BSA24

> the current political policies of the > Supreme Court are biased, obnoxious and > offensive, in my view. They provide a definite > bias towards atheism and therefore create > an atmosphere of hostility towards religion. Can you cite the rulings from the cases you disagree with? I am unable to find any significant supreme court rulings on the establishment clause since 1997. The things that annoy you I rather appreciate: http://www.politicsplus.org/blog/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/30Iran.jpg

> never expressed their own sense of morality Discussing morality requires no religion according to BSA. Remember that we are to teach boys how to be good men without using religion. BSA is a grey place to you?

> never expressed their own sense of morality Discussing morality requires no religion according to BSA. Remember that we are to teach boys how to be good men without using religion. BSA is a grey place to you?

AZmike, Yep - shut him up on the topic. If he's on everyone's dime, then he needs to stick to the topic and not play at being a preacher. He's not one. There's never been a president who was "morally straight" anyway. Being a politician pretty much disqualifies you from that category. As for political consistency - I think that is an unrealistic expectation. Given the inconsistencies everywhere in everyone's political beliefs. Liberals throw back "You are pro-life, but you don't want to take care of people after they are born - just before." They also throw back, "You are against big government, unless it is regulating marriage, private affairs, or giving tax breaks to churches." There's all sorts of inconsistencies everywhere. I think that's what this debate is about. It's about being consistent. There are a growing number of Americans who find BSA's membership restrictions to be out of step with the national culture as well as the ideals that they think the organization represents.

In my troop the adults marched us to the showers. The patrol leaders used to run around saying "clean set of clothes please." There was much policing of our cleanliness.

I don't think Federal Courts are trying to eliminate religion. I think they are simply enforcing the establishment clause of the Constitution. As the nation's consciousness about what constitutes a belief and a religion morphs over time, those who were advantaged by the previous interpretations which excluded other voices are now having their rights reduced to make room for others. As someone who was raised in a very conservative Christian home, it seems natural to me to bow my head in prayer and say "Amen" at the end. But these are strictly Christian practices. Having someone give the prayer while I merely quietly bow my head is also Christian. Perhaps what you see as pushing back on religion is actually setting up preventative care to preserve Christianity in the future when its number of believers are outnumbered by something else. It is only because Christianity is completely dominant in American life that these rulings seem to be against religion. In fact, they are against Christian assumptions that all belief systems work the same. Look at Scout practices. We say we welcome all faiths, but we only practice Christian Sunday morning services. We only use Christian style prayers. We only use Christian "Amen" at the end. We talk about "God" even though Buddhism has no inherent belief in a conscious deity (though there is room for such). We talk about "God" even though Muslims feel that "Allah" is the proper word. Scouting doesn't welcome all faiths. Scouting welcomes all people to practice Christian cultural behaviors and not make waves or say there is no God. "respect the beliefs of others" is currently translated to "respect Christian culture." There is no respect for much else. Until that changes, Christians cannot be trusted with the public square. No one can be. We are all too human and irresponsible with the power of the majority. That is what courts are for. They prevent the majority from enacting law that steps on others.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

Is it for the boys? If so, then forget what the adults want and do what the boys want. Consider Lone Scouting for the boys, or found your own unit without BSA in support and run a traditional scout troop without them. Use military garb for your uniforms, and get badges from the baden powell scout association. http://www.inquiry.net/traditional/index.htm Folks in BSA are always saying like it or leave it - turns out it is easy to leave. Really easy. With BSA's falling membership levels and street cred among employers in urban areas, you're probably doing your kids a service. No COR required, no minimum committee. You can be a scoutmaster to the two boys and just run with it like they did in the old days. If others join - cool. Make your own uniforms from army/navy surplus. The boys will not care where the scouting is coming from. Possible negatives: No access to boy scout camps, no ability to say later "I am an eagle scout." In 20 years, none of that may matter with BSA on target to financially implode by then. A positive: the adults can do the scouting too, earn the badges, and do things right alongside the youth - together - rather than just attending endless leadership and policy administration training. Like BSA was back in the 10's and 20's. BSA is a horrible franchiser. They are as oppressive and controlling as any franchise company, and the support they provide is largely them coming around asking you for more donations. Do what any business would do when their franchiser stinks. Go independent and change the name of your restaurant. I doubt the customers will care.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> If atheists are unhappy with Scouting --- don't join. Don't like it? Tough. It may bring pleasure to assume this stance, but it is unbecoming of an organization with ideals like ours.

