Eagledad

My two favorite subjects. Not to be confused with accounting. Seems math is not an exact science with accountants. 😂 Barry

OK, but ThenNow is saying that he is here to provide information, but in providing information, he keeps giving a personal, not so kind opinion, of the BSA, Then defends himself as just the messenger. Continued Unleasing on him. All of us here whine now and then about National, but at least we admit it. He needs to be a scout like with us as he says the BSA is supposed to be.

As I said before, why are you here? Barry

If trend is a unit problem, correct with instruction at the unit level. Trends aren't personal, so don't make the correction personal. When the correction involves the parents and scouts, then instruct the parents and scouts together. Barry

God blessed us by creating us all differently. Barry

I have coached a lot of folks on their tickets. My first question is have you talked to CC and SM. I know that you said the CC step down, but he could still advised some direction for the troop needs. Talk to the SM as well. I am not one to suggest being very diversified, especially if you are new. Keep it simple. Don't take on big projects that require skills you've never used. How many camporee disasters were planned by a scouter working a ticket item. Too many. And, instead of being a planning leader for activities like fund raising or Scouting for Food, , write your ticket to be an assistant planner for several activities. Learn from the experienced adults instead of reinventing the wheel. Then add your own little improvements as you gain understanding. Stick to your unit. A lot of adults tend to get into district and even council stuff. Unless you plan to spend most of your time in those areas, stick with your unit. Ticket items should be a practice of skills toward your position expectations. If you aren't given expectations, then wright the ticket to observe or assist. But, don't do a lot of activities or you will burn yourself out and get soured by the experience. Pace yourself. Sometimes observing gains the most knowledge. One of my ticket items was visiting 4 other troop PLC meetings to observe different techniques. I've suggest new CC chairs visit for other units to observe committee meetings. Funny enough, you will observe more of what doesn't work than what does work. But, I like the beer idea. Good luck, and we are here for you. Barry

I thought the 4th law of motion was "a scout is always hungry". Hmm, I can't seem to google it..

Yes, I agree. But now the culture and community don't show agreement of the bad behavior because activist promote self expression of the youth. Not all that long ago, neighbors would stop and report concerning behaviors to the parents and the parents would take care of their children's issues. Today the community turns a blind eye to the behavior by youth because they don't want to get involved with a hostile response from the parents, and possibly the community. It doesn't even have to be sexual, often the police are called by concerned citizens when they see a child walking to school. Talk to any teacher, the trend now is to accept a students sexual choice behavior without reporting it to parents. Parents may be the last to hear their child has made a sexual lifestyle choice, even with their elementary age children. It may be just a brief experiment or phase for the child, but the culture will take it, guide and push them toward that choice. Barry

It's just balance to the few here marketing the program as unsafe against predators. Barry I appreciate that, thanks. Barry

I'm sorry for your pain, I really am. But, I don't know why you are even here. I've talked to a lot of people about this subject and accepting for a couple of angry posters on this forum, nobody believes the BSA is haven for abused boys or predators. Sure, scouts were abused by bad people and laws were broken. The historical reputation of the scouting program holds it's integrity. I hope you get what is coming to you, but I also hope you get the help for getting a healthy mind and back to a normal life because telling off BSA members on a BSA forum is not going to do it. The BSA and it's members are not your problem or enemy. As I said in other discussions, all the bad in the history of Boy Scouting isn't even a micro blip when compared to all the good the program has brought. You and a couple others here may get some satisfaction with the down fall of the BSA, but history shows that future humanity looses out the most. Barry

I agree as far as not allowing such things, but not calling it abuse. Barry

Yes, but when we are talking about 600 claims, skinny dipping and strip poker doesn't rate up their with some of the monstrous stuff being talked about. Barry

I would have thought there would have to be some predator motivation to make a claim. I don't see a predator in your incident. A lot of scouts used to go down stream at summer camp to skinny dip. Claims? Barry

Ah, that makes sense. Thanks. Barry

I took qwazse's post as more of; YP has done all it can, not it's up to family and community. Maybe that isn't what he said, but I can't see changes improving YP guidelines at the unit level. Barry

Really! Now that seems sticky. How, in a patrol method program where scouts tent with each other away from the adult camp, can an adult not create context for a youth predator? Barry

Can it get safer than YP at the unit level? Maybe the changes should be toward reactions to abuse reports. Isn't that what the real complaint is? Barry

