BSA24

> ever be surprised by the conduct of one scouter to another.

> bsa really does tolerate some horrendous conduct directed

> from adults to adults

I too was appalled by the behavior of scouters toward one another when I first got involved as an adult leader. Interrupting, stating opinions as facts, telling other people what to do boldly...

For the sake of discussion, let's group leaders into two groups: grown up boy scouts and everyone else. The grown up boy scouts still do a good turn every day before they go to bed, and they still mutter the scout oath and law to themselves in the morning while getting dressed or driving to work. Scouting for them is who they are. They live it, love it, and give it.

Then there's most everyone else.

They are parents doing something for their kids, they have no motivation to be nice to each other. These are not Boy Scouts. These are mostly not volunteers who give their time to other people's children. These are mostly parents of children who take over as leaders to ensure their own kids are safe, successful, and have fun. Not all, but most.

And in the Scouts, gone are all of the PC behavior controls present in the workplace. The restrictions on talking politics and religion, the restrictions on telling someone to shove it. None of that is there. Then you get a guy who is used to being the boss at work, and he starts barking orders or doing his best Steve Carrell impersonation with the other leaders, and they forcefully and loudly push back and remind him they don't work for him.

Most of these parents don't care about proper uniforming. They don't care about the oath, law, or any traditions of scouting. They only care about their son's success and safety. That's all they are there for. Yes, they may make some decent den leaders and cubmasters as side effect of their desires, but they are definitely not there to please the other unit's leaders.

So when cubmaster billy bob from pack 1 yells for Mary den leader of pack 2 to come here or makes some joke at her expense, she gets torqued around the axle and starts politicking against the guy with other leaders.

I used to be horrified. Maybe I still should be. I see units where this doesn't happen inside the unit, but apparently, many of us only behave at work because of the threat of being fired. Once that threat is removed, we push to the next available boundary and our behavior resides there.

It is sad, but I think it is unrealistic to expect boy scout behavior from people who are not boy scouts in spirit. They are adult leaders - and that's not the same.

BSA is big on training, but the training is all on how to deliver the program. There is no training left that asks the leaders to do scouting themselves any longer. That's all gone bye-bye and scout leaders, particularly cub scout leaders, are not big scouts. They are often peewee parents making sure billy gets all the badges.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfxYR2hgBV0&feature=fvwrel

Which tribe is it where the guy in the war bonnet walks around with his arms folded in front of him?

Which tribe used the traditional native battery method to spark a fire instantly

Bonus question:

Which tenet of Youth Protection do you see violated in this video?

I've been a member of the OA for decades, and I've never seen anything but this sort of thing at OA ceremonies in all that time. I've never seen any actual native americans assisting with anything in the OA. Maybe that is a local thing. By native american, I mean someone who grew up within native culture, who speaks the native language as a first language, not a second, not someone like me who is 1/4 of something other than Irish/English/German/Polish.

Does it matter if this is done properly and authentically if the reasons for doing it are entertainment and the costumes being worn have symbols on them (akin to the Eagle Scout medal) that the boys have not earned in that tribe and have no right to wear?

For reference:

http://imgur.com/ndaaZ

Here's a chart showing BSA's annual total traditional membership counts since 1960. The total includes cubs, boy scouts, venturing/exploring (before learning for life came along) and adult leaders in traditional units.

There are some good ideas posted here. I see a lot of "make a good program" comments. Unfortunately, program retains but does not attract. "Build it and they will come" doesn't work. Build it, and no one will know you built it, and very few will come.

I think there are two major problems: Marketing and Conduct of Business.

It is marketing that is missing that attracts youth. BSA is very, very weak at marketing.

What is BSA's brand in the market right now?

Who is the target audience?

What sorts of surveys are run on those who are in the target markets and audience (not members) to find out their perceptions and reasons for not joining?

How many TV ads for BSA have you seen that portrayed it as something tough and cool to do?

How many radio ads for BSA have you heard?

How many web ads have you seen off of BSA related sites?

