moosetracker

thanks Den leader.. 8 qts for a patrol are good for side dishes or desserts. Do you know if they were designed for the outdoors? (feet and lid that holds coals)

Thanks Cambridgeskip.. I remember you explaining that a year or two back.. I doubt we also will get someone saying "Oh, I'll join 'cause their so inclusive".. First off we will still not be as inclusive as you guys.. What we do have now though is several who will say "I will not join because of your ban on homosexuals".. We also have a few churches our DE has called to try to get them to sponsor a unit who have said they will never do so as long as we have a ban on homosexuals.. I guess once we get local option we will have people telling us they wont join or sponsor a unit because we allow every unit the right to choose their own leaders based on their beliefs.. Ok.. Same subject but maybe off on a different trail.. Gates had one statement I found interesting.. How does that read to you?.. Is it just Dr. Gates stating his own personal view? Is he telling councils that from now on if they verbally state their mission to include local option on homosexual leaders and they stop dropping membership of known homosexuals, that National will no longer play hardball and squeeze them until they tow the line?.. Either way, how many Councils who have been stopped under threat, or have been following policy but pleading to get a waver for this do you think will open their doors based on hearing or reading this statement?

Scouter99 the book is on abuse of scouts in BSA by PEDOPHILES, not gays... Most have a persona of the family man husband, wife children, church goer, civic minded.. Pedophiles will never be your openly homosexual person because of people like you who equate the two words of homosexual and pedophile as the same.. A pedophile takes on a persona that will allow parents and children to trust him and think nothing about letting their children be alone with them.. An openly homosexual scoutmaster will not have that type of trust, at least I don't see it in any near future..

Bad wolf - I doubt it will shift again in BSA at least on this issue.. BSA got royally hurt by choosing a side rather then keeping things the way they were, staying out of the arguement and leaving it up to the CO's through local option.. But on the conservative side in other political issues you may win a battle here and there, just don't be surprised if you win that it does not put an end to the issue and your win doesn't stick for more then a few years to a generation.. Battles lost sting, but it doesn't mean I need to give up the fight..

Local option IS allowing everyone to live and let live.. Forced compliance is not.. Yes, I will go to a restaurant with inconvenient parking for the good food. Yes, I will go to the party where 80% of my friends are although the loud mouthed bragger I dislike will be there also. I might try to not buy from a company I dislike, but if it is a product few other companies make and I need it, I will buy it. With BSA my husbands family has a history of being in the BSA my son is 3rd generation we like the outdoors perspective, we like being around other parents with similar ideas on how to raise our children, BSA had activities that interested my son and as an only child the association with other boys was what we wanted.. So the good outweighs the bad.. You join and work to change to improve the organization.. Why did conservatives need to change the local option???.... Why do you think it was good for your side to change what was and add that policy, but it is bad to remove it??... Why weren't conservatives content with the live and let live policy that BSA had?.. If local option was so awful, then why did conservatives join and then advocate for change until National provided it for them? According to you, while BSA had local option no one with your opinion to force everyone to comply with your ideas should never have joined BSA and then changed it, they should have never joined in the first place. Sorry, life will not always go your way..

Simple - BSA main purpose is not it's homosexual issue.. You will rarely if ever find a group that 100% meets all your morals, values, interests etc.. You pick a close fit and work to change for improvements in the program.. Packs and Troops do this all the time, sometimes it changes through the direction of a new CubMaster or ScoutMaster or committee chair and the changes they wish, sometimes through the committee, sometimes through the scouts.. And anytime a program has change, you have those who think the old ways were better, and some see the change as good, and some really don't notice the change because it was not the important reason they joined the program so old way or new way all the same to them as long as you don't fiddle with XYZ.. Districts and Councils do this all the time - we just went through an emotional rollercoaster in changing the way Merit Badge counselors renew their application.. National Program does this all the time also - The cub scout program is now under going changes although there was major change only 2 or 3 years ago.. Both the changes of 2-3 years ago and the current changes are met with 3 reaction, love it, hate it, makes no difference to me I'll work whatever program you tell me to work.. Anytime there is change, there is this sort of reaction from members of the group.. Change is inevitable, in fact this is one of the topics in the Woodbadge course, I was the staffer who was assigned to cover this 1 hour topic when I was the woodbadge scribe.. And yes, one part even states those who can not change will leave, and you need to wish them well and thank them for their time, but accept their decision.