Great post, but this one line sticks to me as the major problem. This generation does not agree as a community of moral behavior. Nobody in our neighborhood would dare bring up sexuality, much less abuses, because political correctness has confuse common sense morality. My neighbor who has two young boys quit talking to us when they found we voted for other guy in the presidential election. The neighbors across the street are nice folks as far as we can tell, but they obviously live a different lifestyle, and keep to themselves. There is no doubt to me that young folks today are confused about basic moral principles. The same principles communities hold each other accountable not that long ago. The media is so hypocritical on moral behavior that few people could feel safe in discussing their beliefs. It takes a strong person to admit to the religious principles.. Barry

Thanks, that does help a lot. Still, I heard discussions of sex from scout filled tents late in the night that could be construed in that list. I'm not sure I'm completely over my dads talk of the birds and the bees. I wonder how many of these claims are acts from other scouts. Barry

What constitutes abuse? We had one situation where an ASM lost his temper and hit a scout with his plastic coffee cup. The scout wasn't physically hurt AT ALL, but he and his parents were mentally worried the adult could loose his temper again. We reported the situation to district and council and restricted the leader from the scouts. We never saw him again accept at his son's ECOH. The family was satisfied with our actions, but could they go back on this litigation? We had another adult claim her son was a victim of abused because she heard scouts cussing near her son. Her son said it never happened. Could she try to file a claim? My high school teacher son has a lot of stories where students claimed unproven acts of abuse. It is a big deal because teachers are put on leave until the investigation is completed. But, students know the actions and use them to their advantage. So, I wouldn't hold 600 recent cased as an example of continued problem. There are some bad people out there and I hope they are sorted out from claims that don't rate up to those bad acts. Barry

I don't know that the culture will allow Scouting to get to it's roots. I had almost as many parents pushing their son to get elected into OA during their first year of Scouting. Many parents were irate when their son wasn't elected and demanded that the SM intercede. We live in a culture where each player of the youth soccer team is handed a trophy for just being on the team. That wasn't driven by the players. Adults encourage mediocrity so they don't have to deal with the emotions of disappointment they feel when their children don't accel. Barry

Oh, I guess. But it isn't the same. One has to be careful of defending passion in spite of reality. When I was a Scout in the 70's, OA Arrowmen held more respect by scouts than the Eagles because they were selected by their everyday scouting actions within the troop. The respect of the Eagle came from scouts who independently put in the extra effort to earn the Eagle. And, that is a well earned respect of itself. But, when I became a Scout Leader in 1992, I found my Cubs getting continued lectures by adults to stay in scouting for the Eagle. The All Mighty Eagle. I'm not sure how many of the Cubs listened to those lectures, but their parents sure did. As Scoutmaster talking to visiting Webelos families looking for a home troop, the number one question by the parents was how quickly can their son get an Eagle in our Troop. No doubt in my mind that 90% of Eagles today wouldn't have made it without a lot of push from adults. Call it cultural, I guess, but the Eagle is different today. It is still a stature of respect, but not the same. That being said, there are still those 2 percent of scouts who are self-motivated and driven to aspire to Eagle nobility. In that since, .nothing has changed. Barry

Over the years I heard the struggles of friends building or remolding their house. They found that if they weren't watching the building contractor crews in person, the crews tended to build toward a different plan, or no plan at all. I later had the same experience. There is the visionary, then everyone else. The problem with great visions is the people making it a reality don't see the vision, so they work to complete their personal vision of the task. If there isn't a visionary mentor watching, guiding and teaching, the vision fades into easy tasks that have little to do with the vision. As the District Membership Chair, I worked with a lot of new units at all age groups and I found that if there wasn't a general understanding for the purpose of the unit, it likely would not survive. Even units that split off from another unit rarely survive two generations of leadership if the leadership never really had the vision and passion of the original unit leadership. More often than not, they merge back into the original unit. Success is almost fully dependent on "Relationships also provide the exchange of ideas, and mentoring, needed by new Scouters". My problem was trying to get our DEs to understand the importance of Relationships and mentoring the vision and ideas to the next generations. It was a numbers game for them. Not that I'm blaming DEs' for the ills of the dying units, they were following orders. But, as I said, if the visionary mentor isn't teaching and guiding, how can the workers at ground level reach the goal? I think many people have the time, but aren't recruited. The key is first finding the Visionary mentor who gets it and understands how to structure the program so that it functions efficiently toward the goals. Then to find and recruit the folks who AGREE and SEE the vision and WANT to give energy to the effort. An expert in building successful businesses said that the most successful business's have workers who understand and agree with the vision of the company. When they all do their small part, the big vision is achieved. The hardest part is finding a Visionary mentor with the skills of selling refrigerators to Eskimos. Most Councils don't know how to search and recruit that person. Barry

It is interesting. Have to be careful though, National has a reputation of using research to justify changes that they wanted to implement before the research was started. Barry

There is a saying in our district, "If you aren't comfortable in the weather, you didn't dress right!". Barry