> We need to join together to understand and respect > our varying religious traditions --- atheism included. > They should all have a respected place in the public > square and in Scouting in particular. I agree. The United States was founded and continues to exist as a nation where one is free to pursue religion in his own way. We don't allow any one religion to define our lives for us, and we shouldn't allow lack of belief to define our lives for us. Where we are having trouble is in the public square where all are taxed to pay for landscaping and maintenance, the schools where all are mandated by law to attend, and court rooms where all are mandated by law to appear. While I agree with you ideals entirely, I just don't believe that Americans are mature enough to allow for it. Censorship of religion from the public square remains necessary because we handle it worse than we do firearms. We can't be trusted to behave in a polite, civil way. And let's be honest - the root cause of this lack of maturity is due to the nature of Islam and Christianity themselves. They are taught in the United States as evangelical pursuits. It is the mission of adherents not only to believe, as Judaism and other non-Abrahamic religions teach, but also to pursue the recruiting of new believers. As a result, people are taught in church and mosque to behave so poorly in public that they have gone and ruined it for everyone. Putting up crosses and then denying access to others is common. Insisting on the expression of only one religion. Or how about the militant scouter who ends his pre-meal grace with "In Jesus Name, the only true God, Amen." Yeah, that happens every day. Or better yet, the prayer where before we eat lunch a scout prays that we will all come to Jesus before it is too late. Yes, that happens too. Militant atheists do not exist in a vacuum. They are an equal reaction to an action. In nations where religion is not evangelical, such as Europe, atheists are largely silent.

> Just because it's the courts that are censoring > speech doesn't mean it isn't censorship, pure and simple. I agree with SP. Respecting the beliefs of others is advanced citizenship. It is a standard that we as Americans have yet to understand or embrace. Frankly, we aren't yet smart enough or emotionally mature as a nation to be able to act on this ideal, even though we say in the Scout Law. I doubt a Muslim call to prayer before meals would be welcome at summer camp. I'd like to see someone do that. Carpets for everyone! Buddhist meditation? Sit down in the half-lotus, everyone, and get out your beads. We will now meditate on the Noble Eightfold Path. No? This is why the atheists are right in trying to silence prayer. Yes, it is censorship. It is necessary censorship to have everyone get along, because despite what we say, religious beliefs are often highly offensive to people who hold different beliefs. A Scout is Reverent - he respects the beliefs of others. In my opinion, respecting the beliefs of others means not speaking about your own beliefs. At all. Because I love my beliefs, but yours are just some science fiction nonsense and your holy book says you will kill my people or we will go to the bad place when we die.

Suggestion: Do your beading at a committee meeting or a party for the leaders at your house. Let everyone come casual, you in uniform, receive the beads, and then change clothes and have a casual party for your adults that is not scouting related. Don't step on the Eagle COH with your wood badge ceremony. The wood badge staff might show up and turn into overbaked hams and bore everyone to death. There are a large percentage of non-scouter adults who think that an adult getting an award from the scouts is childish and silly. You'll tick people off, even if the scout is OK with it. Beadings should never ride on top of other meetings - COH's, Pack Meetings, etc, because the wood badge staff will start telling the story of William Boyce and promoting wood badge. Those meetings are supposed to be for the boys, not for the adults. The boys are not invited to wood badge. Both the Eagle Award and the Wood Badge beads were treasured at one time because of their rarity and the difficulty in obtaining them. Now both are more frequently obtained. Wood Badge is now leader training - it used to be a week long hazing festival where leaders learned outdoor skills. Eagle used to be earned by 1% of scouts, but now 4% earn it thanks to National Jamborees and District Merit Badge Clinics that allow boys to earn 100 merit badges in four years. I see the value in having every leader trained, but at the same time, there are no scouting achievements left that are rare and respected other than the life-saving medals. Everything is becoming a participation or tenure award.

Just to inject more chaos: Since the previous training times indicated that new requirements would be coming out, but you could complete the awards under the old requirements, let's see how many districts turn in the old forms, and how many reject the old forms because they think the new form is instantly required sending their volunteers into a hissy fit because they thought they finished their award, but now they have another year to go or some additional requirement to meet. LOL BSA's National Committees - when it absolutely, positively has to be done completely wrong and poorly communicated.

Arrgghhh The award forms have "This is Scouting" required on them even though the requirement to take it to be considered "trained" was done away with because it is redundant. This page: http://www.scouting.org/scoutsource/CubScouts/resources/CSLeaderRecAwards.aspx Still not updated. I too bemoan the use of facebook for notifications. Why do they use the training updates page for a newsletter that is quarterly instead of just blogging on it?