Answer for me: I am not aware that any of this is being done. Instead, BSA has an unadvertised web site that any amateur web designer could have built, provides no forums, no ability to comment, no links to outside volunteer sources, no sense of community. I've seen no ads for anything to do with BSA. I have heard no ads. No billboards. No nothing.

The company I work for in my day job does the opposite in all of these categories. They flood the market with ads, we survey people who don't use us and ask why not, and we have programs specifically tied to turning customer opinion around about us.

I think conduct of business is another major hurdle to success for the scouts. Someone mentioned that a leader wanted to skype into round table. That's a good point. People working in companies with technology are working from home all day. The conference call and web chat for every meeting. They never travel. They never do anything in person any longer. Then along comes BSA who wants a paper check and can't take paypal, only has in-person committee meetings, no conference calls, short office hours, paper applications, and scout shops and program centers located 40 miles away from the average scout parent.

BSA is conducting business 1995 style - at best - both in terms of technology and work style. BSA employees still work out of an office. Why? What do they need an office for? BSA still uses paper applications? Why? I don't even use paper to pay my taxes any longer.

I think BSA has to wake up and respect the parents' lifestyle more instead of trying to stick their chin out and insist on the parents changing. The parents are not going to change. They need to be able to dial into unit committee meetings, not come in person. Round table does not need to be in-person - not unless you are going to hold it a maximum of five miles away from every leader in the area. Most people can't drive in today's traffic to get to round table after work any distance.

I think that marketing BSA better would attract more members. Conducting business where applicable in a 21st century method would probably help some more.

We can't have it both ways. We can't hold to principles and say that we don't care if not every boy joins and hope to help produce a useful number of good citizens to impact our country in the future in a positive way. Without big numbers, our members are embarrassed of belonging. Without big numbers, we can't pay for these outrageous scout camps we have everywhere.

There is a certain size below which BSA will not be able to operate any longer. It will devolve into a popcorn selling company with kids in t-shirts meeting once a month to visit the zoo or stay in a cabin. That's what happened to the girl scouts, and they have as many members as BSA does today. I think BSA is using FOS to slow down the decline, but it won't work forever.

> Who is doing the creative statics??

No one. The Eagle Award is given out far more frequently today than previously. The membership numbers are falling, and a higher percentage of boys are receiving the award. 4% instead of the previous

Deleted previous comment.

I really can't tell what this story is about. I tried to read it twice, but it is such a badly written wall of text that it is impossible to make out what the issue is.

However, after reading it, I was reminded of a common problem of the den leader mom who wants to be an ASM in a chauvinist boy scout troop.

I've had a few of these angry phone calls over the years. "I was a den leader for five years, and now my little Billy is in that troop and I am supposed to be his scoutmaster and they won't let me." Then following that is a lot of accusations and drama designed to make it all look far worse than it was.

Usually what has really happened is that Den Leader "Mom" was told that all of the ASM's are old eagle scouts, and the troop doesn't want "Mom" as a leader.

"Mom" is highly offended and has enjoyed helicoptering over her children to date as their leader. Now she's cut off and all of the scout leaders are paranoid control freaks with psychological problems.

I have no idea if that is the situation with this person who is posting here, because only an Egyptologist will ever figure out what that obelisk of pictographs above is trying to tell us.

But it is an interesting situation worth discussing. It happens a lot.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> I am sure that members of the African

> Scouting Associations have native influences

> in their ceremonies, much as we do do here

> in the USA.

Do you think white South Africans do that?

> I've met a lot of folks who had no problems

> with the OA.

Back in the 1970's, a frat at my college was doing black-face dances as part of their ritual. They all said the same thing... they know some black people who don't mind. Black people helped them come up with it. It's not offensive if they can find a guy who thinks it is awesome.

I don't see what dressing up in fake Indian gear (I've never seen anything that looks like the native dress of any particular tribe in any of our OA events) and doing fake drumming and fake dances has to do with Boy Scouts, being an honor society, or giving service to others.

Just seems like very valuable and hard-to-come-by time is being spent pretending we are Indians or that we are somehow special and accepted as part Indian or Indian like (no, we're not, folks. Get real)... wouldn't this time be better spent working on other things that are so frequently brought up on these forums?

