332
submitted 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago) by girlfreddy@lemmy.ca to c/news@lemmy.world

Missouri Girl Scout leaders threatened legal action against a troop that made bracelets to raise funds for starving children in Gaza, provoking outrage and ridicule from the girls’ supporters and advocates for people trapped in the Palestinian territory by the latest humanitarian crisis.

Girl Scouts of the USA said its eastern Missouri chapter had only been following fundraising rules, but that it was “disappointed and disheartened by the tone” of the communication with the troop in St. Louis.

“What do you think a group of 10-year-old girls would want to do if they felt helpless?” Abuhamdeh asked during a Zoom meeting promoted by Ceasefire for Kids, which advocates for children in Gaza. “They would want to help. How do they want to help? They want to make bracelets. They’re 10 years old. That’s what they felt like they could do.”

Link to the bracelets **** Please note they are sold out at the moment, but will be making more soon.

top 17 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 102 points 6 months ago

Let's just assume for a moment, just for the sake of argument, that Hamas is so dangerous that it needs to be completely rooted out of Gaza and destroyed with a massive amount of force. Let's even assume that every able-bodied Gazan adult is a member of Hamas.

These girls are trying to feed starving children.

Once again, we are expected to believe that children are extremely dangerous Hamas fighters.

[-] JustZ@lemmy.world 7 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

Sounds like the issue was that the girls were using the GSA name and logo without permission and without following the formalities that a 501(c)(3) must follow, and the IRS could theoretically revoke GSA's status over it. Seems pretty unlikely that this small fundraiser would trigger such a harsh response from the IRS.

Or, if this has anything to do with money raised by selling cookies, it could be catastrophic for GSA. The cookie money has to go toward supporting GSA's primary charitable endeavors, educating and enriching girls in America or whatever their mission statement is. If cookie money starts being used to fund something else, the IRS can treat it the cookie money as "unrelated business income," and start taxing it, and also the cookie enterprise would be subject to labor laws, which I think would probably be the end of GSA, given their dependence on unpaid child labor.

[-] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 48 points 6 months ago

Finally. Someone says "think of the children" and actually MEANS IT!

[-] tryptaminev@feddit.de 38 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

https://thinmint.sdgirlscouts.org/files/volunteer/What_We_Stand_For.pdf

The Girl Scout Law
I will do my best to be
honest and fair,
friendly and helpful,
considerate and caring,
courageous and strong, and
responsible for what I say and do,
and to
respect myself and others,
respect authority,
use resources wisely,
make the world a better place,
and be a sister to every Girl Scout

Caring for starving children is the most principled thing by the principles of the organization. Anybody who has targeted them for their activities shows that they are in direct contradiction to about everything the girl scouts stand for.

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 16 points 6 months ago

Hopefully, this will spread to other troops into a bracelet-making movement for Gaza.

[-] moistclump@lemmy.world 13 points 6 months ago

respect authority

Interesting

[-] A_Toasty_Strudel@lemmy.world 7 points 6 months ago

That one took me a lil off guard as well. Can't say it's always a rule that's 100% good to adhere to.

[-] moistclump@lemmy.world 2 points 6 months ago

Especially when we’re talking about Israel. I don’t want the Girl Scouts to respect bidens authority on Israel. Or bidens authority about supporting Israel’s authority.

[-] JustZ@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

An organization that makes kids wear uniforms teaches authoritarian sympathies?

Who could have guessed?!

[-] MimicJar@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago

The cynic in me agrees, but in this case I'm certain this, in combination with the statement above to "respect yourself and others" means authority like parents, teachers, & troop leaders.

Respect also doesn't imply follow, and in either case as 10 year olds this is good advice.

I hope this is an obvious statement.

[-] Linkerbaan@lemmy.world 5 points 6 months ago

Sounds like the real law.

[-] Tractorbeam42@lemmynsfw.com 13 points 6 months ago
[-] stoly@lemmy.world 9 points 6 months ago

“We are sorry that Ms. Abuhamdeh chose to disband,” the statement said. “We would welcome them back to the Girl Scout family.”

No, you were sorry that you got caught being racist assholes.>

[-] IWantToFuckSpez@kbin.social 2 points 6 months ago

Hey Scout leaders stop screwing over kids.

[-] tygerprints@kbin.social 2 points 6 months ago

Isn't it terrible how adults act. Threatening legal action against this troop for trying to do something to help. That's just sickening. Thank god there are people in the world who actually care about what's going on with the horrific genocide in the middle east.

[-] Maeve@kbin.social 1 points 6 months ago

They even noted fundraising for Ukraine but no complaints or threats. Seriously, something is wrong with these people.

this post was submitted on 05 Mar 2024
332 points (95.1% liked)

News

22855 readers
5658 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS