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TORONTO, February 14, 2014 (LifeSiteNews.com) – As US pro-life activists lead a boycott campaign on the Girl Scouts, the Girl Guides of Canada has been caught partnering with and supporting organizations that actively promote contraception and abortion as empowering to girls.

Promising to be “true to myself” and to “take action for a better world” Girl Guide members have been sent as youth representatives to pro-abortion conferences in the developing world and to a leadership training camp run by a pro-abortion-and-contraception organization. They have worked for organizations promoting “reproductive health” in poor countries.

Critics have called the revelation “appalling” and a “betrayal” of women.

Girl Guides members sent to pro-abortion ‘Women Deliver’ conference

Girl Guides of Canada sent youth representatives to the 2013 Women Deliver conference in Malaysia, a global event where the world’s leading abortion and population-control advocates — including Microsoft billionaire Melinda Gates; abortionist LeRoy Carhart; Catholics for a Free Choice founder Frances Kissling; and Princeton infanticide advocate Peter Singer — made presentations.

“Participating in the conference also allowed me to grow as a human being and learn to appreciate many of the things I take for granted on a daily basis,” wrote Rukaiyah Lakkadghatwala, a Girl Guide for 11 years, on the GirlGuidesCAN blog. “Attending the conference also allowed me to fully appreciate how the Girl Guides of Canada supports our growth and development into strong women.”

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Grade 11 student Carly Checholik said she was glad to be chosen as a representative since she has “been a fan of what Women Deliver stands for a few years now.”

Checholik said her “highlight” from the conference was when a panel addressed her concerns about the “education of young girls when it comes to sexual and reproductive rights.”

“I cherish the way Women Deliver opened my eyes and gave me a first-hand look at the problems facing people my age around the world,” she wrote on the GirlGuidesCAN blog.

Girl Guides members receive exclusive training from ‘sexual rights’ organization

Last year Girl Guides of Canada sent girls to a leadership training camp near Montreal called Young Women’s Leadership Program run by Girls Action Foundation, an organization that promotes homosexuality, oral sex, anal sex, lesbian “humping,” sex toys, abortion, and contraception.

“Honestly, I was totally engrossed, being surrounded by girls who care about the issues I do and wanted to do their best to change for the better was awe-inspiring,” wrote Girl Guide Elizabeth from Kelowna, BC on GirlGuidesCAN’s blog.

Girl Guides partners with organizations teaching ‘reproductive health’ in developing world

In 2012, Girl Guides from Nova Scotia ages 9-17 sewed reusable sanitary pads for the Jamii Foundation, an organization that teaches children in Kenya about “reproductive health,” “contraceptives,” and “healthy relationships.”

Life and family leaders point out that ‘reproductive health’ is generally synonymous with sex education that emphasizes non-marital sex, the promotion of greater access to abortion, and the promotion of contraception.

Candace Tattrie, director of the Jamii Foundation, said at that time that she was “overwhelmed” by the Girl Guides “support and eagerness to change lives.”

Girl Guides partners with organization promoting abortion as ‘sexual health’

Among Girl Guides of Canada partners is Plan International, an organization with an outreach program for girls called “Because I am a Girl” that equates sexual health for girls with easy access to abortion and contraception.

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“[It’s about] having control over your own body when it comes to having sex and having children,” the group states on its website for teens.

“Girls and women have been in a looonnggggg (sic) fight to have control over their own bodies, especially when it comes to getting pregnant and having babies. The fight isn’t over yet…”

Last year a Plan International delegate to the UN Human Rights Council urged that children and adolescents in the third world should receive “comprehensive sexual education…as part of the school curriculum” to advance the goal of achieving “reproductive health”.

Plan International failed to reply to two letters from United for Life in 2005 asking the organization to “oppose the killing of children by abortion, contraception, human embryo experimentation, IVF, human cloning, and related activities.”

“This raised the question of Plan International's commitment to implementing in full the UDHRs [Universal Declaration of Human Rights] and the Declaration on the Rights of the Child in regard to the unborn,” the group stated.

Girl Guides part of a larger organization championing ‘reproductive health’

Girl Guides of Canada is a member of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS), an international organization that has as part of its mandate to “promote access to education and information about sexual and reproductive health.”

“Reproductive health” is a common theme on WAGGGS’ website.

“The World Association’s way of working enables girls and young women to talk openly about issues such as sexual and reproductive health among their peers and in a safe environment,” WAGGGS says about “prevent[ing] adolescent pregnancy,” its third of seven “key messages” to girls worldwide.

In 2010 WAGGGS boasted that it had sent a young female delegate to advocate for “accessible, affordable and safe abortions” at the 54th session of the Commission on the Status of Women at the United Nations headquarters in New York City.

WAGGGS has partnered with UN agencies such as UNFPA, UNICEF, and UNAIDS, all known for promoting abortion, comprehensive sexuality education, and ‘sexual rights’.

‘Betraying’ Canadian girls

Alissa Golob of Campaign Life Coalition Youth told LifeSiteNews.com that Girl Guides has “betrayed” girls across the country by “partnering with and supporting organizations that promote the exploitation of women and girls by means of contraception and abortion.”

“Contraception strips a girl of one of her greatest and most precious gifts — her fertility. It teaches her to value herself in terms of sexual availability. Is it really ‘pro-woman’ for girls to be taught to be objectified like that?”

“Girl Guides should instead be teaching girls to embrace their fertility, not reject it,” she said.

Gwen Landolt, national vice-president of REAL Women of Canada, called the Girl Guide link to contraception and abortion “appalling.”

“Instead of teaching young women to be the leaders of tomorrow, Girl Guides is teaching them to be the sex-objects of tomorrow,” she told LifeSiteNews.com.

Landolt, who belonged to the Girl Guides as a little girl, wondered, “Who’s guiding the Guides?”

“They seem to have lost their way in everything that Girl Guides is supposed to be about — building character and being future citizens.”

Landolt criticized the Girl Guides for jumping on a “secular bandwagon” that she said transforms girls into “sexual objects” instead of “women of merit and character.”

“What’s the purpose of Girl Guides now, to become a sexual object and learn how to have sex?”

“No rational parent would want their daughter to be involved in that clutch of misleading tenets,” she said. “I wouldn’t want my daughter or granddaughter anywhere near that organization.”

The news comes at a time when Girl Scouts USA is facing increasing scrutiny for its pro-abortion and anti-family actions and policies and multi-faceted ties to the ‘reproductive rights’ agenda.

Girl Guides of Canada did not respond to LifeSiteNews.com’s questions by press time asking what a scouting organization is doing pushing contraception and abortion on its girls.

Contact:

Sharron Callahan, Girl Guides Canada Chief Commissioner
[email protected]

Girl Guides Canada National Office
Girl Guides of Canada-Guides du Canada
50 Merton Street
Toronto, Ontario M4S 1A3
Phone: (416) 487-5281
Use online email form here.