With everyone claiming youth and adults have little time to do scouting at all, am I really going to drive my son to a scout camp so he can make a fake headgear with some overweight white guy who is absolutely not an an athropologist or native historian and then fake dance around a fire or do fake ceremonies? No, I'm not going to do that. That's insane.

If you really feel confident about native acceptance of these practices, put together a team, and head to your local reservation, and get on a sidewalk, and start performing. See how that works out for you.

I think that frat that did the blackface dancing would have fared similarly in Harlem.

We had a native family in our pack a few years ago. They saw an OA ceremony with drums and dress for the boys to receive their bobcat, and boy did we hear from them afterward about that. They were NOT happy, and NOT supportive.

If scouting is fun with a purpose - I see no purpose for the fake native stuff.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> BSA claims to want experienced instructors,

> but them goes out of the way to discourage

> the people with the experience.

BSA prioritizes avoiding lawsuit risk over the program in everything they do.

Your den leader lied. Time to discuss with the CC and CM whether or not to go to the COR and ask that the leader be removed. You'll have to decide this yourselves.

As to what to do with the boy, I don't know. The youth is innocent and should not suffer for it, but clearly cannot meet later Webelos requirements that he be out of the 4th grade for 6 months or 10.5 yrs of age to get the AOL. Eventually this catches up with him, so someone should do something with him now that is constructive.

I have a problem with the Cub Scout advancement program overall. I think I prefer the way it worked a long time ago when I was a kid. It was simpler, less confusion about badges. You joined a den. The den was run by den leaders. You earned your little bobcat pin when you joined. You then worked on Wolf, Bear, and Lion at your own pace and arrow points for all three.

You could then earn your webelos badge (now called the arrow of light). There were no belt loops, no webelos pins, no sports and academics pins, no outdoor activity award, no summertime award, no progress toward ranks, no paw print with beads that fall off and go everywhere, no tiger badge that goes where the newer webelos badge was supposed to go. The uniform and badges were simple, and the boys all stayed together with their friends.

The dens were largely constructed around friendships and locality. So, you didn't worry about the school year ending or changing neckerchiefs, or any of that.

There were no crossover ceremonies, either. You just got your webelos badge and you were done. I remember getting mine and wearing it on my uniform for a long time before I went to a Boy Scout troop.

I'm not sure what the motivation is for having a complex program of badges for cubs. The boys cannot comprehend it. They have no idea what to earn next.

I'd like to see dens formed in 1st grade, and then boys work on wolf, bear, and lion - finally the AOL/Webelos badge at their own pace however they like until they are old enough to join the boy scouts.

Probably the joining age for boy scouts should roll back to 9 years old to 14 as keeping 16 year olds and older around doesn't happen so much any more as they have "the fumes." Also, kids today are a lot less innocent than we were back in the 1960's.

I want to start a society within scouting that will use the traditions, dances, and songs of Africa. We will all dress up like Zulu, make shields with zebra skins and spears, and we will do Zulu dances.

Problems?

The two things that seem to come up over and over:

* The Great Elephant in the Room (old fashioned)

* Failure to position and perform as an organization for tough guys.

Forgetting the first one for a second, consider the tough guy aspect. Can BSA market itself as being for tough guys while it is full of nerd guys?

Or won't we have to actually require that one pull up, or maybe more, for tenderfoot, and make scouting something hard that kids cannot do?

In my area, a lot of non-profit types of organizations are firing up that are sort of ROTC based. They are paramilitary organizations for youth. They are very strict on uniforming, and the kids are required to do considerable running of obstacle courses and calisthenics.

The kids also get to shoot AR-15's instead of .22's and get to spend time on military bases.

Is that the replacement for the scouts? Is that where we went wrong? Baden Powell came up with his Handbook for Scouting as a tool to teach youth to be tough outdoorsman to make them good soldiers.

But we now prioritize their safety. Should we instead be prioritizing their capabilities instead of their safety?

> Liberals are never going to be happy with Scouting.

