yknot

Where are you getting this information? They don't "convict" school age children of bullying. Generally cases of harassment, intimidation, and bullying are handled within the district and disciplined with detention or suspension and/or referred for counseling. The only time it would go to court is if a parent sues. The issue for today's kids, though, as I have been commenting about so frequently to you that it does feel like I am on a replay loop, is that almost anything can be interpreted as bullying or microaggression. The recipient definitely controls what is perceived as bullying because all they have to do is report it and it instantly triggers a process. It is therefore very confusing for a kid to be given a pass by adults to tease in scouting when the same behavior in school would result in discipline. On the flip side, a kid on the receiving end of teasing in scouting can be disoriented when adults seem to turn a blind eye. There are a lot of kids for whom those situations don't help build character, they just quit, which brings me to membership. As far as membership, every other youth organization has faced the same pressures scouting has and yet so many of them are faring better. 4-H for example still has 4 million kids or thereabouts. 4-H, despite waning agricultural roots, has done a really good job of navigating changing times and still staying relevant to present day youth. Kids do think their problems are more insurmountable today despite what you believe and the statistics on youth depression and suicide bear that out. It's a whole other discussion as to why and whether it actually is true, but that is their reality.

It's not circular to me. If I feel like I have to explain or defend what I said to a kid, I probably shouldn't have said it in the first place. That's why kids are different. That's my point. BSA's own membership numbers show that it has been struggling to connect with kids in recent decades. It's not just me saying kids are different. Other youth organizations seem to be doing a better job of adapting to this. A lot of organizations saw declining membership as the numbers of school age kids dropped, but none so precipitous as BSA. And many other new youth organizations have sprung up to meet some of these changing needs and interests. Again, I disagree. Not acknowledging that kids have different worries and stressors today isn't helpful. I don't know if you have school age children or not but you must not have encountered HIB laws in your state. In the school system at least, bullying is not held to an objective standard. Pretty much anything and everything IS called bullying today, and kids have to navigate that. BSA needs to align with their reality,. I think it does on paper, but in practice in units where old attitudes hold sway, it can still be very mixed messaging and there are problematic experiences for some scouts. Don't get me started on the tea pot song.

My feeling is that if you feel like you have to defend teasing, it is probably best not done. Kids are always in a subordinate position to adults and it's hard to get a true read of what they really think even when you think you do. Kid on kid teasing is even worse. Kids today have a very strange social and cultural lanscape to navigate. Their counterparts in the 1960s may have had to worry about physical landmines; kids today have to be vigilant about not putting a foot wrong and hitting a social landmine. Say the wrong word or post the wrong thing on social media, and your life can be blown up. Kids are very unsure about where the lines are drawn. Some of the things I have seen done in scouts that are still considered acceptable, like teapot songs and the like, would get them disciplined or even suspended if they did the same thing in school. Bullying today is decided by the recipient, not the deliverer. I would also say that as adults we need to be sensitive to the fact that some kids who come to scouting are here because they feel like they don't fit in anywhere else. They have likely already put up with their lifetime quota of teasing.

Kids today are very different in some important ways. They start puberty at younger and younger ages and are increasingly likely to be depressed. Suicide rates have increased dramatically over the past two decades, with more suicides occuring among younger, middle school age children. The events of their time are leading them to mature faster in a physical sense but obviously leaving a lot of them without the skills to cope with the stressors and pressures of their daily lives in a psychological sense. I haven't seen many adults who are capable of teasing kids in such a way that builds character. It's mostly the opposite. I've mostly seen adults who think their teasing is humorous but it is not to the kid. The quickest way I know to lose a kid's trust or respect is to tease them.

If you have any agriculture near you, try there. We have a farm that does events through December and they rent small tents to groups for a nominal fee or sometimes you can get it for free if you also buy tickets for the corn maze or other activity. I can think of worse fall pack meetings to have. Some farmers also have equipment barns. Ask a firehouse if you can meet in one of their bays. They might be willing to move a truck outside and leave the garage bay door open for you to meet. See if there is any empty warehouse spaces or empty buildings with garage bays. Most of these places won't have heat but you might get light and be out of the rain/wind. Some might have limited bathroom access. If it gets you through to December you can try Jan or Feb as a family ski or skate night outdoors somewhere or cancel for those two months. Don't worry so much about running a traditional pack meeting for now. Just get the kids together someplace safe and fun and ad lib the rest.

I have been hearing of councils that don't want to serve as the chartering org as well. That's something for BSA to resolve though in its reorg plan I would think.

Wouldn't the liability concerns for any future charter though be the same as for any old charter? The UMC COs that are switching to facilities use around here are doing so because they don't trust the liability situation and coverage going forward with BSA. It's not just child abuse concerns either but what would happen if there was an injury claim or some other problem. The BSA has a lot of the traditional COs completely rattled and spooked and from where I sit it doesn't look like those reactions are without cause. An organization they trusted for decades and took at their word because of their promotion of things like The Scout Law has suddenly become unrecognizable. I don't know that I could ask any other community group to be a CO in good conscience right now. To me the solution for now seems to be the Council because then at least if there are any problems going forward it's not going to hurt the people at my local Elks or FD or any other group I might ask.

