Eagledad

I thought the 4th law of motion was "a scout is always hungry". Hmm, I can't seem to google it..

Yes, I agree. But now the culture and community don't show agreement of the bad behavior because activist promote self expression of the youth. Not all that long ago, neighbors would stop and report concerning behaviors to the parents and the parents would take care of their children's issues. Today the community turns a blind eye to the behavior by youth because they don't want to get involved with a hostile response from the parents, and possibly the community. It doesn't even have to be sexual, often the police are called by concerned citizens when they see a child walking to school. Talk to any teacher, the trend now is to accept a students sexual choice behavior without reporting it to parents. Parents may be the last to hear their child has made a sexual lifestyle choice, even with their elementary age children. It may be just a brief experiment or phase for the child, but the culture will take it, guide and push them toward that choice. Barry

It's just balance to the few here marketing the program as unsafe against predators. Barry I appreciate that, thanks. Barry

I'm sorry for your pain, I really am. But, I don't know why you are even here. I've talked to a lot of people about this subject and accepting for a couple of angry posters on this forum, nobody believes the BSA is haven for abused boys or predators. Sure, scouts were abused by bad people and laws were broken. The historical reputation of the scouting program holds it's integrity. I hope you get what is coming to you, but I also hope you get the help for getting a healthy mind and back to a normal life because telling off BSA members on a BSA forum is not going to do it. The BSA and it's members are not your problem or enemy. As I said in other discussions, all the bad in the history of Boy Scouting isn't even a micro blip when compared to all the good the program has brought. You and a couple others here may get some satisfaction with the down fall of the BSA, but history shows that future humanity looses out the most. Barry

I agree as far as not allowing such things, but not calling it abuse. Barry

Yes, but when we are talking about 600 claims, skinny dipping and strip poker doesn't rate up their with some of the monstrous stuff being talked about. Barry

I would have thought there would have to be some predator motivation to make a claim. I don't see a predator in your incident. A lot of scouts used to go down stream at summer camp to skinny dip. Claims? Barry

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks. Barry

I took qwazse's post as more of; YP has done all it can, not it's up to family and community. Maybe that isn't what he said, but I can't see changes improving YP guidelines at the unit level. Barry

Really! Now that seems sticky. How, in a patrol method program where scouts tent with each other away from the adult camp, can an adult not create context for a youth predator? Barry

Can it get safer than YP at the unit level? Maybe the changes should be toward reactions to abuse reports. Isn't that what the real complaint is? Barry

Great post, but this one line sticks to me as the major problem. This generation does not agree as a community of moral behavior. Nobody in our neighborhood would dare bring up sexuality, much less abuses, because political correctness has confuse common sense morality. My neighbor who has two young boys quit talking to us when they found we voted for other guy in the presidential election. The neighbors across the street are nice folks as far as we can tell, but they obviously live a different lifestyle, and keep to themselves. There is no doubt to me that young folks today are confused about basic moral principles. The same principles communities hold each other accountable not that long ago. The media is so hypocritical on moral behavior that few people could feel safe in discussing their beliefs. It takes a strong person to admit to the religious principles.. Barry

Thanks, that does help a lot. Still, I heard discussions of sex from scout filled tents late in the night that could be construed in that list. I'm not sure I'm completely over my dads talk of the birds and the bees. I wonder how many of these claims are acts from other scouts. Barry

What constitutes abuse? We had one situation where an ASM lost his temper and hit a scout with his plastic coffee cup. The scout wasn't physically hurt AT ALL, but he and his parents were mentally worried the adult could loose his temper again. We reported the situation to district and council and restricted the leader from the scouts. We never saw him again accept at his son's ECOH. The family was satisfied with our actions, but could they go back on this litigation? We had another adult claim her son was a victim of abused because she heard scouts cussing near her son. Her son said it never happened. Could she try to file a claim? My high school teacher son has a lot of stories where students claimed unproven acts of abuse. It is a big deal because teachers are put on leave until the investigation is completed. But, students know the actions and use them to their advantage. So, I wouldn't hold 600 recent cased as an example of continued problem. There are some bad people out there and I hope they are sorted out from claims that don't rate up to those bad acts. Barry

I don't know that the culture will allow Scouting to get to it's roots. I had almost as many parents pushing their son to get elected into OA during their first year of Scouting. Many parents were irate when their son wasn't elected and demanded that the SM intercede. We live in a culture where each player of the youth soccer team is handed a trophy for just being on the team. That wasn't driven by the players. Adults encourage mediocrity so they don't have to deal with the emotions of disappointment they feel when their children don't accel. Barry

Oh, I guess. But it isn't the same. One has to be careful of defending passion in spite of reality. When I was a Scout in the 70's, OA Arrowmen held more respect by scouts than the Eagles because they were selected by their everyday scouting actions within the troop. The respect of the Eagle came from scouts who independently put in the extra effort to earn the Eagle. And, that is a well earned respect of itself. But, when I became a Scout Leader in 1992, I found my Cubs getting continued lectures by adults to stay in scouting for the Eagle. The All Mighty Eagle. I'm not sure how many of the Cubs listened to those lectures, but their parents sure did. As Scoutmaster talking to visiting Webelos families looking for a home troop, the number one question by the parents was how quickly can their son get an Eagle in our Troop. No doubt in my mind that 90% of Eagles today wouldn't have made it without a lot of push from adults. Call it cultural, I guess, but the Eagle is different today. It is still a stature of respect, but not the same. That being said, there are still those 2 percent of scouts who are self-motivated and driven to aspire to Eagle nobility. In that since, .nothing has changed. Barry