The best one is the one that you and the boys make together. Buy some 1x8 white pine shelf boards or get them donated Draw, dremel, carve, or paint a sunrise/sunset on the board Drill two holes Put some sticks in the holes or dowels Glue them in place Mount the arrow to the board Have the boys make their own, or you make them for them and have all the boys sign each other's on the back with a sharpie marker.

> the advancement chair (the arbiter of "new rules") tells Scouts, > at a Board of Review, "okay,... from here on out you're going > to be expected to actually participate But that is not the role of the Advancement Chair, and they are not entitled to say such a thing. The Advancement Chair doesn't decide if a requirement is met. The SM does that. The SM makes that decision. The AC only decides if the records are updated properly and everything signed off properly. They make sure the BOR happens, but their only role in the BOR is to review all paperwork and ensure all requirements are met. This is a problem in a lot of troops. Advancement Chairs think they are in charge of all advancement. That's not correct. They are in charge of the Administration of Advancement. Their job: * Make sure there are BOR's * Help get BOR's set up for boys * Keep records updated by advising the Troop Scribe to update them * During BOR ensure all requirements have been properly signed off The AC does not decide if the requirement is met, just that it was logged as completed properly.

Sometimes a boy needs to be pulled aside and cooled down. Sometimes I need to ask myself what I did to bore them so bad they wanted to do something else. I don't punish them. I just grind through it and use the scout sign as long as it takes.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> position-specific training does not transfer! > So if you had a trained Den Leader who switched > registration to Cubmaster this year, he is no longer > considered trained. This is why the fancy position patches for being trained made sense. The trained badge is silly. You sew it on, you aren't going to remove it just because you change positions. People leave them on forever once they get them on. Often they are glued on and can't come off without major surgery. The trained position patches were the ticket here. Shiny badges for trained leaders, regular badges for those who had not completed training. Forced you to downgrade your status until you attended training.

I too am from ye olden days. I did not receive "instant recognition." We had a COH ever three months instead of a regular meeting. It was a covered dish meal following the awards ceremony. If you completed a badge, you waited until the COH to receive it. My SM put a lot of work into the ceremonies - turning off the lights and lighting candles in the room. It was a very powerful experience. Your dad pinned your pin on your pocket flap. You pinned your Mom with the mother's pin. The SM handed you the cloth badge. The pin was put on upside down. We could only turn it right side up after doing our first good turn. This had to be a serious good deed and not just holding a door for someone. After receiving my tenderfoot pin upside down, I went to the local grocery store the next day and pulled all the carts in for them. Then I raced home and turned it right side up. These days, SM's just wait till the end of the meeting, call up the boy, and hand them a cloth badge like it's another thing to do. Shake hands, good job, ok, sit down. Very casual with no sense of stage craft at all. An old scouter wrote that there should be a sense of the picturesque in all things. We are losing that when we don't do these ceremonies.

He's a VERY angry elf!

> How about the SM who got caught by his > wife being unfaithful with the ASM? I'd want to know more details about what happened as their COR to make a call on that. I'd conduct a thorough investigation before rendering a decision on who needed to leave and if they needed to leave depending on what I learned - not one sentence in a forum. It is never as black and white as reported. > Or the child porn film maker who wanted to be a SM. Probably BSA will reject the application. As the COR, I would refuse to sign it. Then I would call the cops. > There is the stripper who wanted to be a CM. I'd want to talk with her and see what "a stripper" means and at what point in her life she did that. I'd investigate to find out who knew what, and make a determination to see if she was a threat to the youth or undermined the respect for Scouting that anyone in the unit would feel as a result. I'd make these judgements one at a time based on the individual and the full facts as I investigated. I would not make them based on broad-brush policies. > Scouts will be confronted with generalizations of > behavior for the rest of their lives, are you suggesting > that we teach them that all behaviors should be > acceptable to our community? Thank you, thank you, thank you for bringing this up. Because I think this is the most important point in the entire debate to surface: police behavior and not thoughts. I would handle behaviors in my unit as a COR. I'd let an atheist join. If he chose not to pray, I would say nothing. If he spoke during prayers, I'd talk to him about it. If he denounced others' beliefs, I'd warn him, then dismiss him. I'd let a gay man be CM. If he came to a meeting dressed as a woman, I'd dismiss him. If his background check failed, I would not allow him to join. If he was french kissing his boyfriend in front of the pack at a pack meeting, I'd warn him once and dismiss him the next time. I'd let my neighbor be a CM. If he tried to tell other people that Jesus is Lord, I'd tell him to stop it, and if he kept doing it, I'd dismiss him. If he french kissed his wife at a pack meeting, I'd warn him once and dismiss him the next time he did it. > The values of scouting are unconditional unselfish > acts toward others to be fair and just All of this can be handled in a just in fair method by learning to take each person as an individual, and not to declare an entire group of people "bad" and then exclude them based on only one quality of their person. Just like everyone was ranting that "poor" does not make someone bad. "Black" does not make someone bad. "Gay" does not make someone bad. "Atheist" does not make someone bad. That's what bigotry and prejudice are: Us judging people based on something other than their behavior and individuality.