What about Scouts Canada, the UK, and Germany? Do their populations consider the scouts out of touch with youth culture? Are they under attack by their country's liberals?

I find all of the ceremonies in the OA to be odd.

Much like the membership policies, I find the OA's use of fake American Indian lore to be disturbingly old fashioned. I'd like to see OA reduced to a service organization that performs service within BSA in exchange for the sash, and I'd like for the OA to stop dressing boys up like fake Indians. A bunch of black and white kids dressed up in fake Indian garb mixed up from various nations (or non-existent nations) all pretending to be Spaghetti Western Hollywood-style deep voiced Indian chiefs around a fire - it's too 1950's for me. Flintstone's buffalo club. I think this is something BSA needs to ditch entirely.

I've been in the OA a long time, and the older I have gotten, the more embarrassing it is to see OA ceremonies, dancing, and drumming. It makes me blush. Yeah, there's always "that guy" who claims he is 25% Souix (he's not - he has blue eyes and white skin) or that the ceremonies are validated by real Indian ceremony teams (they are not) or that the Delaware Indians have approved of all of this (I met some who think it is very racist and really hate the chief that wrote the letter for BSA). There's always some rationalization, some justification as to why it is OK to "honor" the many hundreds of native nations of North America by teaching incorrectly how they behaved, dressing up like them, and then trying to do impressions of them during ceremonies.

I understand that it is not intentional mockery, I thought I was honoring people too when I was young and first inducted. But as time passes, and the number of actual red-skinned people I know grows around the country, the less I see this behavior as anything other than silly.

But I love the service aspect and the idea of an honor society. I just don't think Indian Lore and national honor society go together in the 21st Century.

This was the best answer, imo:

> the only people attending a Boy Scout function

> should be Scouts, registered leaders and any

> parents/guardians who are checking it out to

> see if they want to become registered leaders,

> or who are needed because there aren't enough

> registered leaders. From that standpoint,

> regardless of the aged-out Scouter's sexual

> orientation, he shouldn't be attending (and

> if guy in question has no reason to attend,

> his boyfriend especially has absolutely no

> reason to attend).

> Can you wear your Woodbadge beads with other neckerchiefs?

It depends. By that question, which of the following do you mean?

A> Will there be consequences if I wear my beads with another neckerchief?

Possibly an uninformed leader will tell you that you shouldn't do that. Your response is yours to make. Anything from "Really?" with you then taking no action they hope for to eye rolling is appropriate. You could also ask them to cite the dreaded insignia guide and show you the exact wording that forbids it.

B> Will I be in conflict with the recommendations in the insignia guide?

Don't know. Don't care. You'll have to look it up.

C> Will my beads fit with another neckerchief?

Sure. Why not.

You can wear vintage patches mix and match with the new uniform. Anything that was ever official uniforming is official uniforming today. You can wear an old square tenderfoot badge on your new uniform. It's not a big deal.

Short version: You can use whatever you like. We are just happy to have a concerned adult trying to do the right thing.

What you are running into are old boy scouts serving as adult cub scout leaders. As one myself, I find myself going back and forth. Here are some helpful (?) scenarios:

1. At round table - if it is a cub scout round table, I use the Cub Scout sign and so should the other leaders. We are playing at being cub scouts there.

2. Mixed round table - Boy Scout sign because I am a Boy Scout in my heart.

3. Pack Meeting - Cub Scout Sign - it is for the youth to silence them except for those pledging their oaths. Always the cub scout sign.... EXCEPT...

4. Webelos - always use the Boy Scout sign. Webelos are supposed to be learning about the Boy Scouts. I always started pack meetings with the Cub Scout Promise and Law of the pack, then turned to the Webelos and had them give the Boy Scout Oath and the Scout Law for our closing and use the three finger signs and salutes with them.

On the whole, all adults who register with BSA as leaders are saying that they sign onto the Scout Oath and Scout Law, and the mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to instill the Scout Oath and Scout Law in youth to prepare them for life. Therefore, it does make sense for all adult leaders to educate themselves as Boy Scouts and learn the Scout Oath and Law the Boy Scouts use as that is the core of the program.

