NJCubScouter

Yeah, and you can keep going with that sequence, I'll be there soon enough. I like to call myself a "Life for Life".

Assuming you are talking about STEM, a significant portion of the people who live (as I do) in the Greater New York Metropolitan area wouldn't mind if it was METS. Not a majority, though.

In what forum is that the rule? Not Scouter.com. Discussions that actually relate to the teaching and practice of the 12th point of the Scout law can be in other sections of the forum. But when they devolve into "...and therefore certain kids or adults cannot be involved in Scouting" or "my-religion-is-better-than-yours", as they often do, then yes, they end up in I&P. And when a thread in I&P that relates to Scouting (like this one), seems to be veering off on a tangent into something that has nothing to do with Scouting, as this one did (specifically in cyclops' reaction to one of DavidCO's statements), then it also belongs in I&P... but not in this thread.

There have been some mentions here of Lone Scouting. Unless Maric's former troop is the only troop available in the area, I don't think his situation meets the guidelines for when Lone Scouting is appropriate. See http://www.scouting.org/filestore/boyscouts/pdf/511-420.pdf (page 4, middle section) Eagle is not supposed to be a study-at-home course, unless it really has to be. And in this case there is no indication that it really has to be.

Maybe they should rename it EDGER. That doesn't have the same ring to it. REDGE? That sounds too much like a person's name. We have to keep thinking. After all, they (not the same "they") changed STEM to STEAM...

That's what HE said, see: I would not have used the word "cope" otherwise. But I think what we are both saying is that he does not merely have to "cope" or "muddle through" but can choose to try to go back there and make things better, if that option is still open to him.

Maric, Others have given you good advice on how to find a new troop if you want one. As for whether you should go back to your old troop and "cope", that is something only you can answer. Nobody here has, or can ever really have, anywhere near as much information as you do about what you have been experiencing. I think it also depends on "how" you left, in other words, good terms, bad terms or somewhere in between. If you think you would be welcomed back, maybe you should have a discussion with the troop leaders and see if your concerns can be addressed to your satisfaction, including (as others have suggested) you becoming part of the solution to the problems. And, Welcome to the forums! Sorry your first post has to be under these circumstances.

Since this is a Scouting-related thread, I strongly suggest that it stay that way. If anyone wants to continue to debate about the history of the Roman Catholic church (unless it relates directly to some stand the church may have taken on transgender issues), please start a new thread. I suppose transgender issues in general are within bounds since they may relate to how Scouting should deal with the subject.

Yes Stosh, we know, if we let this young person be a Cub Scout, all of Western Civilization will come crashing down around us. Or has it crashed already? Often when I read your writing, the breadth of the calamity that has already befallen us is so overwhelming that I can't tell what's still standing. It's amazing that we're still walking around. As for "coed Scouting", meaning Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts, I have expressed my opinion in several past threads, that it would be best if boys are served by Cub and Boy Scouting and girls by Girl Scouting. This kid from Secaucus NJ is not an exception. The issue he presents is who we consider to be a "boy". As I have said, the GSUSA's "case by case basis" policy seems pretty good. Yes, you are. As well you should be.

Perhaps not really related to the prior discussions, but I think this is an important point. The BSA recently spent about 15 years being defined (in the mind of most of the public) by the issue of who can stay in and who gets kicked out. I don't think the BSA benefited from that. Is National sending us back there again? And having nothing at all to do with anything, why do the "test cases" all seem to come from New Jersey?

Actually, I don't think any of that. I don't think he is seeking surgery and I don't think any responsible physician would perform it. The idea of surgery came from a post by qwasze to which you responded, here: http://scouter.com/index.php/topic/28705-trans-scouting/?p=447571 The relevant part of your response did not seem to be about this particular child, but about "kids" in general, including those who would be considerably older. Sentinel has suggested that I misunderstood your post, and I am willing to accept that, although I think you misunderstood mine as well.

He doesn't want to be King of the World. He wants to be a Cub Scout.