I give the tiger den leader the pack's bucket 'o beads. I have them award them in the den meetings immediately upon completion of their requirements. For the electives, if the boy says he did ten, we give him a bead. We don't use the advancement chair for that or otherwise try to track or document it. They just track the orange, white, and black beads for their tiger badge requirements so that we don't forget anyone's badge.

Sorry. I was not trying to be hard on SP. My apologies, SP, if that's how it comes across. I was attempting to address each point with either logic or my own perspective. I just viewed it as a lively test of opinions. I'm curious if I learn something when mine don't hold up, and also hopeful sometimes someone else sees some value in my position. It's funny how it sounds all good-natured and fun in your own mind while writing, but someone else will read it in an angry, mean voice. That is not my intent. That is a failure of my poor education and inadequate writing skills.(This message has been edited by BSA24)

> There are certainly loads of atheists and homosexuals in > Scouting now. They merely need to accept the values of > Scouting as it is in order to get along. "The Values of Scouting" = The Membership Policy, apparently. I do not believe that there are any Scouting Values that have anything to do with sexuality or belief in God. To follow the membership policy, you wish for them to comply with the don't ask don't tell practice, which means they should maximize secrecy and not tell anyone what they are up to, but continue to support us in our many leadership positions. > Should BSA decide to change current principles > because it is determined to be the right thing > to do, I would expect to support that. I don't let the national executive board determine what is morally right for me. The Oath and Law are vague enough that any person can follow them to become a better person within a a wide range of human cultures and beliefs about how the world works. > The real bottom line is that you are NEVER going to > make everyone happy. No. That is not the bottom line. In fact, that's entirely irrelevant. We shouldn't do things to make others happy. We should do what's right so our consciences rest easy. > atheists have a responsibility to respect the > beliefs of others too. Yes, I wrote that above. I wrote, "Leave "reverent" in the Law. They can respect the beliefs of others and be faithful in their religious duties (if they have them)." And apparently those atheists are already doing that, because they are in the Scouts today, and I see no internal movement to disrespect prayer time or otherwise trample on the beliefs of others. However, I do sometimes see Jews and Muslims looking aghast as a prayer is led "In the name of Jesus" by a leader with sinister intentions to let us all know what he thinks real religion is and who has zero respect for the beliefs of others. I asked an atheist who is a microbiologist once a long time ago when I was on the other side of this argument how he could say the Scout Oath and consider himself trustworthy. He said, "My God is the Truth. I use science as my religious study of it." He reminded me that BSA policy says that they do not define what someone's higher power or God means to them. He said nature itself is his higher power. During prayers, he contemplates the expanse of the universe and his place in it. The problem with this discussion is the broad generalization of atheists and gays as screaming college kids in the street with tears running down their faces as they run around in nothing but body paint. The reality is that gays and atheists are just as diverse as anyone else, and we are afraid of some stereotype we imagine and what we imagine they will do. This is just like the civil rights era and all the same arguments people made against integrating with minorities. It is exactly the same. Fictional imaginings and paranoia and fear.

As the SM of the troop, you are the top leader of the unit. You do not have to follow troop traditions. You set the tone of the program. When an adult tells a youth not to enter the "adults only zone," say, "My scouts are always welcome in my campsite as long as we are not alone. Come on in, son. What do you need?" Tell the boys they are welcome in your area. That will spark one to approach, and give you the opportunity to issue the correction. Probably no adult will try and stand up to you. If one does, say, "I'm the scoutmaster. My scouts in my troop will always be welcome up here." Wink at them, then turn back to whatever your doing. Recommend you sign up for Wood Badge. Make this one of your ticket items. Also make one to build a committee. Get thee to wood badge now! It will really help you with this stuff.