Youth Guard

The Youth Guard is the third largest peripheral organization around the PRT. It is a charity; Youth Guard bumper stickers shirts and ‘badges’ are a common sight across America. <ref name="PRT"/>

Introduction

The Youth Guard originated from a landmark ruling, Reed vs. PRT, in which parents of one of the first Wards raised complaints about the impact of the Wards program on their day to day life. The small group was put in place to act as oversight to ensure that the Wards were well treated and soon snowballed in size, drawing from television appearances, lucrative charity drives and mass public support.<ref name="PRT"/> It remains the third largest of the peripheral organizations around the PRT. The Youth Guard, as it stands, is a separate organization which maintains a different leadership, command structure, funding structure, goals and methodology than those the PRT employs. Over the course of a number of court rulings in the past twenty-five years, the Youth Guard has effectively won or negotiated for particular powers over the PRT offices.<ref name="PRT"/>

Although the Youth Guard tends to focus on the Wards program, they are not limited to the PRT. They do reach out to minors in Hollywood and any team with under-eighteen heroic parahumans such as New Wave,<ref>The Youth Guard or the Y.G. were the group that acted like the union that protected minors in Hollywood. That had protected minors in Hollywood. They were the group that made sure that Wards’ education and options didn’t suffer as a consequence for them being superheroes, that they didn’t dress provocatively, that they were safe and sane, that nobody took advantage, and other stuff. They’d reached out to my parents at one point, because they weren’t limited to the PRT. They were a guillotine that had hung over the heads of any team with under-eighteen heroes or heroines.

“I’ve heard the horror stories,” I said. - Flare 2.5</ref><ref>“Natalie,” Tristan said. “If they Youth Guard were active, they’d say no, and the kids would get involved anyway. That was a thing that happened in my experience.”

“Oh man, my brother and I gave everyone headaches,” Crystal said. “Our grades dropped and our parents were told we had to give up the costumes for a few months until we pulled them back up. Our parents, the Youth Guard, even the PRT was asked to keep an eye out for us. We were scoundrels.” - Shadow 5.6</ref> Reach,<ref>A conspiracy. Mr. Vaughn knew part of it was a lie, but he wouldn’t press. Reach would get in trouble with the likes of the Youth Guard if it sanctioned minors going after professional killers, as much as it wanted the credit for arrests. The rest of the team knew that part or all of it was a lie, but they didn’t want to get in trouble with Mr. Vaughn or Reach. - Interlude_9.z_II</ref> and Dryad Project 3,<ref>“I haven’t fought alongside them. That’s part of it. The other part is that Recycler and Retouch are from Dryad Project 3. Sponsored,” I said.
[...]
I shrugged. “The lack of care from sponsors and the hired-on heroes seemed pretty obvious to most. Then the team got on the wrong side of the Youth Guard, broke or toed the line of just about every damn rule in the book when it came to costumes, school, friendships, throwing kids into violent situations… Two pairs of parents were saying they hadn’t seen their kid in weeks.”
[...]
I shook my head. “Two members of the other serious or semi-serious members joined a villain eco-terrorist group. The team was barely staying afloat with money from sponsors, after a hundred fines from Youth Guard, court cases, more promotion and marketing, and then a reporter dropped an expose. The sponsor wasn’t a saint in the eco thing, with cover-ups. The heroes were a distraction.”

“Everything that could go wrong went wrong,” Anelace said. - Polarize 10.12</ref> especially when a team is just taking off or if a team is high profile and prominent.<ref name="red1">Yep. Worth saying they work with other teams that aren't the PRT, but the PRT stuff is higher visibility. Those other teams tend to get some slack, especially before 'taking off', but the Y.G. will act on reports and requests (often with a delay). After a team takes off, the Y.G. will often poke their head in and ask some questions, often inadvertently acting as a big hassle around the point in time a team really wants to focus on riding the cresting wave.
[...]
[Panacea] wasn't high profile, really. Y.G. would really only be stepping in if you have a team rising to a prominence where, if they're west coast, people on the east coast know about them, and vice versa.

