Discussion : Should Guiding be only for Women and Girls?

Hello everybody! Welcome to or back to Guiding at Home. I want to introduce something different to this blog, mainly to get everyone thinking and talking. In my weekly Looking at Girlguiding I have mainly just been giving you guys information and putting my views across. If you do still have any questions about things in Girlguiding please leave a comment or email me at guidingathome@gmail.com . But I want you to be able to share your views, so on some Wednesday's I am going to make a discussion post with a topic. I'm going to share two sides of the argument to get you thinking then I want you to think about it and comment your side below.

So the discussion this week that I would like to start is:

Should Guiding be only for Women and Girls?

So as most of you know Girlguiding is an organisation that has been used to empower females and is only limited to people who identify as female, this does include trans people. This has worked for many years, the organisation gets to focus on the needs of young women and teach them to be strong against inequality. It's a safe place for girls to talk about female issues without maybe being uncomfortable if males were around. 

However it can be seen to be unfair to block out an entire gender from an organisation that they might enjoy. Males might love the sound of our meetings and what we stand for so shouldn't they be given the opportunity to join us? Girls and women are allowed in Scouting but we stop boys and men joining Guiding. The organisation is about empowering women but it is possible to do that with men in the organisation. In some ways Guiding can give the impression to young girls that men won't stand for equality and don't want to hear about their needs. We are also teaching young girls that they can't be open in front of men because they will feel awkward. It shouldn't be awkward, we should all be able to talk about our needs openly and not hide it away from the opposite gender. Guiding is suppose to be a safe place for girls to meet but by cutting out the male gender we put forward the impression that girls aren't safe around men and that's not equality.

I can see both sides of the argument so I would like to hear your opinion.

Thank you for reading and make sure you keep safe and keep on Guiding! 




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