KNOTS

[HawkUH60]

Docrwm

OMG!!!! they give knots for that (LOL, I know they do). Next thing you know they will give one to people who give $$$....wait....I got one....never mind. Don't want people to think I am some rich guy going around buying knots LOL.

I just discovered a new one on ebay....looks like BSA has semi professional speakers who can earn a knot.

 

I will never understand why scouters get so territorial over awards and how many a person has. In the army I have 3 badges and 14 ribbons (some with multiple oak leaves) and no one gets bent out of shape about it like I see people do in scouting.

 

[Gold Winger]

"GW, most of the good scouters are fully trained or their units would flounder, many of them choose not to wear the knots they have earned for a variety of reasons,"

 

Four districts, two councils and I haven't met one of those yet. Not bad Scouters but good Scouters who choose to not wear their knots.

 

"Oh no, have I started down a slippery slope to poor scouting?!?! I just got and sewed on my first knot. Tell me I'll be ok??"

 

Apparently not, according to some. By sewing that knot on your uniform, you have just made your participation in the program about you and not about the boys. Shame on you!(This message has been edited by Gold Winger)

[Bob White]

BadenP writes "GW, most of the good scouters are fully trained or their units would flounder, many of them choose not to wear the knots they have earned for a variety of reasons,"

 

And I have to wonder, with over 1.2 MILION adult volunteers where does one find the time to meet enough to know what MOST do?

 

Or could it be that his statement was just a gross exaggeration and that he could not possibly know what most good leaders do.

 

(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[BadenP]

GW you got it wrong dude, I am not talking about scouters with three or four knots I am talking about people who overdo. There is a guy at my RT who wears 16-20 knots on every one of his uniforms, half of them are youth knots, religious award both youth and adult. He never got eagle as he tells it but he wears the knot, he wears knots he bought on ebay that are not even official BSA. He is always in your face about the right way to do things, yet his troop is down to 6 boys who are mostly inactive. However he gives all a good laugh and no one takes him seriously. This guy wears so many other patches that you can't even see the front of his shirt, but he loves to tell tall tales how he saved his troop from a bad SM, was asked by council to help with a crisis etc, etc. Now he is not a typical scouter but rather the extreme end of the scale. The other scouters who like to wear a lot of fruit salad I noticed have scaled back to a more realistic look for fear of being compared to the crackpot.

[Gold Winger]

That's one example of someone who wears awards they haven't earned. What's that have to do with Scouters who wear their earned awards? Not a danged thing.

 

It really sounds like you have some issues. I've observed that people who take screen names from famous people have some serious issues with self esteem. Maybe you need to re-examine your motives for being involved with Scouting.

[Docrwm]

The local SM has served over 40 years in various capacities within BSA. He's a WWII Vet and has volunteered for more community organizations than he can remember. His Troop has around 100 boys in it with 60+ showing up at every activity. His uniform has 4 rows of Knots. At the Memorial Day event we do locally for the National Cemetery he was wearing his mini-ribbons from his USN service. PH with clusters that none of us knew about. SS that none of us knew about. He was embarrassed when one of us pointed it out. He said he wore it to honor the folks with whom he served but who were no longer with us.(This message has been edited by docrwm)

[Buffalo Skipper]

I had a leader with whom I worked with our pack. He proudly wore his Eagle knot, but refused take any interest in any of the cub scout awards. One day, we were talking about it and he said, "I wear the only important one."

 

I appreciate the value of an Eagle scout, but I really felt he was missing the point. We insist (at the boy scout/venturing level) that the youth take the initiative to puruse their own advancement, and we are suposed to movivate them as leaders. Should we not lead by example by following the recognition program BSA has established for adults?

 

 

[Gold Winger]

" One day, we were talking about it and he said, "I wear the only important one."

 

I guess in his mind the purpose of the program is to make Eagles.

[Eagle92]

Ok my $.02 worth.

 

Knots are important because they do show youth, parents, and other scouters how involved you are and some of your accomplishments Should one try and go after everyone knot available, NO, go after the ones that relate to your duties. And definately don't wear knots you didn't earn.

 

Now do some Scouters wear knots for the wrong reasons, absolutely, and I've been just as guilty as the next person. I intially wore only my Eagle, AOL, and youth religious knots. However once I got on the district committee as a 22 yo OA Chapter Adviser, those who didn't know me questioned my abilities to do the job and my knowledge of Scouting. I thought that by earning a chestful of knots, that would change people's opinions. And I went after the Scouter's Training Award. I discovered that wearing knot's don't change people's opinions. Doing your job correctly and being successful in your position does the trick.

