Once upon a time the Girl Scouts of America wasn’t riddled with left-wing feminists obsessed with “women’s” issues. Well, now it is, and, not surprisingly, it has found a champion in the U.S. Senate in North Carolina Democrat Kay Hagan:
In case you haven’t been paying attention, the Girl Scouts of the USA are about a lot more than sewing badges and campfires these days.
In fact, they’ve gotten … political. And the main issue on their Public Policy and Advocacy Office’s agenda is one near and dear to our hearts: how women and girls are portrayed in the media. (Shiseido, W, OK and Self, we’re looking at you.)
We caught up with grown-up Girl Scout / policy associate Clare Bresnahan to get the scoop on their latest project: the Healthy Media for Youth Act, introduced last week in the Senate by Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) and in the House by Rep. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) in March.
Here’s what the bill would do:
The bill has three parts. First, it would provide grants to non-profit youth empowerment groups so they can develop media literacy programs that teach kids how to think more critically about the media and ask, “What do I want to apply to my own life, and what do I want to keep on TV?”
Second, the bill will authorize the National Institutes of Health to review and conduct research on how depictions of girls and women in media impact kids. This is important because there are a lot of gaps in the current research — we need better data on how media images link to eating disorders, early sexual behavior and so on.
Last, the bill will create a National Task Force on Women and Girls in the Media, which will develop voluntary standards and healthy and positive media images of women and girls.
This has all the earmarks of lefty/radical legislation. National taskforce to waste taxpayer time and money? Check. Media portrayal police to bludgeon those who disagree? Check. A sexual component that will no doubt show abortion, lesbianism and transgenderism as wholesome options for Girl Scouts? Check. Empowerment grants to engage in social engineering? Check.
Thanks, Kay. Our daughters really needed that.
