Armymutt

The obvious answer is that we haven't changed the name of the organization enough. I'm certain people will be knocking the doors down now.

That's not a bad idea. I wish our troop was as invested in the pack as yours. Our troop has the same CO but no interaction. Most of the kids came from a pack that folded due to the CO dropping them. Of course, our pack will probably fold at the end of the year due to lack of parental interest and my son crossing over to a different troop.

The Cub program was pretty simple. I think it started too early, but I get the need to get kids interested before they get into sports. It really just took an evening of study to fully grasp it. Taking away the beads and arrowheads simplified things a bit, but then adding in the belt loops made things worse to me. Most kids don't have a waist big enough to carry all the belt loops. Adding back the beads in different colors and ditching the arrow head and belt loops would be an improvement. I think that moving AOL to its own 5th grade program is a bad idea. Puts extra pressure on the DL to get 8 adventures in before 6 months expires. For the kids that turned 10 in 4th grade, the pressure is even greater. Another pack has a girl that is crossing over before school ends for 4th grade. With the new program she couldn't do that. I am curious what the discussion format is for all these changes. It doesn't sound like anyone is developing courses of action and wargaming them to determine the best route. Is anyone Red Teaming them?

I wish it was that simple. Prioritizing my obligations was simple on Monday. 1. Work related that I couldn't blow off or my boss would find out? 2. Scouts. 3. Everything else. Kids had a sports game the same day as a Cub Scout event? No brainer, we'll be camping. I have a hard time being loyal back when an organization is disloyal. I'm just Scottish and German enough to take it personally and say "Screw it" even if I really want to be there.

I've been thinking about it for a couple of days. I've come to the conclusion that the BSA was pretty much my home. It may sound silly, but I can remember the first day I walked into the BSA office in my current council. I had never set foot in that place before, but I felt like I had just walked into my home once again. I did a little reading on rebranding this morning and found out that it's not unusual for brands to lose 20% of their loyal customers following rebranding. I was extremely passionate about the BSA and worked hard to revive a unit, expand the program, and be involved as much as I can. I drove 600 miles after work, got in a 2AM and was up by 6 so that a Cub Scout event could take place. Now, that drive has disappeared. For the first time, I'm content to "just be a parent". I don't even know that I want to be the Scoutmaster for our Scout volunteers at Cub Scout Day Camp in June.

So you never did any backpacking? I don't know of any BSA troops that use giant tents. Maybe things are different today, but we had 2-man tents.

Well, I just resigned my commissioner position. Could no longer justify spending the time I'm in that area to myself. I can't get motivated to do the things I need to do for Cub Scout Day Camp at this point. Tossing a 114 year old name on the trash heap has really destroyed my dedication.

You had 1 male and 1 female in a tent together and never had any contact of a sexual nature occur?

I was going to ask exactly what sort of recruiting support your council provides. Ours provides nothing. They might print up some flyers that are universal. That's not helpful. They don't send anyone to the schools. They don't show up at open houses to help out.

Who stays up to make sure that line isn't crossed? We used to be able to leave our tents and engage in all sorts of mischief without the adults knowing. It's not like the campsite is surrounded by concertina wire.

Maybe the kids today lack the hormones we had in the 90s. I can tell you that back then if there was a girl around, a lot of the guys reverted to being inside the high school halls. Everyone was trying to impress the girl at the expense of the other boys if necessary. Going to be some sleepless nights for adults who have to maintain a vigil all night to keep the two groups separated. Going to be interesting when the first Scouts BSA girl in a troop gets pregnant. Going to make this name change thing look like a molehill.

I guess I don't understand the need for "affinity groups" in Scouting. To me, when one joins Scouting, one sheds all of one's other identities. Same when I go to work. In Scouting, I'm whatever position is on my sleeve and an Eagle Scout. I'm not Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, etc. I'm not gay, straight, etc. I'm a male only for YP and bathroom reasons. I'm not Dr. Armymutt, I'm Mr. Armymutt or just Armymutt. When someone holds tightly onto whatever they are outside of Scouting, I question their values and their commitment to Scouting. If the idea of simply following the Scout Law and Scout Oath are off putting, then perhaps Scouting isn't for that person. If one needs to see people that look like them before joining an organization, then perhaps the mirror section at the local store is a better solution.

I'm not a lawyer, but to me, "Scouting America" implies that it is the only organization for Scouting in the US. That's fully knowing that it isn't. While "Scouting" under the auspices of the BSA isn't confusing to the average person, eliminating the "Boy" tells me that there is no longer a separate organization unless I start digging when coming from the outside.

Sadly, I'm kinda siding with the Girl Scouts on this one. It's a step too far. It implies that there is only one Scouting organization in the US.

There is literally no need to change the name. The stated reason is to bring in more people. Tells me that they don't care about the people already in who have been in for years and are totally cool with most of the changes - I'm still annoyed about trashing the Bobcat rank. Sorry, but to me, when an organization changes its name, it loses its history. You can claim it hasn't, but it has. I never met a single girl who didn't join because Cub Scouts was a program under BSA. I have met plenty who didn't join because it was too expensive. I'm not seeing how spending millions of dollars to change the name helps reduce costs.

