Zahnada

Actually, as opposed to saying, "Nobody will agree with all of this" I prefer to say "Everyone will agree with part of this." I know there were parts that made me cringe a bit and parts that made me laugh. But I think it was all in good fun.

Now the way I heard the story was that a woman approached Churchill at a party.

Woman: Why Mr. Churchill, I do believe you are drunk.

Churchill: And you are ugly, madam. But I shall be sober in the morning.

How could such a man be voted out of office just months after the end of the war?

Another Churchill gem-

"The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter."

Well at least I'm fairly positive that the people responsible for this don't lie very often. It's just such a horrible lie. 20 people with the last name "Doe"? At least use "Smith" or "Williams" or something besides the standard name for a person without a name.

Also, I feel the real damage by this will be between BSA and their continually declining relationship with United Way. I know people in this forum like to complain about the United Way, but they are still a major donor to scouting. It sounds like they were giving quite a bit of money to the local Alabama council, but that will all be reevaluated now. And that's too bad. In an effort to secure more funding for the area, these people may have just lost a major donor. And who gets hurt by this? Always the boys.

And after all that, the school now has a tree dancing around during games. So I have to agree with Rooster that the tree is innane, but I don't think they're bucking the system or trying to look intelligent.

And is anyone going to answer EagleInKY's trivia question because I'm really curious (and too lazy to do a search of mascots)? I know for the NBA, the Jazz and the Magic are singular names.

But can "Cardinal" really be considered a mascot? You can't very well have a dancing color red cheering your team on. Who comes up with this stuff?

Well, while we're sidetracked on marching bands, I would like to say that the Stanford Marching Band doesn't require it's members to play instruments. It's members don't even have to go to Stanford. I've seen people banging on kegs, washboards, cardboard boxes or just running around. And they're still considered an NCAA marching band in the Pac-10. Come to think of it, they don't even march.

Not that this has anything to do with atheism. Or maybe it does since the band recently got into trouble for making fun of poligemy during a halftime show against BYU.

I for one, support BSA's right and decision in this membership policy, but something in this conversation has been troubling me.

Unc said, "I have a problem with the term "Religious Discrimination" that's getting tossed about. Atheism means they do believe there is and Deity to believe in. It may be a strong belief, but it is not a religion."

From what I gather, some atheists and theists worry about the slippery slope of this argument. Personally, I feel the BSA does practice religious discrimination because atheism only exists in response to theism. It is a view of religion. Now, I also feel BSA is completely justified to practice this form of discrimination just as they are justified to practice pedophile discrimination (I purely used both terms for example, not for association).

The danger comes from saying, "It's not religious discrimination to not welcome an atheist because they have no religion." Then exactly what kind of discrimination is it? It's akin to saying, "Atheists just don't count on our moral spectrum so they can't be discriminated against." I think everyone can see where this rationale can lead (I won't draw a Holocaust analogy).

Now, don't get me wrong. I don't think anyone in this forum goes out and throws rocks at the atheist neighbor.

But atheists are human too and I feel some of these arguments a dehumanizing. I certainly hope these feelings aren't being passed to the boys whom we teach by example.

I once had a private message conversation with a poster who felt they were being bullied by others in this forum. When they first joined, they had a very strong debate with some of the "senior" members of the forum. Afterward, he felt as if nothing he posted was ever right and that certain members would pick him out and criticize his posts. But it seemed as if they were only criticizing because of him and not because of the content of the actual post.

He felt as if he couldn't make meaningful contributions to the forum because certain members would rip apart anything he posted. He just wanted to start anew.

Would it be wrong for this poster to register a new name and completely shed his old identity?

Under such circumstances, if he never used the old name again, I think this would be an appropriate course of action.

nldscout,

I think we're pretty much in agreement that the United States is in a no-win situation with regards to much of our foreign aid policy. And both of us are free to donate wherever we feel is more important. But to me, this current situation in SE Asia goes beyond money and it goes beyond world perception of the US. I've heard that they estimate 116,000 dead now and that many more will die because of illness and starvation. I feel as members of the human race, the United States (and every other nation) should be rushing to the aid of their fellow man. I hope the US turns a deaf ear to the criticism and continues to help those in need.

nldscout and Hops,

I too am tired of all the strife given to the US because we either do too much in the world or too little. But criticism comes naturally with the role we've assumed as world protector. I'm also very thankful that the US has stepped up and assumed such a role because with our vast industry and economy, we can help more than anyone else.

