FireStone

It's astonishing how wildly out of control this kind of thing can get, over what appears to be a completely mis-heard word/phrase. Do we really need to sit our scouts down and tell them not to use the word "kill" in any way or any context, because it can be misconstrued? 

It's pure insanity. Next we'll probably hear about a kid kicked out of a Troop for threatening to go on a murder spree after being overheard talking to other scouts about Fortnite. 

1 minute ago, ScoutMama43 said:

If he did threaten to harm the boy I agree he should be in trouble. But he is claiming that he never threatened the boy at all.

Even if that's the case and he did threaten the other boy, the severity of the response isn't justified. This is a "warning" scenario, maybe a sit-down discussion at most. 

19 hours ago, Rick_in_CA said:

You make a good point on how society is failing boys. Though I'm not sure it's just the boys. Girls are having their problems too. And I think Mike Row's comments accurately hit on some of the reasons why. I remember when I was little, my first baby sitters were 12 and 13 year old kids (both boys and girls) from the neighborhood. Now 12 and 13 year olds (and 14 and 15 years olds even) need baby sitters? I think there is something very wrong here, and it's hurting all kids, male and female. Which I think is partly Mike Row's point.

Good point. Being that I've recently been looking for a babysitter, it's been interesting to see how potential candidates advertise themselves. They're often in college, especially this time of year looking for summer work, and they make it a point to mention that they're not just in college but if they're a junior ot senior, they make darn sure that you know it. As if a college freshman or sophmore is under-qualified. 🙄

This certainly feels like a tie-in topic around the societal issue of kids not being allowed to play outside or being escorted home from the local park by police if they are unattended minors. 

Just now, ScoutMama43 said:

Forgive me but who is the COR and CC?

Chartered Organization Rep and Committee Chair

I'm not sure what the official policy is, but personally I think it's highly unusual to expel a scout from a unit over one incident. I guess depending on the severity of the alleged threat, maybe it's justified in some cases. I've heard of cases of alleged "physical violence" that didn't result in expulsion, I think most units act on a system of warning, then action if behavior is repeated. 

Again, there could be circumstances where first offense is grounds for immediate expulsion. But those have to be some pretty extreme threats to warrant that.

This is something you're going to have to probably take up the ladder, contacting your District Executive and Council Exec. 

I'm curious to know what others have to say here about moving to another unit, because that would be my first choice so your son doesn't have to sit out for months, during which time he'll probably grow resentful of the organization and even if he is then reinstated he might not want to go back. 

58 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

Thank you.  Let me provide what I hope is an equally well stated rebuttal...

 

Thanks for the reply. I'm not going to do a point-by-point reply, I think we both know where we stand on this. We disagree, and that probably won't change. 

My point of this thread was optimism and looking forward, which I continue to do and continue to have about the BSA. It's not a popular opinion around here, but I truly believe that the best days of the BSA are ahead of us.

I'm in favor of all of the recent changes, and I'm an Eagle Scout, Den Leader, Pack Committee member, OA Brotherhood. 

4 minutes ago, Buggie said:

related/unrelated question. Is there a date for a new handbook for 11-18 scouts to arrive? (not sure how to state that without saying boy scouts and being clear enough that I"m not talking about the various cub scout programs, LOL)

I don't know if there is a date, but I imagine you could just call it the "Scouts BSA Handbook" and I think most folks will know which book you're talking about. 

Making an assumption based on the release of the Cub books less than a month from the official start date, I wouldn't be surprised to see the Scouts BSA books show up in January. 

I've been really tempted to whip up a "Scouting Isn't Dead" t-shirt design in the style of the old "Punk's Not Dead" graphics. 😄

13 hours ago, FormerProfessional said:

...How many of you will stay or leave with what we know now about girls, “boys” life, and OA changes?

 

I really hope no one will actually leave because Boys' Life changed their name. Or because there will be pictures of girls in handbooks, as was suggested in another thread. 

14 hours ago, JoeBob said:

A clarification brought about after the fact by bad publicity. However alcohol was allowed (for leaders?) in prior WSJs on foreign soil. 

Not a falsehood on the part of Trail Life.

Speaking of clarifications, I'm still hoping you'll clarify what you meant when you falsely stated that WOSM staff could be jailed for providing condoms.

13 hours ago, walk in the woods said:

New uniforms, Venturers and Sea Scouts in the OA are both program changes.  Changes to two deep is a program change.  The military has different PT requirements for men and women so expect changes to Personal Fitness MB and Tenderfoot requirements.  Family Life MB used to have a requirement to discuss with your counselor what it means to be a good father.  That will change.  Rumors of the OA dropping NA regalia will be a program change.  New magazine name is a program change.  But the program is more than rank and badge requirements and logistics.  The program is made by all the intangibles of a single-gender environment and all that will end.

