Scouts & Guides

I'm all for a girls-only space, and for the activities and opportunities on offer being as wide-ranging as possible, and for it being a place for feminist ideals to flourish and be explored.
I wish Beavers, Cubs and Scouts had remained single sex too. So did my son.

I think there's a lot to be said for having all-girl spaces, as most girls of that age aren't in single-sex education.

And I think Guiding can be a space for feminism to flourish - there was that thing last year about Guides calling for more realistic representation of women in the media, and they do work with their members on things like body image. www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/10709521/Girl-Guide-body-confidence-badge-is-brilliant-but-so-terribly-terribly-sad.html

The kinds of activities you do probably vary a lot in practice and are dependent on the interests and abilities of the local leaders. So while my packs were very physically active and did a lot of camping and orienteering type things, there might still be ones which are more craft and hospitality oriented. Not that there's anything wrong with that per se, but if the Scouts don't do it then that's a pretty strongly gendered structure going on.

Well, it doesn't!

Back in the day, these were really obviously sexist organisations. Even when I was a child, girls did 'hospitality' and 'needlework' badges while boys didn't.

What is really crap is that a big part of the reason some groups went mixed isn't feminism - it's simply there was either nowhere for girls to go, or girls wanted to be in the group they saw as 'better'.

I'd love to see the people in charge be explicit about any of this, but I'm not holding out hope.

I take the point about women-only spaces, though. Just hard to know what's best when it's such a big organisation.

There's nothing stopping you from having the mix you want within your beaver colony.

As BillnTeds says, there is an argument for having girl and women only spaces. This fits in just fine with feminism. Some girls will be able to spread their wings more easily in an all girl setting, than if they have to compete with boys (in reality or in their imagination). There is also an argument for all boy spaces, and there are Scout groups which cater for that too, or there is Boy's Brigade.

Either way, I think that taking part in a youth movement like scouts or guides is very useful for young people. As long as the group is active and doesn't pander to stereotypical gender roles, they can be great places to learn new skills and take risks safely.

My understanding is that certain groups of girls can join guides when they wouldn't be allowed by parents to join a mixed organisation.

There is also an argument for girl and women only spaces.