I don't get it either. I am not well-versed in the medical or psychological aspects of the subject. As a "gut" feeling, I would agree with you that it seems premature to conclude that an eight-year-old is transgender. It certainly seems premature to be talking about any medical treatment that is difficult or impossible to reverse, and way premature to be talking about surgery (a sub-topic that seems to have been introduced into this thread by accident.) But that still leaves the question, what does the BSA do when this young person wants to join a Cub Scout pack rather than a Brownie troop? This young person says he's a boy, his parents say he's a boy, his school apparently says he's a boy, and maybe there are medical/psychological professionals who say he's a boy. (One of the many things we don't know from the article is the process by which all these people concluded that this young person is a boy. There have been a lot of assumptions by posters in this thread as to how and why that happened, but we have no facts on the subject.) The BSA says no, the birth certificate says he's a girl, so he's a girl. (It's so difficult to write about this while maintaining proper grammar.) He can be a Venturer when he's old enough, but he cannot be a Cub Scout now or a Boy Scout later. And that judgment does not seem to be based on the idea of "prematurity", because it appears that even when he is considerably older (say, 16), and still considers himself a boy, the BSA will still consider him a girl. So he can be a Venturer, but not a Boy Scout. I don't know with certainty what the right policy is, but I don't think the BSA does at this point either. That being the case, if there is a Cub Scout pack that is willing to accept this boy as a boy, I don't think the BSA should prevent them from doing so.

Stosh, I don't think you understand what the issue is here. The question is not whether he is heterosexual or not. The question is whether he should be treated as a boy or as a girl.

I don't see what this has to do with the topic, but my answer would be that you have not asked a question that can be answered. Technically you have not asked a question at all, but if the question is, "Did I get it right", there can be no answer until we know what "it" is. Or you could be asking the question four different times, in which case the answers are Yes, No, Yes, Yes. Context also matters. If you are an engineer designing an airplane and you get one out of every four equations wrong, I want to be on a different airplane.

I am not going to re-argue the idea of "Don't Ask Don't Tell" in general. We had many debates about it in the context of the "gay issue." It's a nice phrase, but in practice it signified the exclusion of a particular group. In the situation that this thread is about, "Don't Ask Don't Tell" is irrelevant. The article linked in the original post tells us that this boy is 8 years old (so presumably in the second or third grade at school) and "has been living as a boy for more than a year." So he (using only male pronouns here to avoid confusion) started school "living as a girl" and then sometime in the first or second grade started "living as a boy." He was also "accepted as a boy at school", the article says. Presumably the other children noticed this change, and probably some mentioned it to their parents. So just the fact of this happening meant that it was not a secret, and the article confirms that it was "not a secret." So there was no "telling" to be done. Everybody knew.

Thank you for posting that. One of the Boy Scouts on that date was my father, at the age of 15.

There's a hint there of a statement made during wartime, and it sounds like how FDR spoke, so I am guessing him, sometime during WW2.

This strikes me as kids bein' kids, and seeking after attention in da way that happens to work for 'em. Used to be it was Rock and Roll, or long hair, or green hair. So Beavah, you're saying that kids are seeking surgery on their private parts without really needing it, just to get attention? I guess I should be glad my generation chose "Rock and Roll" instead. But I didn't know we were listening to it just to get attention. I thought we just liked the music. I am amazed at the level of sheer nonsense that I am reading in this thread, but I guess I shouldn't be.

It's deja vu all over again. I am not concerned about "trouble" from "activists." There are still some people ("activists", if you like) who don't like the fact that BSA gave the option to religious-organization CO's to continue to exclude openly gay adult leaders in 2015. I supported it at the time and I still support it, because I thought it was the best thing for the BSA and the youth it serves. So far, it has held up. Let's just make the right decision, and the "activists" (on both sides) can do what they wish.

I thought you were also talking about the parents of the youths who are in this situation. If not, I apologize for the misunderstanding.

Of course, there is always "local option." Here we are again.

Well, I think I understand what Eagledad is saying there. If a young person is going down the "wrong path" by deciding to live life as the gender that does not match his birth certificate, by excluding that person from Scouting the leaders will not "contribute" to the young person going further down the "wrong path." But it always comes back to the assumption that the young person is going down the "wrong path." In Eagledad's view there is no room for the other possibility, which is that the path being taken by the young man in this article is, for him, the "right path". If indeed it is, it is probably still going to be a very bumpy path, and in that case we as leaders CAN make a contribution - a positive contribution, to a hopefully positive future for this young person.

I will readily admit that I, too, am not certain that an 8-year-old has the ability to make this determination. But what if he is? You say "Do no harm", but if what she (in this case) is really correct and you force her to pretend to be something she is not? For how long? Ten years, until she is an adult? Not to be overly dramatic, but I think there's a good chance she wouldn't live that long.

But how do you know it's "deception"? I really don't think this has anything to do with religion or morals or ethics. Based on a small amount of reading I have just done, it appears that a very small number of people (about 0.3 to 0.6 percent) are certain that their gender does not match the gender that was "assigned" at birth based on their physical attributes. Isn't it possible that this very small number of people are "wired" differently than the rest of us? Who am I (or you) to say it's not possible?