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My most favorite Thanksgiving dinners were defined by strangers at the table.

Good thing they didn't mention kisses. Mediterranean heads would explode! At the same time, I agree that it's important for children to know that their affections are theirs to give. They certainly aren't "owed" to anyone because they gave the kid a gift or toy. I remember being told how much our kisses bring our elderly relatives happiness, that's it.

The papers in the Treasure Coast towns where my in-laws lived have long voiced concerns about the passenger lines and traffic. Part of it was precisely that the railroad had no interest in putting the best signage signals at every intersection -- of which there are many -- even though their reason for being is that these coastal towns have succeeded in drawing the most highly concentrated customer base for passenger rail traffic in the nation. The industry is perfectly content with saddling automobile drivers and train crews with the guilt for these collisions. There is no reason that every foot of rail could not light up in red in advance of the stopping distance for oncoming trains.

Edin, Green, Hampton, Platts, and New are not Pitt. But, my bad for not specifying the antecedent of "one." And I have never gotten used to Valiant online.It was so much easier when Dad or I put the change on the doorstep, and the paper boy collected and delivered in one fell swoop. That may be the biggest issue that BSA faces. The program teaches scouts how to "get by" with whatever they find on their doorstep. Those scouts grow up thinking that indeed they can manage minimally, and are therefore unimpressed by most of the big-ticket stuff National offers.

I guess the Sixteen Nineteen Council wasn't on the ballot.

That's Pittsburgh, the only one with an 'h' at the end. But, since the Post-Gazzette no longer runs print -- and hasn't run Prince Valiant in its comics for a decade -- I would not expect it to offer any insight into this one. It could have at least sent a reporter up the street to council HQ to get quotes from someone at the scout shop. It didn't. Frankly, I have no idea why it's running the story without soliciting local comment.

More info than you'll ever want to know -- and nothing relevant to your question -- is in BSA Brand Guidlines.

@Onslow, it sounds like you feel you may be seen as an outsider. If that's the case, you need to get your boots on the ground and get to know a few of the folks in the target community. Ideally these would be people who have kids or grandkids in the age group you'd be working with.

Censorship for political correctness does no good. Depending on the mod, your indignance might be muzzled -- such requests most always end badly. The OP is a scouter who boldly states his biases. You think he's wrong, but he doesn't seem to think so. If this is some flight of fancy of some DE, he may be be spot on. If some members of the target community have been asking for such a program, he may indeed be allowing his worst-case perceptions to get the better of him. Either his perception of the situation or the situation itself is the obstacle. (We've seen both on this forum.) We've more to gain from guiding the OP through that than we have demanding he not say those mean things. I speak as an erstwhile deplorable. My more recent observations have been that the rural venturing crews in our area have been more successful than the urban and suburban ones.

To boldly camp where most will not camp anymore!

. I announced varsity soccer games ... quite clearly. So much so, that Daughter's teammates asked her why I was cheering so well for the other team. I told her to tell her teammates to start scoring, and then they'll understand. Before the start of next season I forwarded an essay to the coaches to share with the players. An excerpt from "When the Mic Goes On" ...

I'm all for STREAM: Science -- in the outdoors, Technology -- in pioneering, signalling, etc... Recreation -- as in recreating our wilderness, LNT, etc ... Engineering -- your personal path toward rank advanement ... Art -- especially the kind in those Norman Rockwell paintings! Mathematics -- as in ordering enough food for your patrol (and their ASM guest)!

Injury liability aside ... I think a soccer clubhouse would be a great meeting place, and I have no problem whatsoever with a bunch of patrols arriving at the pitch, putting on their activity uniform, conditioning, then playing a few quarters, cleaning up, throwing their activity uniform in the wash (under the QM's guidance), donning their field uniform, having their meeting, then getting their game clothes from the dryer and checking them back into their patrol lockers. A meal will have to fit in there somewhere ... but I've ate some of my best dinners at soccer booster concessions (their coffee definitely an improvement over the football/band booster's swill)! Saturday games? A lot of our fields are near some fine camping locations.

This is easily lost on even the best of us ... MB completion is the scout's responsibility. If the scout does not produce a blue card with a counselors signature on the "completion" line, he did not earn the badge. If the counselor did not remember that a scout demonstrated a skill and therefore did not record it the application, the scout did not demonstrate the skill. In both circumstances it is the scout's responsibility to ensure that his portion of the properly signed blue card is in his hands -- not on any SMs list. If he chooses to leave camp without that card, then his priority is on getting home and he is leaving his progress in the hands of someone else. If the scout missed doing a requirement, he needs to let his SM know that he needs a counselor near home. If the counselor missed something, he needs to touch base with him/her before he leaves camp. Insisting that things be done this way regardless of the camp's ad-hoc tracking system puts the scout in control of his destiny. The scout makes sure that everything is properly signed, and when the application is complete, divides it for the appropriate parties, and secures his portion in case the counselor's and the unit's record-keeping fails him. It's scout's advancement -- not the parent's, or the SM's, or the counselor's.