Scouter99 - You take one incident in which those who planned to march in uniform were warned not to and why, some obeyed the order not to, some did not.. But it is clear the SE words back up what both Rick & NJ said... So if BSA has a policy against aiming squirt guns at people, and troops ignore the policy that makes someone stating the policy about squirt guns a liar???? Really.. So what does that mean about you stating we have a policy against homosexual scout leaders, when it is clear it is ignored by many.. Does that mean we have never really had that policy in force?? That policy has always been for local option.

They were turned, we use to have local option then BSA was pressured by conservative religions to implement this policy.. Didn't feel good, but we stayed with BSA anyway enjoyed the positives Scouting offered our son and worked hard to reverse this bad decision.. So now the tables are turning to right the wrong..

I never brought up the gay marriage opinion that is looming, I don't think it does have any weight on this decision be it for or against. But the sexual orientation is currently front & center due to NY hiring a gay at camp, and when mumblings of the hiring being against BSA rules hit the states ears they started an investigation into if BSA is following the states anti-discrimination laws.. I don't think any state with anti-discrimination laws ever thought to investigate BSA in the past.

Well maybe I was wrong about the 5 year prediction.. Perhaps we will get the change sooner.. I knew they were trying to wait for the dust to settle from the last vote taken before continuing the change.. Has BSA changed policy in the past with very conflicting viewpoints, the answer is "yes" the two that come to mind are the acceptance of women in scout leadership positions and de-segregation of all white troops and all black troops.. The women went to local option, which still caused a raucous because women would start going to district & national events even if your troop chose not to have them, so much the same stormy sea.. Desegregation was worse with units complying - it was not local option, all unit had to comply (I think the only way you could wiggle out was if you had unit that allowed only members of a private school or members of religion to join and those were white only/black only, therefore your potential members still were only white/black).. Anyway, this isn't a first time ever that BSA has moved policy to be acceptable to societies standards, it will not be the last time either. The point brought up about BSA now coming into conflict with the discrimination laws in various states is definitely a valid one.. Here is another one, SCOTUS ruled on a single person's complaint he was removed by BSA for being gay.. All you need is a different type of group to take BSA to court over a different issue.. Say if some CO's who are religions and do not find a problem with homosexuals and treat them as equal and valued people, take BSA to court over the fact that BSA promote their program as nonsectarian and yet will not allow their faith to practice their religious views and teach them to their youth through this youth program. Instead it forces them to comply with someone else's religious faith.

I would find it a very odd site to see the majority of churches surrounded by high fences with razor wire.. Does not imply "welcome".. I think Detroit is like that (not sure about the church fences) but the fact that everyone who can is moving out and leaving the very poor who have no means to move out behind.. At least it was that way last year. I had heard they may be starting to curb the flow, but not sure if they have started to turn it around yet. I know where I grew up until I left high school there was also a different sort of flight.. Utica NY had a very large state mental hospital.. During my last few years in HS the budgets were severely cut for mental hospitals and all the patients were let out and settled right there in Utica.. It was not unusual to find many hanging on the streets or wandering in the streets, yelling at invisible people or wandering aimlessly.. So everyone else was leaving, the comment was "Last one out, turn off the lights.".. I think over time the mentally ill slowly dispersed, or they found ways to treat and medicate them better as out patients.. When I went back to visit 10 or 15 years later, it seemed pretty back to normal.