Let's not drag the innocent Harris Hawk into this sordid tale. They are lovely creatures, which is why they are so suitable for falconry. They are less likely to talon your face.

Not at all. I'm just saying some of them and maybe more than is realized. I also think it's dishonest for BSA to try to offload all of this on COs when they intentionally did not manage or oversee the relationship. Why did they renew charters for so many units that had dysfunctional COs?

I'm not a lawyer but one of the areas I have been most involved with the law has been with elder care. The standards for a valid signature for a possibly compromised senior adult are very high. Virtually everything has to be notarized. So many of the people I have dealt with in COs seem to be of questionable cognition. Just my two cents.

But what if the COR was not a member of the CO but of the unit, and says they were told to sign the form by the unit leader and the unit commissioner (who, in effect, are their "bosses")? And then were directed to wave forms under the IH and just get a signature. And were even directed to mark the signature lines with highlighter with the intention of getting the elderly IH to just focus on the signature and "not all that verbiage on the form"?

You and others keep characterizing it as an abdication of responsibility. However, if a unit leader from a trusted legacy unit year after year waves the same paperwork under a COs nose and says, it's OK, sign here, we're the boy scouts, so you don't need to worry about anything because you know you can trust us, I think there may be questions. A lot of these people are elderly. Perhaps could even be proven to be mentally compromised. In most of the units I know, the COR is not a member of the CO, it is a unit volunteer filling that role as a warm body. At some point it can start to look kind of like an elder abuse scam. I know that early in my scout involvement, I was guilty of form waving. We were under the belief that we should not do anything to upset our long term CO and elderly members. District and Council were only interested in membership and keeping the units alive. They knew what the "warm body" CORs were doing.

The COs I know that signed off on applications did so because they didn't know the people and unit leaders asked them to. They did so because they trusted the unit leaders.

Canada is also a completely different country. They are used to socialized medicine and while some segments will still fuss, it is not like here. Look at how quickly they went from 0% vaccinated to 70% plus once they had vaccine. I think all pressure should be brought to bear on all eligible people to be vaccinated through the means cited by Eagle1993 but I think BSA has to stick with its policy for now.

This is one of those many badges that need updating because it contains extremely dated information. For example, scouts should not be taught to replace cords on blinds because they are illegal. Corded blinds are no longer manufactured and may no longer be offered for sale.

Agreed. Kids shouldn't be dropping dead of heat injury during sports practices or drowning on scout hikes. A phenomenon I've seen the past decade or so is an overreliance on phone radar apps and online weather services as if they never lie or conflict. People have lost the ability to look up or use common sense.

That is what I'm talking about -- be prepared to change plans. My nephew was badly injured during a camp out that should have been cancelled or changed because of weather. It's no joke.

I kind of disagree. Having the mentality that you don't cancel for bad weather is the opposite of what I think scouts is supposed to teach. We teach be prepared, which includes being prepared to change plans. Even D-Day was weather dependent. This is scouts, not the military.

Maybe that benefits the judge, LOL.

Yes that is true. In public schools (in my state) once teacher performance became linked to test scores a lot of things were cut out. I was on the board of a PTA, an educational foundation, and a board of ed liaison and saw school assemblies, enrichment programs, kid birthday parties or cupcakes, and most class parties all cut out. The kids were lucky to get an hour for pizza and a movie before winter break. One of the other issues (in my area) is parents being overwhelmed with emails or long emails. For example, the PTA stopped including scouts, sports, etc. announcements in their weekly eblast for that reason.

I would say it is generally localized now but coming to a school near you soon. A lot of this is the continued aftermath of the Sandy Hook school shooting and other subsequent events. We've discussed this in other posts but this is why many schools and grounds are completely monitored by video cameras and why many now have security guards and hardened exteriors. Over the past 20 years I went from being able to roam local schools almost at will if I was known to the administration. Now, parents are not allowed in schools. There are no parent volunteers. No more helping at field day or running a PTA holiday shop. You cannot have access to school children during the school day. After school, the facility is still locked and you can only get in with your student if you are attending practice or some other event. Even our student pickup is outside. I know people think this is somehow a conspiracy against scouting but it is not. Some school districts are not yet this extreme but it is only a matter of time.

Thanks. There was a period of time where my council said it was doing criminal background checks but didn't do them. They believed anyone with a problem would balk at signing the waiver and they would self screen, so why spend the money.

Can you clarify anything about who was/is responsible for criminal background checks in scouting? In everything I recall, it was BSA. No CO I have ever dealt with had the resources to do that until relatively recently as part of their own youth protection initiatives.

Understood. But that developed over time and I would argue didn't need to get to the point where BSA felt like LDS had them over a barrel. Making decisions based on membership has continually gotten BSA off track.

I'm sorry, I missed the part where the LDS mafia sent thugs to beat up BSA leadership and leave horse heads in their beds. Are you kidding me, LOL? A group of people who are supposed to be the most morally upright Dudley Do Rights on the planet somehow caved to this kind of pressure? This is what I'm talking about.