Over the years I heard the struggles of friends building or remolding their house. They found that if they weren't watching the building contractor crews in person, the crews tended to build toward a different plan, or no plan at all. I later had the same experience. There is the visionary, then everyone else. The problem with great visions is the people making it a reality don't see the vision, so they work to complete their personal vision of the task. If there isn't a visionary mentor watching, guiding and teaching, the vision fades into easy tasks that have little to do with the vision. As the District Membership Chair, I worked with a lot of new units at all age groups and I found that if there wasn't a general understanding for the purpose of the unit, it likely would not survive. Even units that split off from another unit rarely survive two generations of leadership if the leadership never really had the vision and passion of the original unit leadership. More often than not, they merge back into the original unit. Success is almost fully dependent on "Relationships also provide the exchange of ideas, and mentoring, needed by new Scouters". My problem was trying to get our DEs to understand the importance of Relationships and mentoring the vision and ideas to the next generations. It was a numbers game for them. Not that I'm blaming DEs' for the ills of the dying units, they were following orders. But, as I said, if the visionary mentor isn't teaching and guiding, how can the workers at ground level reach the goal? I think many people have the time, but aren't recruited. The key is first finding the Visionary mentor who gets it and understands how to structure the program so that it functions efficiently toward the goals. Then to find and recruit the folks who AGREE and SEE the vision and WANT to give energy to the effort. An expert in building successful businesses said that the most successful business's have workers who understand and agree with the vision of the company. When they all do their small part, the big vision is achieved. The hardest part is finding a Visionary mentor with the skills of selling refrigerators to Eskimos. Most Councils don't know how to search and recruit that person. Barry

It is interesting. Have to be careful though, National has a reputation of using research to justify changes that they wanted to implement before the research was started. Barry

There is a saying in our district, "If you aren't comfortable in the weather, you didn't dress right!". Barry

Interestingly hail is becoming the common concern the last few years in Oklahoma. A result of climate change? I don't know. But damage cost from hail far out weighs cost from other weather events. I'm not sure how well a tent will hold up to hail that breaks windshields. Barry

Most troops in Oklahoma been there and done that a few times. It's not always cut and dried and the risk of moving 100 scouts and scouters can certainly be more dangerous than leaving in the tents. I will say that lightning was my greatest fear as a SM, and a member of high adventure crews. Of course Tornados are a risk here in Oklahoma. We had one patrol on a patrol campout that abandoned their camp in the middle of the night so they could drive out of harms way. There was no damage to the camp when they got back, but it was close. We had a huge storm during a Camporee with lightning hits all around, but the only unit that moved was the one on the hill. They stayed in cars all night. The leader (cook) who slept in the camp shelter said that lightning was hitting all around and he hoped nobody was heading there to get away from the lightning. Actually the real risk was the flash flooding in the creek. So, getting low campsites can have it's own risks. I don't think there is an easy answer short of cancelling due to forecast. But, storms are so common in Oklahoma, troops would rarely get out. The most damage our group has incurred over the years was broken tent poles during 50mph winds at Philmont. The hail was eye opening as well. By coincidence, Oklahoma is getting fire danger warning and 50 mph winds as I write this post. What is a troop supposed to do? Barry

And then what? No we don't have to have that discussion. The Oath and Law set how to judge others around us. Anything more is about who is judging, not the person being judged. The uniform code is specific. The discussion is really about how lenient we should be to ignoring the code. If you really want to pull your fitness generalizations, or rather unfitness, that is on you. My experience is youth are more accepting of other peoples physical and mental abilities and disabilities than adults. Ironic since adults generally view themselves as idealistic role models. Scouting is a great program for youth until the adults get involved. Barry

Wow! Let's see; long hair, ear-ring, nose ring, tattoos, body odor, bad breath. I guess we like to talk inclusion, but when it gets down to it,........ I think this discussion took a left turn into somewhere scary. Barry

I don't know Latin Scot, I've watch a lot of scouts ask adults about their knots with a real curiosity. You may be offended with the appearance, but a lot of folks are very passionate about their scouting experiences and express it different ways. I agree with qwaze that when folks push the guidelines, "neat appearance" should be the overall guideline. I once watched a one legged scouter at the Council Scout Show, show off his wooden peg leg that had dozens of scout camp brands and signatures all over it. If a scout asked kindly, he might even let them sign it. He was very popular with the scouts. I don't remember what his uniform looked like.😂 Barry

Yes, well this could be a Pandora's box. What if the unit choses to only recruit one gender? One member on this forum adamantly pushed letting units choose as long as they include both genders. His point was that since the BSA membership now includes both genders, they must recruit both genders. I think that is called bait and switch. Barry