The "Irish need not apply" signs were in America also, we had our period of discriminating at one time or another against Indian, Irish, Chinese, Italian, Afro-American, Hispanics.. Some group always has to be on the bottom of the dog-pile in order for other groups of people to be happy.. I hear from many guys the two girls making out isn't as gross to them (providing the girls are cute).. My opinion is that guys are weird to begin with.. I have been to places that are known to have a heavy gay culture, P-town on the Cape is the one I frequent the most.. Aside from some hand holding or maybe an arm-in-arm, I have not witness anything more then that.. I think they still stay pretty low key so as not to shock.. I admit I never have gone into a gay bar or someplace they may feel more open to be themselves at.. We talked in a different thread about the north not officially denying blacks into any school, but that it sort of happened anyway by were people lived.. If too many blacks moved into a neighborhood their was "white flight" and the whites moved further into the suburbs.. Therefore our schools would end up sort of segregated although you had your occasional blacks in the predominantly white school, and your occasional whites in the predominantly white schools.. There is a lot more blending now, and "white flight" is a thing of the past.. But where I live (not a suburb but in the country) it still is predominantly white.. There is only one school for the whole town for each grade group, in fact our high school covers two towns.. It is just few blacks seem to look for the country life and prefer the city I guess.. I hope more will move out though, it does a society good the more it inter-mingles.. It is human nature to fear the unknown..

Back to it being a child again.. Since we can not agree on that point, we really are arguing apples and oranges... No brain, no soul, not yet a human.. Sorry.. But, if you must know, I am all for euthanasia for brain dead patients, parents or spouses should have the right to decide even if a living will was not made.. Also I am for a person terminally ill who has nothing but pain or loss of their mind until they are in a vegetative state to choose a quicker, less painful, more humane way to end their lives.. Since AZMike took my comments and altered them to fit his own agenda, Should I then take qwazse statement to mean he is all for handing a two or three year old a loaded weapon and encouraging them to commit suicide or murder?.. Because the life of an embryo is the only thing of importance, after that it is worthless.

Ahhh. No, what we disagree on is the rights of a women to have control over her own body and her own life.. We also disagree on government getting between a women and her doctor : 1) making decisions for the women as proposals that the court or a governor decides each individual case of it an abortion is acceptable to them. 2) forcing the doctor to lie to the women or making it legal for the doctor to lie to women http://www.refinery29.com/2015/04/85242/5-lies-doctors-legally-required-tell-abortion 3) making mandatory unnecessary procedures (forced ultrasounds, waiting periods between consultation and the procedure) 4) Forced closing of Planned Parenthood clinics with trap laws. I will counter-propose your ridiculous proposal.. YOU get the embryo to answer your question intelligently as an embryo...

Problem is we disagree on when an embryo is a viable human life form and when it is just dividing cells.. So the daughter/son does not yet exist to have a say in anything..

Very true Eagledad.. Local option is we will let you believe what you want, but we have a right to believe what we want.. (live and let live).. It get's nowhere with the "My way or the highway" from the other side. I will be happy to drop it.. Don't argue your side or drag it into a otherwise unrelated thread, I will not feel the need to represent the other side of the argument. (That statement is not just directed at Eagledad's posts, but anyones.. This thread OP kindof started right off on the topic, or at least was interpreted that way by Rick_In_CA, but threads like "New Chief Executive Announced" could of stayed clear of the issue.. I even gave a warning not to go down the rabbit hole, yet down the hole we went)..