However, I feel your responses of "Let someone else do the work then" are misguided. This action (or inaction) would only hurt the thousands who are suffering in Southeast Asia. It would give more ammunition to anti-American sentiment in the world. Personally, I don't care what people think of the US as long as I am convinced we are doing what's best.

We've gotten stuck in a battle over terms and words. First of all, PR is very complicated. People spend years trying to learn this field (and they get paid good money for it too). It combines communication, psychology, sociology and probably a few other areas. They are professionals.

But there's also a flip side to PR that's apparent from just looking at the term. Public Relations involves relating to the public. Every idea generated on this thread demonstrates the troop trying to relate back to the public whether it be by being active and just following the program, to getting the names and pictures of the latest Eagles into the paper.

These troop level methods of relating back to the public I feel are powerful in keeping the Boy Scout image alive in the community. It also helps the troop because I've seen the motivational power that seeing an Eagle in the paper can have on the younger scouts.

However, PR done at the troop level should not extend beyond the troop level. What I mean by this is that councils and districts have people responsible for issuing press releases, designing public service announcements, giving stories to the media, etc.

This past summer, the television station I work for had me produce a PSA for the local council. I met with several members of their PR department and learned exactly what kind of message they wanted to send out to the public. If I had gone on my own, it would have had a very different focus and probably wouldn't have been as effective because I didn't have the luxury of access to their market research.

So the point is, use your friends at the district and council when you can.

"Zahnada

Seems like you are running away from something you started, whats up with that.

You asked for an example I gave you one, but you do not like it, I do not understand, why you asked for something, and than say you do not agree with something you asked for. Whats up with that."

Dan,

I would much prefer to hold these conversations in PM, but I guess I'll reply since you called me out in public.

To answer your questions, I am running away from something I started because it is no longer the thread I started. I'm perfectly willing to discuss my original question through PM. But now, things are so bitter that I feel any post will be ripped apart and criticized based on semantics or other non-substantive criteria.

As for your example of a program change, it is what I asked for. I did ask for changes that have worked, and in the mind of the scoutmaster in question, apparently it has worked. Never have I said that I would agree with all changes and support them. I do not like that change and I would never implement such a change in a troop or support such implementation. This is not contradictory on my part. I just evaluated the change and didn't like it.

I feel this conversation has gotten increasingly nasty and will continue along this route. Therefore, I intend to say my piece and then depart.

To start, Dan, I do not agree with what the scoutmaster of the troop has done by adding requirements to the Life Rank.

I feel that the people responding to this thread have been portrayed in a black-and-white manner. There's the staunch, immobile, program conservationists on one side and the anarchist, do-what-you-want, program tinkerers on the other.

Here's my view of this topic. The BSA program is wonderful and it has been proven to work in millions of cases. But, as I mentioned before, nothing man-made is perfect and the BSA is no exception. Part of our job as leaders is to constantly evaluate the effectiveness of the program we are giving the youth under us. Here are the steps I would use when delivering the BSA program.

1. Deliver the program by the book.

2. Evaluate the program's success (what criteria depends on what aspect of the program). For my previous example of JLTC, I and others evaluated that boys were not having fun and they were not effectively learning leadership skills. Something was failing.

3. Return to the program. Read the materials, ask the professionals for help. Do everything possible to make sure that what you're delivering is the BSA program in its entirety. Make sure the leaders are following it.

4. Evaluate again.

5. If you still feel that something's failing, try to nail down what the exact problem is.

6. Return to the program. Research that problem and ask the professionals again. Is there a solution to the problem within the program?

7. Experiment. Try something new.

8. Evaluate the alterations.

Naturally, #7 is what the forum is arguing about. I realize that it is a very slippery slope to change one thing and then change more. I realize that once you've fallen down that slippery slope, you're no longer giving the BSA program. However, as leaders we should always be evaluating and searching for improvement. Usually that improvement can be found within the BSA literature. Usually alterations are not necessary and should definitely be avoided.

97% of the time I would agree with Bob White that adults who alter the program are doing a disservice to their youth. However, as with the case of JLTC, I feel that the old program did them more of a disservice. The changes we made created a better learning environment and a more enjoyable experience for the youth. I'm rather vindicated that BSA has also chosen to rewrite JLTC and search for improvements.

Program changes should be small and rare, but good can come of them.

