie boycott in protest of the Colorado decision.
Honest Girl Scouts describes itself as a group of current and former scouts whose “aim is to educate, enlighten, uncover facts and insist on a return to the traditional values listed in the Girl Scouts of USA Congressional Charter that includes the words: ‘qualities of truth’ [and] ‘purity.'” The group accuses the Girl Scouts of being a “pro-lesbian,” radical feminist organization and takes particular issue with the GSUSA.
(“FACTOID,” the website announces. “Did you know that radical feminist Betty Friedan, founder of NOW (National Organization for Women) and NARAL (National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League), was on the National Board of GSUSA for 12 years?”)
The boycott video has since been removed from Honest Girls Scouts’ site, although a still photo remains showing the teen scout in front of a wall with several hand-lettered signs, including one that reads “Boycott Girl Scout Cookies!”
This isn’t the first time conservatives have called for a cookie boycott; Honest Girl Scouts’ website even offers a downloadable boycott flyer in which it accuses the Girl Scouts of using cookie proceeds to “promote abortion and LGBT agendas” and “pay New Age consultants to train Girl Scout executives,” among other transgressions.
Honest Girl Scouts isn’t alone in raising alarms about the GSUSA’s alleged hidden, devious agenda; in recent years, conservative groups such as the anti-gay-rights Family Research Council and anti-choice Concerned Women for America have accused the Scouts of promoting sexual promiscuity, lesbianism, paganism and “radical feminism,” and for offering, as role models for girls, such alarming figures as environmentalist Rachel Carson, former U.S. Reps. Barbara Jordan and Shirley Chisholm, suffragist Carrie Chapman Catt, and Frances Perkins, the first female Cabinet member (she was FDR’s secretary of labor and, for good measure, a Mount Holyoke alumna).
The Girl Scouts, by the way, don’t back away from one especially controversial issue that the Christian right has made much of in recent years: its development of programs for girls that focus on sexuality, body image and related issues. In an interview last summer on NBC’s Today show, Kathy Cloninger, CEO of Girl Scouts of the USA, said the organization will continue addressing those issues. “It’s really impossible for girls to grow up in today’s society without having access to good information,” she said.
Want to buy Peanut Butter Patties but don’t have a Brownie living on your block? Go to www.girlscoutcookies.com to find your local Girl Scout council.