Eagledad is racism consider a Christian cause still?.. I think not... I hear people state there is no racism anymore, and the other side state there is.. But except for skin-heads, kkk groups and neo-Nazi groups I really have not heard any major group especially any group stating it is their Christian faith to be a racist.. Calico - thanks for the research.. I was thinking along that line.. I doubted they handed people a questionnaire and if you marked true to racist, anti-abortion or homophobic they deny you membership.. I could see if someone has a fit about another members life choices or the color of their skin in a way that the YMCA has to make a choice of it's the complainer or the person being complained about although they did nothing, that the YMCA would remove the member making the complaint and keep the member that was simply living their life and making choices for themselves.. There may have been something about who could use the womens or mens rooms.. I don't remember if that was a YMCA or YWCA.. I do know my YWCA provide men rooms, women rooms and another small room which sounds more like it is for families but could be used by LGBT people.. Otherwise there was an age of when I could and could not bring my son into the womens changing room.. Cut off was embarrassingly a little to early, when I had him go in to change in the mens dressing room alone for the first time and he came out buck naked to complain to me that someone had stolen one of his socks.. And there was a crowd at the entrance waiting for their kids or spouses.. "OK kid go back and get dressed.. You have more to worry about then a missing sock !" Pro-choice is as Calico states for everyone.. Pro-choice is not about forcing people who want to have a child have an abortion against their will.. Therefore there is no conflict to being pro-choice and supporting women who need a helping hand to keep and raise their children.. Yeah my concept of YWCA or YMCA is very different, I was a member for a while as well as my children.. It was an affordable summer camp for working parents.. Swimming lessons, work-out center, a place for a pool party or to rent the rock climbing wall.. They offered youth related activities like dancing or trips to the beach etc.. Actually all of it would be help to a single parent, but it was offered to all whether you were a single parent or not. My mother probably was a member of the YWCA more around the time when they rented rooms, but for me I just knew mommy came home with handcrafted hats and metal art wall hangings.. It is only through TV shows that I know about the fact they use to offer affordable rooms, and help to the down and out.

Usually the news is about the homosexual asking for a service the business is in the business of supplying.. Or some law that would give businesses the right to deny this group equal treatment, simply for being homosexual without taking the time to decide if the individual is a jerk or not.. If you sell cakes would you call all customers jerks if they came into your business to order a cake, and threw them out?.. If so you would not be in business for long.. A jerk is not someone asking for equal service that you provide everyone else. I personally have not heard of an outcry of anyone killed while defending against an intruder, unless the homeowner shot an innocent person who was not intruding but perhaps knocking on their door to ask for help or something.. So just don't be trigger happy in or out of the house.. It is true though if you want to be trigger happy if you are white and run around shooting innocent whites, their skin color will not be as big a story equal to the incident itself.. But, it you target blacks, then skin color will be in question of if it was a reason you targeted them. This does not mean that we are all for children growing up too fast, and becoming sexual way too early.. Teaching them to treat homosexuals the same as everyone else does not force them to grow up to be sexually aware any faster then normal.. I know my husband had a Aunt Margret who was homosexual with a life long partner.. Growing up they would visit for a weekend or longer every now and then because it was a great vacation spot for his family.. He loved the farm and the dog kennels and remembers how his Aunt could start out planning dinner for 6 and somehow magically stretch it to feed 10 or 12 as people started showing up unexpected.. Sometime while he grew up and he matured to understand sex he noticed that Aunt Margret shared a bedroom with her friend.. It was recognized by him in his own time, and was accepted about the same as acknowledging your parents share a bedroom, and figuring out that your parents had to have sex in order for you and any siblings you have to be born.. I would say my husbands parents were ahead of their time on acceptance as my husband grew up in the 60's.. Treating homosexuals equally means not making a big deal out of their sex lives any more so then others make of your heterosexual life.

I guess eye contact is about the same as being in a lineup and everyone but you taking one step back... oops! Seriously, being involved in your sons scouting career will be a blessing.. You and your son can share a common interest.. During cub scouts you are teaching him so much more about community service by your being involved rather then trying to have someone else teach this to him.. Also for youth having their parents being a big wig is a source of pride for them.. If he stays in through boy scouts and you also stay involved, you will find the common interest will even keep you connected to him through the teen years, in one aspect of his life if not in all, but through scouting you will learn to value his judgment when you witness his growth & maturity, so you are not staying up sleepless nights when he is out and about.

Eagledad - I saw no names dropped, so I don't think you crossed any lines.. Lots of people in the psychologists out there, so no way I can track down your friend specifically from what you said. I don't know why (s)he dragged the government into this though, their may be politics about homosexuals, but what to do about gender dysphoria has not become a political ping/pong (yet).. Unless (s)he thinks they should be doing something they are not, like removing the children from the home.. I don't know about your 61 year old friend except to say if they didn't get a gender identity issue until that late, their parents would have no role in choosing how to raise him in regards to this issue.. Maybe they were not the greatest parents, but that doesn't mean that his parents spent their lives turning him into a girl, perhaps they did things that made him prefer to later in life deal with it in this manner. I am also more aware of the 2 to 5 year olds who have the issue and that's where the parent needs to get involved, but all seem to get consistent professional advise to not fight the child over their choice..