If anyone wants to discuss this with me further, please PM me. I have found that for the more tense topics, Private Messaging is often more productive and informative. There appears to be a battle commensing on this thread and I would rather remove myself now.

Bob, please read all my post before you criticize.

Quoted from myself, "And now BSA is gearing up to release a new Junior Leader Training. Although we have had great success with our version, we will definitely give the new one its chance "by the book.""

Well, anyway, back to our regularly scheduled thread...

As some of you know, I've been very active with JLTC here for many years. The course always followed BSA's program "by the book" doing everything word for word. It was like this for quite some time and nobody ever questioned it because it was always much easier just to present the BSA course and assume it was working. Then a friend and I decided to start actively evaluating the success of the course and we discovered that the boys attending were not only not having much fun, they were hardly learing anything. The course was too class-heavy with not enough activities that solidified understanding. Concepts weren't presented in conjunction with activities in a manner logical to boys.

So we spent the summer and much of the next year pouring over the course guide and finally ripping it up and redesigning the course page by page. Everything got moved around, activities were added, classes were cut for length. We kept the 11 Skills of Leadership, but we trimmed much of the fat from them so that certain key points were easier to remember. I won't get into the details of what the new course looked like (if you're interested, send me a PM), but we instituted the basic idea that for each skill, there would first be a learning experience, then a class that would refer back to the experience, then application of the skill.

We had some pretty strict evaluation of the course for our own purposes. Certainly, we've finetuned over the years, but on the whole, boys were having a blast. They also walked away from the course remembering and utilizing more leadership and scouting skills than before. It was so successful that home troop scoutmasters and even parents could tell the difference.

To make a long story short, I don't believe anything made by man is perfect. The BSA program is pretty darned close though. However, we can't just close our eyes and blindly follow it without constantly evaluating "Is this working? Is there a better way?" I think often, we will find that there is not a better way (which is why responses to this thread that are on topic are understandably low). But scouting has not reached perfection yet.

And now BSA is gearing up to release a new Junior Leader Training. Although we have had great success with our version, we will definitely give the new one its chance "by the book."

There's been a lot of criticism about the thread that this one was spun from. Many posters feel the thread was more of a set-up than a discussion.

So now I ask the question from a different angle. When have you altered/experimented with the program and met with success? What were some new things you've tried that actually worked?

Oh, I got one!

The troop I'm affiliated with used to try that whole boy-run thing. Boy, big mistake. Those kids kept doing things wrong. They were never organized enough, they were always making mistakes. Complete disaster. And then we adults always had to waste time by guiding them. Ugh.

So we got rid of boy leadership. Adults ran everything and the meetings went almost completely smooth. But kids were still kind of loud so we just got rid of the boys. Now we have a perfect troop. And we owe it all to not following the program.

Trailpounder,

Was that really necessary when answering a new forum member's question?

amie,

I'll try to respond as best I can. Hopefully it won't require much more explanation because this topic has traditionally been a hot one on this forum and a lot of us would like to be done with it.

First and foremost, BSA is a private organization (which was verified by the Supreme Court) and as such, BSA has the right to set their own membership policies and restrictions.

So the real question is why have they decided that gays have no place in scouting? Here are some reasons, and anyone who can think of others are free to add them. The BSA website gives the specific reasons, but I'll try to summarize all the reasons I've heard from various members:

1. Safety- gays in scouting would represent a physical risk to our youth. This argument will occasionally draw parallels between gays and sex offenders or child molesters.

2. Bad example- This is a morality argument that may or may not stem from religious beliefs. Basically, it says that gays are immoral and so as leaders, to allow gays to be scouting members would be condoning their lifestyle by ommision. This argument connects to the discussions about letting unmarried, pregnant women be leaders.

3. Conversion- This is an argument that believes all (or most) gays to be activists. Sex really doesn't have a place in scouting. Some feel that if gays are admitted they will then either recruit others to become gay or make their sexuality an issue. This hurts the program whether it's a gay person or a straight person who brings sex into scouting.

4. Gays are just not scouting material- This is a bit of an add-on to "Bad Example" in that it also focuses on morality. This argument will say that gays are immoral people, and therefore they are just not who we want to have around. Look at this argument the same way you would view the anti-atheist argument. If gays are immoral than they are counter to the Scout Oath and Law and therefore cannot be scouts.

So that's what I can come up with for reasons. You don't have to agree with them, but you should understand that many people have very strong feelings about those arguments in this issue.