I too was burned by this. Yes, it is a change.

It used to be that you were trained, and then had to use the training by working as an officer on a range at least once a year to keep it current. Now it expires at two years.

It's ridiculous for running a shooting sports range.

Like the other guy above me, I too am seeking NRA training and abandoning BSA as a training source so I can get a more professional training experience and not have it expire in my face.

Every time I have retrained for shooting sports, I have been more and more disappointed with the quality of the training. The last class I was in, the council employee doing the teaching pointed the "don't call it a weapon" at me and then protested my ducking by saying it wasn't loaded. He wasn't aim-pointing, careless pointing is more accurate while looking at someone else.

BSA really is not equipped to offer this training in all councils. Sometimes the training is pretty bad.

(This message has been edited by BSA24)

BSA's 2011 annual report shows continuing annual declines in membership and revenues.

The decline has been going on since the 1960's, with the number of potential youth almost doubling in the same period.

BSA's market share of youth is drastically reduced from what it was in the 1960's.

Is there ONE BIG THING that could be "fixed" to restore BSA's attraction to youth, is it many things, or is the brand burned?

Interested in your thoughts.

The number of postings here by unit leaders with trouble shows us that our commissioner program is not functioning very well at a national level. I know some of you are UC's and you do a great job, but you know you are few and far between. Most UC's are doing three other jobs, and unit leaders have no idea who their UC is, and the UC has no idea how to help them.

Agree.

If the unit commissioner is doing his job (hahahahaha - rarely happens), then they are coming to the unit's meetings every month or so, and they are attending the unit's committee meetings hopefully quarterly.

A unit commissioner is supposed to have NO OTHER JOB IN BSA. The commissioners field guide clearly tells us that commissioners shall not be unit leaders and that holding any other position in BSA is unacceptable.

However, districts continue to recruit commissioners who have multiple jobs and unit numerals on their shirts. So they are busy and the job is not done.

As a result, the acrimony within a unit, which could have been immediately addressed by the unit commissioner inside the leader meetings with gentle counsel and advice, goes straight to ultra-harsh, and leaves the unit on the brink of self-destruction by the time the DE is contacted and he sends in someone to try to do something to fix things.

Most units that district leadership become aware of as dysfunctional are, you are correct, terminal. Keeping them around is keeping a brain-dead person on life support for no reason other than to avoid the pain to pulling the plug.

Sometimes you can ask the unit to hold a leader meeting, and the commissioner can go in with the membership chair and tell them, "Guys, we're ready to yank the CO's charter. Pull it together, right here, right now, and decide who does what, or we'll ask the COR to step in and dismiss some of you or half of you to end the fighting."

Good luck getting the DE to support this. BSA makes him a salesman who has recruiting goals, and shutting down units will hit him in this pocket book. He will often fight you tooth and nail to keep a bad unit alive.

Edit: I accidentally a word.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> So, there are no people who are truly poor, only those who "choose" to be poor?

Correct. The youth certainly don't choose it, but the adults do. They make bad choices, and they are poor as a result. I used to believe I was lucky. Then I started doing social work with the poor to get others on their feet. I walked in a guilty liberal. I walked out and stopped the help with no guilt.

I watched people boost up their trucks while claiming they could not afford a tie for an interview. I saw people paying for cigarettes by the carton and smoking them like a chimney, but saying they couldn't spend $40 on christmas presents for their children. It is all about choices.

I was raised poor. I became wealthy through choices I made. I had no advantages other than I chose good decisions over poor ones. I could not afford a uniform. I chose to sell donuts at an intersection for three weekends as an 11 year old (found the idea in a 1970's Boy's Life in the back), and earned my money for my uniform.

I believe that through scouting, you can teach youth to view themselves as fully capable - not victims - not stuck - not labels - but able to personally take control of their destiny and one day walk on the moon.

They may fall short of walking on the moon, but they will be a heck of a lot better off.

Prejudiced? I believe it is prejudiced to judge all poor people as somehow completely helpless and the rest of us as amazingly lucky. We all have various levels of fortune, but America gives us opportunity to change that.