With the PRT they have an established agenda, focus, and mechanisms for reaching out. With anyone else... not so much. - Tell me about the youth guard</ref> However, because they focus on the PRT and cases such as Kenzie Martin, who they genuinely helped,<ref>“They weren’t a horror story for me. They said I was being moved around too much and I needed to go somewhere to stay. Not going to the fun camps and training sucked, but I went back to Baltimore, and I got to set up my workshop, fi-nuh-ly.”
[...]
“Yep,” she said. She pitched her voice lower, “The Youth Guard was good to me. I liked the people who I worked with there, even if the people in charge of me didn’t. Some of my favorite people next to Mrs. Yamada worked for them. - Flare 2.5</ref> other hero groups can slip though the cracks if they are not high profile.<ref name="red1" />

Mission Statement

The Youth Guard’s public mission statement, as it appears on their website:

To increase the personal safety of child parahumans, reduce their risk of physical, mental, or emotional harm, and to prevent sexual exploitation and abuse

To ensure that the child’s essential needs are met, and that the duties do not impact their requirement for food, water and sleep

To ensure that the child’s peripheral needs are met, and that their duties do not have an egregious impact on their need for entertainment, freedom, self-esteem, or family

To prevent the long-term harm to the children by way of a neglect in education

To ensure that the child’s identity remains strong, preventing ‘boot camp’ grinding down of personality, brainwashing, cult-like manipulations, and sexualization of the costumed alter-ego

To act as liaisons for parents who feel that the PRT is co-opting their rights

To offer legal counsel to children and parents who have signed on with the PRT, when concerns lie with the PRT or other groups

To research better practices on how to keep Wards safer

To maintain comprehensive data on the latest trends in abuses.

Coordinates national efforts in these areas through collaboration with non-profit agencies, government, industry, law enforcement, educators, and families

The Youth Guard employs thirty thousand individuals across the United States, and is an exceedingly popular charity. 68% of those polled said that they believed they were directly supporting the Wards program by donating to the Youth Guard. 62% believed they were directly supporting their local teams.

It is the Youth Guard’s prerogative to decide what penalty best fits the situation, serves the interests of the Ward(s) in question and is most likely to change the department’s behavior. The Youth Guard can offer a warning instead, but are not liable to without notable outside pressures. <ref name="PRT">PRT Document for PRT: Department Sixty-Four</ref>

Penalties

It is the Youth Guard’s prerogative to decide what penalty best fits the situation, serves the interests of the Ward(s) in question and is most likely to change the department’s behavior. The Youth Guard can offer a warning instead, but are not liable to without notable outside pressures.

First Offense:

Ward(s’) hours are cut by two days, to five days a week. Ward pay may or may not be reduced. Ward(s’) hours cut by four days.
$10,000 fine per Ward.
All department heads and management must attend 4 hours/week of sensitivity training and a 2 hours meeting with representatives. Lasts one month.

Second Offense:

Ward(s’) hours cut by four days. Minor financial penalties from Head Office. (Less than $10,000)
$20,000 fine per Ward
8 hours/week of sensitivity training, workshops, and 2 hours/week of meetings with Youth Guard representatives over one month.

Third+ Offense:

Ward(s’) hours cut by six days. Department must shoulder cost of Ward with no assistance from head office.
$30,000 fine per ward.
As second offense, but time is tripled to a three month duration, and Youth Guard representative is installed on department staff with veto powers.

Penalties are not exclusive, and can be in addition to legal action.

If funds are not available to pay a fine, the Youth Guard may request that a representative is installed on the staff for a temporary duration, with veto power as described in Y.G. Involvement, third offense.

An on-staff Y.G. Agent will retain the ability to cancel any action, purchase, funding, or event that involves the Wards program, directly or peripherally. The Y.G. agent does not have access to classified material, but can request access to the Ward’s files. They can take disciplinary action with the Wards, but cannot assign orders or mission directives.

Offenses do not expire. Once a first offense is made, the Youth Guard is authorized to call for a second offense penalty for future violations, regardless of violation types for the respective incidents. In lieu of this, the Head Office may attempt to restructure the department instead.

References