I hope this helps.

I've seen a variety of great music used during Eagle Courts. John Williams' "Theme from Superman" was used once and prompted the SM to open his speech by saying "I'd like to remind these young gentlemen that it's 'Eagle' Scout not 'Ego' Scout."

Someone once got a soundtrack of TV themes and used songs like the Muppet Themesong or Looney Tunes during parts of their court. I've also heard several marches like "Bridge on the River Kwai", "William Tell" and other Western themes.

I always like it when the songs actually had some meaning during the scout's experiences in the troop. One group of guys always sang "Yellow Submarine" so the song also found its way into their Eagle Ceremony.

My advice is let the music fit the scout. Famous classical songs will work for some people and will go along with their pictures. Marches will work for other people. Oldies, TV themes, humorous songs, etc might fit someone else's scouting career.

I shamefully pass on the title of "Forum Math King" to scoutldr. I only held the position for a matter of hours, but I now realize I became currupt with power.

All Hail the New King!

I actually meant to put a little smiley face next to my last post. You're forgiven, Unc. I remember once in college, I was with a bunch of guys and we had just finished some kind of activity/ community service. We were given a pan of coffee cake and we all sat down and grabbed a piece. Then one guy says, "I know someone's going to hit me, but did anyone notice that we managed to eat the cake into the periodic table?" And sure enough, the remaining pieces were in the shape of the table of elements.

Then someone hit him.

I'm going to post this despite the risk of getting booed right out of the forum. But I beg all of you to offer me the freedom of speech to say this. Of course you all may judge me accordingly once I have said my piece, but I hope you are all understanding that my following comment is only for the benefit of the forum that we have all become a part of.

So here goes...

Isn't a tangent a concept from trigonometry and not geometry?

Thanks Laurie!

I do take the occasional break from the forum so I understand where Eamonn and Bob are coming from. And I haven't even been involved in any heated confrontations lately.

I'll be honest, I find the arguing very intriguing and it definitely grabs my attention and interest. However, I also find that the constant backbiting, politics, and insults that fly at times in this forum actually diminishes my own appreciation of scouts. There are times when I read a thread and say, "This is from the organization I grew up loving?"

There's only one solution. Pack your bags, take a break from the forum, and go hang out with the boys.

So while I hope some of our departed members return, I also hope they make the most of their "vacation."

Everybody calm down. Bob White will be back. I actually wouldn't be surprised if he's reading these forums everyday and sending out massive amounts of PMs to answer questions. He'll come back.

The two I'm concerned about are Eamonn and dsteele. I have a lot of respect for those two. They have so much knowledge and experience and they are both really great guys. I really hope they decide to return someday because we can all learn a lot from those two.

It's amazing how this forum can create an argument when none exists.

Bob, let's look at the original post that started this discussion about sheath knives being "cool".

"Ah...we have forgotten what it is like to be a boy. Sheath knives are cool. We allow them on non-district, non-council events (council and district usually ask that sheath knives not be used on events they run but allow them according to BSA policy otherwise). They are seldom used since pocket knives usually have more utility around camp but it doesn't matter. They're cool. Doesn't matter if they never get used. They're just cool. If you don't understend that then you don't understand boys. They were cool when I was 12 and in my experience that hasn't changed. Teach the boys how to use knives (and axes and bow saws). Don't let them wear them when playing capture the flag if you are concerned about the knife stabbing a boy through the scabbard (I have never witnessed or even heard of a bona fide account of that, by the way, in my admittedly limited 42 years association with Scouting). Let's not be too PC and wimpy. We have enough of that already."

Now Bob, this post has no disregard for safety. It's not saying anything about "if it feels cool, do it." And I would say that the poster is making the case that "coolness" is the definitive criteria for carrying a sheath knife. He doesn't even say anything about using sheath knives when they're obviously the wrong tool for the job. Actually, he recognizes that sheath knives are seldom used because they aren't the right tool. That leaves me to believe that his troop is properly instructing the boys in the use of edged tools in a safe and constructive manner.

I think you need to read the original post more carefully, Bob. One of the questions raised in this discussion is, "Why should boys have a sheath knife?" The poster answered with one reason in an honest and practical manner. He never implies that coolness trump safety. He never claims that coolness determine everything in life. But coolness is a reason for many of a boy's actions and we cannot ignore that. As scouters, we need to make that coolness constructive. I see no harm in what the original post says.