Girl Guides membership - our daughter cannot join?

Hermia

poet123 wrote: »

Perhaps because it suits that particular leader, that doesn't mean that generally the ethos has changed. It is what it is. If you find a group that is more relaxed about the criteria so be it, if you don't again, so be it.

I cannot abide people who know the membership criteria who then rail against it because it doesn't suit them personally. Again, this is an organisation which you choose to join, if its ethos doesn't appeal, don't join. Simple really.

I agree that a membership organisation can obviously have its own membership criteria. But, I also think it's a shame if one of the largest and most well-known organisations for kids has this sort of criteria, especially in a society which isn't the most religious in the world. I certainly remember when I was a teenager there were no alternatives to the guides and brownies in my area.

mikey72

poet123 wrote: »

Perhaps because it suits that particular leader, that doesn't mean that generally the ethos has changed. It is what it is. If you find a group that is more relaxed about the criteria so be it, if you don't again, so be it.

I cannot abide people who know the membership criteria who then rail against it because it doesn't suit them personally. Again, this is an organisation which you choose to join, if its ethos doesn't appeal, don't join. Simple really.

If the leaders are happy to ignore what the guide group was set up as, I wonder if they're just as happy if a member doesn't want to keep guide law, or refuses to serve the country, or decides they don't want to "help other people".

I wonder what oath the leader took, and when they decided the oath was just meaningless words they could utter on the day.

If that's the oath, that's the oath. The spirit of the group was honesty, and the pledges were meaningful once. It's a shame it seems so easy to promise without any meaning, or expect leaders simply to leave it out because it doesn't suit them personally.

poet123

Hermia wrote: »

I agree that a membership organisation can obviously have its own membership criteria. But, I also think it's a shame if one of the largest and most well-known organisations for kids has this sort of criteria, especially in a society which isn't the most religious in the world. I certainly remember when I was a teenager there were no alternatives to the guides and brownies in my area.

The Promise refers to God and Queen as the monarch is still the head of the established church.

Welshwoofs

poet123 wrote: »

Perhaps because it suits that particular leader, that doesn't mean that generally the ethos has changed.

When you say 'suits that particular leader' what you are actually saying is 'although the Guides state they don't discriminate on any grounds and are concerned with diversity and equality, if an individual leader wants to discriminate on a local level that's A.OK'

I cannot abide people who know the membership criteria who then rail against it because it doesn't suit them personally. Again, this is an organisation which you choose to join, if its ethos doesn't appeal, don't join. Simple really.

The membership criteria is here:

http://guidingmanual.guk.org.uk/policies/membership_and_recruitment/young_members.aspx
"Youth membership of Girlguiding UK is voluntary and is open to any girl or young woman aged between her 5th (4th in Northern Ireland) and 26th birthdays, regardless of faith, race, culture, nationality or any other circumstance"

Can you see any mention of needing to believe in a god?

.

Nicki

The organisation started as a Christian organisation and whilst it now accepts children of other faiths, one of its stated aims is still to encourage children to develop spiritually and explore faith.

If, as some would wish, they HAD to accept children who are explicitly of no faith, then some parents would argue that they should not be allowed to explore or discuss faith or spirituality at all, as this would infringe their darling's right not to be exposed to others views on these matters.

So, to leave themselves the option of being able to do what they were set up to do in the first place, they have to have the option of refusing children of no faith. Troops who don't want to develop the children spiritually obviously can and do ignore this requirement.

Whatever the position years ago, there are now dozens of activities for children from sports to duke of Edinburgh which don't involve faith at all. So if you are a militantly atheist family who wants to avow that publicly and not make vows you don't believe in, you don't choose a group for your child which has that as a prerequisite to joining.

Person_one

Nicki wrote: »

The organisation started as a Christian organisation and whilst it now accepts children of other faiths, one of its stated aims is still to encourage children to develop spiritually and explore faith.

If, as some would wish, they HAD to accept children who are explicitly of no faith, then some parents would argue that they should not be allowed to explore or discuss faith or spirituality at all, as this would infringe their darling's right not to be exposed to others views on these matters.

I went to rainbows, brownies, guides and scouts from the ages of 5 (I think) to 15.

I don't remember god coming up at all except at the remembrance day services we went to.

There was far more exposure to religion (and only one religion) at my non church state primary school.

Welshwoofs

Nicki wrote: »

So if you are a militantly atheist family who wants to avow that publicly and not make vows you don't believe in, you don't choose a group for your child which has that as a prerequisite to joining.

The Op stated that her daughter was happy to make the vow...just as she had during her time at Brownies. She is being excluded on the basis that the leader took it upon herself to subject a young child to an interrogation about her religious beliefs and didn't like the answer she got....even though the child is happy to make the vow.

Ettenna

There is not actually a requirement to make the Promise as a Guide. It is only a requirement if you are doing the Queen's Guide.

mikey72

Welshwoofs wrote: »

The Op stated that her daughter was happy to make the vow...just as she had during her time at Brownies. She is being excluded on the basis that the leader took it upon herself to subject a young child to an interrogation about her religious beliefs and didn't like the answer she got....even though the child is happy to make the vow.

It is unfortunate the leader believes in a promise actually meaning something then, rather than being empty words that have no meaning at all.
Maybe the leader isn't happy for her to make a vow she doesn't mean.

Nicki

Unless I have misread, OP has not yet had a chance to speak to the leader and say her child will make the vow though. So far as I read, the issue was raised and the child declared herself to be of no faith. We don't yet know whether the leader will be happy with this compromise.