My mother told me she knew of a child who was born with both male & female anatomy.. The parents were going to wait until they were old enough to decide if they were male or female before they had them have surgery to become a specific gender.. I wonder what youth organizations would be willing to accept him/her until the operation was performed.. Never heard what the outcome was, not even sure my mother kept in contact with them enough to know.. At the time she was retired and living out of a 5th wheel camper hitting the highways and seeing all of the USA at a slow leisurely pace.

If GSUSA stated policy is to be believed, it sounds like they are not forced onto a troop that is not equipped to deal with it.. If so, I don't see the problem.. But the one news article I know of the one child trying to join I think was handled all wrong and attempted to force the troop into accepting her.. I also think the newspaper was unfair to just give the accounting from the parents of the transgender child and paint the Troop Leader in a totally negative light. From how the story reads the parents never contacted the troop leader, or the GS for Colorado or National or whatever to give a heads up on the unique situation and find out the policy and allow either the troop leader or the GS for Colorado made the needed inquires and find out if they had suitable placement.. It sounds like the child was brought in by the Grandmother and they just expected the volunteer to have the knowledge & experience to deal with it.. Then were totally mortified that they did not, and went to the papers with the complaint. A heads up and allowing the troop to have time to discuss the matter with others and figure out what could be done I would expect from any parent with a child with special needs (be they politically charged or not).. A child with autism, a paraplegic child etc... You as a parent want your child to be welcomed when they come into a setting, if your child has something unusual, that means not just whisking them into something without giving the leaders a heads up, so they can figure out if they can include the child into their group, and allowing them to prepare the youth so that the youth are prepared, know what to expect and have some guidance on how to deal with them and include them. But then the Colorado branch (per the newspaper, which could have quoted them wrong) stated that ""In this case, an associate delivering our program was not aware of our approach." This makes it sound like the Troop was to simply accept the child whether the leaders and youth of the group could deal with it or not.. I would have felt better had they stated that the parents were not aware of the policy that would place the child if they could find a good fit, and that the parents should have contacted the GSUSA in order for them to be able to help with the placement..

EagleDad - YOUR statements were that of questioning what made Q's and Psychiatrists on the subject more qualified then your own.. I was just allowing you the chance to prove you have more qualifications.. I don't think politics should have anything to do with this subject.. Politicians are not qualified to give expert advice on the subject, they just state whatever they think will get them elected. So if your expertise is from a politicians point of view, forget it. Until you can state your expertise and then give professional well thought out advise on the subject, I (like NJCubScouter) will side with medical professionals..

Eagledad - you forgot to mention the experience (aside from personal) you have that makes you better qualified then Q who works with them, and the advice of psychologists trained in this field.. Since schools and other youth organizations are listening to the advice of the current experts in this field.. Perhaps you could put out your scientific paper on the subject soon in order to direct everyone in the correct method of treatment. Luckily I have no personal experience with this.. I would hope I would treat them normally, but I do not think it would come naturally until I really got to know them, and my friendliness I fear may come off as forced or fake..

It's great when armchair warriors know more then the experts.. I admit that I don't quite understand this, it is harder to wrap my head around then a same sex attraction.. What I do know is that these families wrestle with this problem in their child.. Most of them take their child from psychiatrist to psychiatrist for a year of more trying to find a cure only to be counseled that they need to accept and love their child as they are, and they are to treat them as the gender they believe they are.. This is a very difficult decision for them to make, only made more difficult by anyone who wishes to second guess all the psychiatrists and tell the parents they need to ignore what the experts are saying and calling them unfit or abusive parents for following what they have been counseled to do.. All I can say is I feel for these families.. They have a hard road ahead of them.