So, yeah, I require that the leaders wear the uniform down to the socks, because I believe that teaches something, and no, I don't pick on them for putting the bobcat badge in the wrong place. I don't think that teaches anything.

But thanks for the insulting, discourteous, unfriendly, and unhelpful remarks, BadenP. That was very Scout Law of you.

They can't have it both ways. It is untrustworthy and disloyal to hire gay employees, give them control of corporate finances, and then also be a member of an organization that publicly and officially states that their gay employees are immoral.

How would your black employees feel if you joined the KKK? Just because it is legal doesn't mean your company and shareholders won't ditch you to get out of a sticky political situation.

This is not about labor laws. This is about politics. CEO types are very political. As soon as this becomes a touchy subject for them, they will push BSA over the edge.

> Please don't visit my Cub Pack. I'm sure

> you would be a very unhappy camper with your attitude.

If I took it over, I'd have them all in uniform next year and prove your beliefs about their inability to obtain them are false.

I learned about this from the local baseball league. All of the parents in my pack who said they could never afford a uniform bought $300 baseball bats for their sons to play baseball. They also bought them complete baseball uniforms. Why? Because Dizzy Dean is strict on uniforming. Boys not in complete uniform at games are out of the game and can't go on the field.

> You do realize that there is NO requirement

> that Scouts or Scouters wear a uniform at all?

Yes. Our local boy scout troops apparently don't care and require the uniform strictly anyway. My unit does as well.

I've had many claims of hardship and that it is too expensive, but we've held firm on it as the local baseball league is also absolutely rigid on the uniform, and everyone finds a way to get one, apparently. I no longer am a believer in the family that can't get a uniform - since they all manage it despite initial objections.

> So how does one differentiate between

> "uniform police bullying" and "strongly pushing?"

I require the socks, pants, and shirt. We provide the neckers.

To me, uniform police tell people they can't wear an eagle dad pin, or that their knots are upside down on their shirts, or that the religious emblem goes over the left pocket, or that the oa sash can't go over the belt.

I am not concerned with the badges on the uniform. I am concerned with the actual clothing itself.

> The consensus of today is that there is only slight

> if no importance at all of uniforming.

Where is that? Our local boy scout troops all require it. They are intensely strict about it.

> The boys don't want to wear it

The boys don't want to wear the uniform when the adults are not proud to wear it and don't get on them when they do not wear it. Set foot in a local scout hut out of uniform, and everyone immediately starts in on you. "Where's your uniform, son? Did you forget something?"

They start wearing it when you hold firm on its importance and shake your head when they say they can't afford it. I've looked a parent who said they can't afford it in the eye and said, "You got cable TV? Cancel it. One month of that costs more than a uniform. You got an iphone? Sell it. You got a truck with jacked up tires? Costs about $5000 to do that to a truck. Sell it."

I am not one of those people who is sympathetic to people who choose to be poor. They need guidance in decision making, not sympathy.

> Uniforming is a touchy subject on this forum.

So what?

> They are whatever rank they are, whether they've

> earned the rank patch or not.

A boy in the 2nd grade is a member of a wolf den and is considered a wolf level cub scout.

He is working on his wolf cub scout rank.

The rank is the little diamond patch that he earns.

I went to an event yesterday which was sponsored by a couple of units but attended by the community. When I arrived, I was the only person in a scout uniform surrounded by a few hundred other folks. Then some other scouters and scouts started to arrive in their full uniforms, and we greeted each other with the left hand shake and smiles.

While I am always against the uniform police bullying people about unnecessary details of their uniforms, I strongly push leaders and scouts to wear a complete uniform - socks, belt, pants, and shirt - at every opportunity. I want them to enjoy wearing their uniforms, because nothing beats that feeling of brotherhood you get when you are wondering where your help is at, and then they show up, easily identifiable, and dressed to play ball.

Just like Baseball, Scouting is a uniformed activity. Jeans and a shirt don't cut it on the baseball diamond, and it doesn't cut it at Scouting events, either.