Those are not program changes. Program is the program, what kids do and learn, not what they wear or the title of the magazine they read. YPT is not program, it's YPT. 

What is something that kids used to do that they don't anymore because of the recent changes? 

Thanks for the doom and gloom, folks.

Some of us are optimistic about the future of the BSA. I was hoping for just a minute we could focus on that, or at least those of us who believe that could discuss it. But of course in this forum it's not possible without people tearing things down again. Oh well, it was worth a try. 

45 minutes ago, Hawkwin said:

Well, that was readily apparent from day 1 as it was the Chairman of the Board for Trail Life that was trying to advance this false narrative. I am rather disappointed that this organization that portrays itself as more Christian than BSA would be so intentionally dishonest and misleading.

Agreed. I'm not sure of the legalities of this kind of thing, but at the very least, spreading mesleading (or downright false) information about your competitors is entirely un-Scoutlike. 

Just now, walk in the woods said:

Maybe but the odds of the BSA rolling back any of the recent changes is less than zero.  I'll just close my wallet, focus on my unit gor now, and see what happens.

I agree. It's probably too late.

I would just add that at the time I was writing some of those letters and voicing those concerns, I had very little faith that any changes would be made. I still did it, though, because it felt right to me. I think that some folks who may eventually walk away from this because of these changes might find some comfort in knowing that they at least spoke up, they did what they could to oppose what was happening, and in the end if they still have to walk away, they can do it knowing that they at least tried. 

4 minutes ago, gblotter said:

...That question will be answered soon enough. If BSA does indeed survive, the new configuration will bear little resemblance to the Scouting we have known in the past...

 

I still have yet to hear of any change in program or requirements, ranks, badges, activities, etc., so as far as I can see, things still look pretty much the same. I don't think that a girl in BSA uniform makes the BSA unrecognizable.

24 minutes ago, Oldscout448 said:

 Voice it where? to who?

 

Well, you probably won't want to hear this, but when folks like me were arguing in favor of gay scouts, gay scouters, and girls in the BSA, we weren't just talking about it on Internet forums. We were writing letters (not emails, typed letters, hand-signed and mailed) to various members of the Executive Board. We were donating money to groups like Scouts for Equality. We were signing petitions, making phine calls, and speaking up in any way that we could. 

This forum is great for discussion, but it doesn't actually give any of us a voice in any debate in a way that actually sways opinion. If you want to get things done, you should use your voice (and your pen, and your keyboard, and your printer paper and stamps) to be heard by anyone who you can find a phone number or mailing address for that can influence these things. 

I'd rather you didn't. 😉 But I'm just sayin', folks like me have been lound and clear on these issues for years, with the people making these decisions. If you haven't been, well, I think you can probably imagine how we got here then. 

47 minutes ago, gblotter said:

...Thing is, BSA cannot sustain those kinds of membership losses this time around and still survive as an organization. The margins are too thin for these kinds of mistakes.

 

I've never thought that any of this was about saving the organization. This is about saving a bunch of jobs in one Texas office.

The BSA can live on as a volunteer-only scouting org, like others around the world. Under 100,000 members we could keep right on scouting along. We just can't sustain the bloat of the big salaries, SBR debts, etc. 

The BPSA-US has, what, a couple of thousand members, maybe? They still go camping, have Camporee-type of events (Hullabalo I believe they call them), wear uniforms, give out badges, do service projects, march in parades, hold fundraisers, pay dues, have training sessions, etc. It's all done on a smaller scale (no big summer camps, no jamborees), but it works. A handful of national staff volunteers oversee the bigger operations, making program changes, writing handbooks, getting badges manufactured, etc. But the vast majority of the work happens on the ground at the unit level. Not all that different from what most of us already do anyway.

Scouting will endure in America for a long time. The BSA specifically can endure, but not if we lose a lot of members and National isn't willing to change their business model to something more thrifty.  

I don't believe it will come to that, I have faith in our new trajectory and that this thing will work in it's new configuration. But if I'm wrong and things do go bad, I hope National will do the right thing and not sacrifice the whole ship just to keep a few captains well-paid for a few extra years. 

33 minutes ago, walk in the woods said:

His name is Creek Stewart.  He's been associated with the BSA at least informally for years.