Something has to fill the vacuum since Risk Management removed dodgeball from the program! By the way, the next time someone tosses out "OK, Boomer", just reply "That'll be Civil Rights Generation to you, post-modern nomad."

If I were a fighting man, I'd let you load your gloves with as many MB's as they could hold while I stuffed mine with belt loops!

Dipping in acrylic, or fashioning from metal ... that's about the only way to make an MB hard for every scout.

Won by who?

I think this varies with the interests of the scout. Your second post has more general answers: Some of my scouts are generalists (like I am when it comes to munitions). Others love to wade into the weeds and go on an on about rifling, barrel length, range, sighting, and velocity. The goal is to help the generalist to think a little more about the details, and to get the scout who's stuck on details out of the weeds! @Jameson76, depends on which Zombie is using it. BTW - did anyone else go to school where guys made guns in shop and decorated stocks in art class? I never took on a project like that myself, but I was mesmerized by my friends' craftsmanship.

(Aside: just saw a post on discussions-dot-scouting-dot-org regarding "allowances" for Camping req 8 for devout Jewish scouts who cannot light fires on Sabbath ... followed by some good responses about scheduling campouts on different days.) Ceremonial vs. moral categories of violations aside, I agree with @DuctTape that for some time now folks have seen BSA as a cudgel for promulgating national values. Evidently providing oneself as an example for a couple dozen youth for 48 hour stretches isn't sufficient. One must also fret about someone on the opposite side of the country providing the "opposite" example for a couple of dozen different youth.

@ParkMan, your first scentence contradicts the remainder of your reply. You say this issue is about some higher ideal, "equality", but then every example you put forward is an example of permissive sexual ethics, and you conclude with the biased judgment that BSA picked "the wrong side" in the late 80s. The promoters of restrictive sexual ethics continue to argue that BSA is choosing the wrong side now. They flourish in their domains. And here is where I especially disagree with you ... I encourage anyone, of any particular faction, in any particular role (leader, follower) to keep talking about BSA. I'd prefer that they'd say something novel and insightful each time they spoke, but we should recognize that is hard to do. (See the reference to a rehashed article in law-dot-com in another thread for an example of failure at novelty.) It gives parents something to talk to me about. Negative advertising: it ain't great, but it's cheap!

I use the terms "restrictive" and "permissive" because they adequately neutrally describe the polarized views on this issue. Either one asserts that authoritative figures (e.g., church, state, youth organizations) should "restrict" which forms of sexual expression should be held in honor by society, or one asserts that a wide varietey of forms of sexual expression should be "permitted" to hold equal standing by society. One may be inclusive of race, creed, or sex, yet still want their children to aspire to restrictive or permissive norms regarding sexual ethics. If one aspires to restrictive sexual ethics, they exclude those with permissive sexual ethics ... and vice versa. (E.g., it was said by a member of this forum that we [scouters who stuck with BSA] were better off without them [scouters who spun off TL/USA for the sake of those in the restrictive camp].) At least for now, there are precious few venues where both sit comfortably in the same room together for long.

I disagree about the outcome. It is very good for LDS. They are no longer throwing $$ toward an organization for which a large portion of their male youth weren't actively involved, and the adult leadership demands were overtaxing. The potential for the LDS to attract non-LDS families is as high as it's ever been. If TL/USA is any indication, they are poised to vacuum up a lot of youth in families with a restrictive sexual ethic. On the other hand, those tens of thousands who might want their boys to be brought up with a mind toward a more permissive sexual ethic have not flocked to BSA.

Shared with my jamboree troop.

The article's regurgitation of facts is very confusing. It attributes BSA's membership loss to its entrenchment in Dale, but elevates GS/USA for its support of a permissive sexual ethic without acknowleging it's equally precipitous membership trajectory. It further ignores the rise in membership of the nascent TL/USA and AHG, both of which uphold restrictive sexual ethics. It also fails to acknowledge that the court made clear that artisans cannot be compelled to act as conscripts of a cause to spite their religion. Furthermore, it does not opine on BSA's declaration of religious principle, and how that has truly hampered the organization's role in public institutions. It is neither investigative nor instructive. We've seen these articles before. What is clear: private organization's can and do discriminate, but should they?