 

I can't fault people who don't want to wear knots they have earned. heck I haven't sewed on my Dis. Com.Key knot on all my uniforms yet, and I've had them a year now. But on my primary uniform it is on and wghen I was doing training, I encouraged everyone to keep up with the awards they are eligible for.

[Buffalo Skipper]

Eagle92,

I think you really hit the nail on the head here. I have several uniforms which I wear for different occasions. For a cub scout function, I wear my youth achievements, and cub scout related awards, but I don't haveBoy Scout awards or others which are less relevant to a cub scout audience.

On the other hand, as cubmaster back in 2006 with the "Cub Scout Shipbuilders" theme, I wore my Sea Scout whites with a CM patch temporarilystitched on the sleeve. I had several cubs come up and ask about my Seabadge Trident and other uniform parts not seen on my Cubmaster uniform. I even had one den leader ask why I didn't wear my Cubmaster award on my whites.

Have I really become a better leader for earning awards. Maybe, maybe (k)not. I am an active supporter of training (I stepped down as Cubmaster to be the Pack Trainer), and I strongly encourage other leaders to follow up on awards. Every den leader I have worked with over the past 5 years who has not completed the requirements for an award has only failed because of not participating in Roundtable. Would that have made them better leaders? Very possibly.

Show me a pack whose leaders have no knots, and more often than not this will be a unit whose leaders have not all been to training, do not attend Roundtables, do not have good youth retention, and are generally out of step with what is happening in the District and Cub Scouting in general. Who suffers for this? The leader who doesn't wear a knot? Certainly not! It is the cub scout who is being denied the best possible program. I would say that this "trend" applies as much to Troop leaders as well.

[jr56]

Excellent post. It has often been my experience that the scout leaders who ignore the training knots appropriate to their position are often the leaders off doing their own thing, with no regard for the official BSA program.

[BadenP]

Gee Gold didn't know you were a psychologist too, lol. The only one with issues here is you my friend adding your barrage of nonsensical posts, acting like an expert about everything including scouting. Maybe you should check your own motives with your craving for constant attention in this forum by posting on every thread multiple times. At least Bob can quote references to support his ideas, you sir do not have a clue what you are talking about most of the time. So say what you want but IMHO you are a complete waste of my time. By the way the example I gave was to show how the knot thing can get carried to the extreme, most scouters do not act like that, most are humble caring individuals who love scouting. How many knots do you have Gold, or are you even a true scouter?

[emb021]

"I discovered that wearing knot's don't change people's opinions. Doing your job correctly and being successful in your position does the trick. "

 

Becare of speaking in generalities.

 

Yes, there are some people who will not be impressed by knots. There some who will be. For myself, I take knots as a general indication of the involvement and experience of the wearer. I always reserve final judgement as to what kind of person the scouter is after I've interacted with them &/or seen them in action.

 

Seeing a person in action is always a better indicator. What is most frustrating is that some people are unwilling to give people the chance to 'show their stuff'...

 

 

[Eagle92]

Emb021,

I hear ya. I was referring to my expereince only. In retrospect I think the age factor played a major part. After all I was 22, and looked a little younger. In my situation after about 6 months of being in my job, those who didn't know me either did know me or have heard about me. Still it got interesting a few times that I showed up with the OA ceremony team to do an AOL/Crossover Ceremony and introduced myself as the adviser to a CM (This message has been edited by Eagle92)

[GaHillBilly]

Interesting . . . very interesting.

 

 

 

BW, I continue to be amazed by the way you mix real and bogus knowledge. I would have thought someone as literate as you would have actually looked up the definition of "prejudice", before accusing me of not knowing it. Even if you didn't care about anything else, I would have guessed you'd check first just to avoid the egg on your face!

 

Crow, for supper, anyone?

 

 

 

GW, In my original post, I didn't say that the choice I made was between someone with knots vs. someone without. I said the choice was between someone with a chestful of knots, vs with "worn but mostly bare uniform shirts".

 

If a new unworn shirt without knots signifies anything (especially right now), one way or another, I don't know what it would be.

 

But, going out on a limb a bit, GW I'm gonna guess, based on my "observation" of your posts, and my 'prejudicial interpretation' of those observations . . . that you wear a bunch of knots.

 

 

 

GaHill--"I gots no knots!"--Billy