I have to admit I didn't know much about him and had to Google him. He seems like a cool guy, just not sure he'd be the guy the BSA would be looking for as the US equivalent to Bear. Creek seems a bit more old-school and has that mid-western-rancher-meets-navajo-medicine-man vibe about him. Might not be a modern enough image for what the BSA would probably be looking for. 

And he wore an Eagle Scout badge on a uniform shirt as an adult, so clearly he's out. 😉

Putting aside the doom-and-gloom ideas for a moment, let's think about what this all looks like in a few years, or maybe a decade, if all of the changes don't sink the BSA. National has to have some sort of plan (go ahead, laugh, but let's assume for a minute that they actually do have a plan), or at least some idea of what they are driving the organization towards. 

My guess? Look at Scouts UK. 

Things that Scouts UK has done differently in past decades that the BSA is now doing: 

Scouts UK has been co-ed for a long time. They simplified their uniforms, attempting to revamp the image of scouting, something I suspect the BSA is already working on (look at BSA Brand Center marketing photos and lack of uniforms). They modernized their program, adding more non-traditional badges and activities (look at the heavy push in STEM in the BSA). 

These are all things that the BSA is already doing or seems to be working towards. We've had glimpses of a revamped uniform discussed here in this forum. I think we'll see more and more of that in the years to come. I've even seen BSA personnel and camp staffers occasionally walking around wearing neckerchiefs in the UK style and without the uniform shirt, and new larger necker sizes becoming available. 

If I had to imagine what National is envisioning as they move forward, that vision really does feel a lot like what we've seen across the pond. I would not be at all surprised to see the BSA even take on an ambassador like Bear Grylls to try and push this newer, cooler scouting image in the US. Not sure who our Bear could be, though. 

Any other guesses as to what the BSA of the future might look like? Are we on a path that aligns with the UK program or something else? 

11 hours ago, Gwaihir said:

Where did you hear that?  The OA isn't the OA anymore if you drop the Lenni Lanape Lore.  

It could be. It just means making the effort to change the script. The lore isn't the only thing that makes the OA what it is. Sure it's rooted in Lenape history and style, but what makes it special is the mystique about it, the secretiveness, the ceremonies (the act of carrying out the ceremonies, not necessarily the exact lore behind them), etc. 

Swap any cultural lore into an OA ceremony and to me I think it would be just as cool. Imagine an OA based on pacific island culture, island ceremony, dance, and regalia. I think that would easily be just as impressive. I'm not saying to just appropriate another culture, but I think that the OA doesn't need to be entirely dependent on a specific brand of cultural lore to maintain the image of a brotherhood, an honor society, or a somewhat mysterious secretive group. 

Keep the brotherhood, the honor, the core of the organization, and instead of wrapping it in Lenape, wrap it in something else. Or create something else around it. Maybe this is actually an opportunity for the OA to recreate itself in an image that the OA can say is entirely their own. 

1 hour ago, RememberSchiff said:

As odd as it might sound,  anyone can buy condoms in West Virginia.

Doesn't sound odd at all. Teen pregnancies would skyrocket if there was a minimum age for condom purchase. 

1 minute ago, JoeBob said:

https://www.ageofconsent.net/states/west-virginia

That says nothing about minors having condoms, or being given them by adults. 

58 minutes ago, David CO said:

Are we really?

BSA prohibits us from talking to our scouts about sex, even if that conversation is done in a manner and context consistent with the policies and moral teachings of our Chartered Organization. The distribution and use of these items is expressly forbidden by our religion. BSA will be offering these items to our scouts. At the same time, BSA will be prohibiting us from explaining to our scouts why they should not ask for, accept, or use these items.

If BSA is going to be handing out these items, it should, in all fairness, lift its ban so that we can help our scouts to better understand these issues in a moral/religious context.

Can we at least be fair in how we discuss this? the BSA is not "offering these items to our scouts," and not "going to be handing out these items." Condoms are made available, upon request, probably at the health center. 

The way this is talked about here by some folks you would almost think there will be a guy in a condom costume flinging handfuls of rubbers into the crowd. 

As for the religious implications, not all religions prohibit the use of condoms, and some don't prohibit pre-marital sex. So even if you were allowed by the BSA to discuss sex with Scouts, I'm not sure it would be appropriate to discuss the religious implications even under those conditions. 

For the purposes of informing scouts about the risk to their BSA membership by engaging in any sexual activity at a scouting venue, maybe you can find someone in your organization that is not religiously bound to refrain from dropping the hint to scouts that if they find themselves needing to use the condoms available at Jambo that the might also find themselves not in the BSA anymore. They don't have to go into detail, just make it known that there is a policy, and don't break it.