"Scouting America is a verb, not a noun. Are we calling the kids "Scoutings" now? The willingness to just change the name of a very old, very known organization to appeal to outsiders who have no wish to invest in it is a sign of instability to me. It says "We don't really have a solid foundation in our mission". The US Army is still the US Army even though it is more of a world SWAT organization these days.

I think that changing the name to appease simpletons isn't a good solution, but it seems to be the way the BSA wants to go anyway. Rather than expect people to be critical thinkers and rise up to the organization's level, it will come down to meet them. We saw this with the elimination of the Bobcat badge. Simpletons were confused so the solution was to destroy a legacy rather than insist that people take time to learn and understand. To me, the BSA has been the only constant in my life. My parents divorced when I was young, so neither was in my life 100% of the time. We moved around in the Air Force, so no location was a constant either. Consequently, I feel very little devotion to anything. Haven't seen my dad in 2 years. Haven't seen my mom in about a year and a half. I haven't seen one of my sisters since 2021, the rest in about 2 years. It doesn't bother me because it was all fluid anyway. Missing a weekly Scout meeting was murder as a kid and being forced to not be at our meetings these days has made me very grumpy. Now I have to question my future involvement. If the organization is so fluid as to completely change its name and toss away over 100 years of being a solid foundation simply to appease the simpletons, is it really something I want to dedicate my time to? I'd estimate that I've spent about 1000 hours a year for the last 3 years on Scouting. I'm currently a pack committee chair, a unit commissioner, and a part-time OA Associate Advisor. Frankly, I don't know if I can continue to advocate for an organization that is willing to compromise itself essentially for "likes". While a name change may seem like a small thing, it's not. If your parents decided that they were going to change the family name it would be a pretty significant event. If this came right after they decided to toss out some item you would have inherited, the impact would be even more significant. Changing the name to me makes "Scouting America" equal to Trail Life, American Heritage Girls, and whatever the other youth orgs with a short history are. It tosses away a legacy and a history simply because people are unwilling to look beneath the surface. Makes me question the values of the people at the top.

It's like the Army changing the name of Ft. Hood to Ft. Cavasos. Guess what, nothing else changed and it is still a terrible, depressing place. Frankly, this sounds like some staffer getting a bullet on an evaluation. Someone recently went through and changed the names of several organizations in the Army. Nothing else changed and we're still not getting recruits.

So the boy units who have the exact same problem are left out again. There are lots of boy units who have the exact same problem, especially in the inner city, like Charlotte where that council is located. You would think that they would open it to all new troops. Might be a great way to get boys off the streets and into the woods.

Just got a letter from our SE. The Executive board has decided to raise the youth fee from $66 to $80 and the adult fee from $12 to $26. The email goes on to say that it's $165 per Scout - $85 national and $80 council. Isn't there an extra $12 for insurance on there, or is that a council thing? Scout Life is $15 for now. Time to up those popcorn sales.

Here's the link to one of them on the council website: https://www.mccscouting.org/content/115391/2024-Girl-Camporee-of-the-East-Coast--Girl-Camporee-of-the-East-Coast I would refuse to let my daughter go to one of these if offered in our council. Every group faces challenges. We wouldn't have a "Military Dependent Camporee", even though those kids routinely have to move, make new friends, get pushed around, don't get selected for Vigil, have a harder time making Eagle, etc.

I've also seen Girl-only Camporees. That really gets to me. Imagine if we had Boy-only Camporees these days. More than one person actually defended it by saying that all of them were Boy-only prior to girls joining. Seriously? I fully support girls being in the program - my daughter loves it. However, I insist that all events be open to boys and girls. To do so otherwise is an insult to the members of BSA who are excluded. Even our Catholic Camporee is open to everyone.

Isn't the argument about mixed gender dens moot out since it is now allowed until AOL? Without them, there'd be very few girls in Cub Scouts in many areas. In well-to-do areas, I'm sure the packs are large. In others, a highwater mark of 20 post-COVID is acceptable. Our pack maxed out a 4 girls - 2 AOL and 2 Tiger. Honestly, if we didn't mix them, the boy in the Tiger den would have been denied Cub Scouting at our Pack, as would the 3 boys in the AOL den. The DLs were parents of the girls and the boys' parents were unable to volunteer. If our pack still exists in 2 years, that's exactly what will have to happen. The boy in the AOL den will be sent away from the pack due to the rules.

I haven't experience Scouts BSA yet, but I hope this isn't the norm. This sort of behavior and actions can make Scouts resentful of the new paradigm of BSA.

One of the things that has been bugging me for the last 30+ years is the loss of the background color on the rank patches. I remember something about blending in better with nature, but that's kinda bunk when you look at the variety of OA flaps, CSPs, and campout patches. As my kids move up to the troop, I'm very tempted to buy them the old patches. Thoughts?