Am I missing Something?

[Fat Old Guy]

Wheeler, I was agreeing with you about a bunch of stuff but I think that you've stepped off into the deep end.

 

You remind me of baseball managers that I'd run across. "Fun," they'd scream, "we're not here to have fun. We're here to play baseball."

 

We can learn while having fun. We can have fun with work. People who take the fun out of life are the same people that start wars and fly planes into tall buildings. Nah, I'm sure that latter group had fun while training.

 

 

 

[Bob White]

Allow me to juxtapose two quotes from two different people who claim to know a lot about scouting and have strong opinions about life.

 

The first is from Wheeeler.

"Fun. Do you not think that maybe you are giving a false impression of life. Are you really preparing them for life? Is real life about having fun?"

 

You may recognize the second quote

"I believe that God put us in this jolly world to be happy and enjoy life. Happiness doesn't come from being rich, nor merely from being successful in your career, nor by self-indulgence.

 

One step towards happiness is to make yourself healthy and strong while you are a boy, so that you can be useful, and so can enjoy life when you are a man.

 

Nature will show you how full of beautiful and wonderful things God has made the world for you to enjoy.

 

Be contented with what you got, and make the best of it; look on the bright side of things instead of the gloomy one. But the real way to get happiness is by giving out happiness to other people.

 

Try and leave this world a little better than you found it, and when your turn comes to die you can die happy in feeling that at any rate you have not wasted your time but have "done your best".

 

"Be Prepared" in this way, to live happy and die happy; stick to your Scout Promise always--even after you have ceased to be a boy--and God will help you to do it.

 

Your friend,

 

Baden-Powell"

 

Wheeler, Is scouting supposed to be fun? Yes. Is life supposed to be fun? BP thought so, and so do many of us. Unfortunately you do not see the joy, and happiness in this jolly world that Baden-Powell and so many of us see. I feel sorry for you.

 

I get a clearer and clearer picture of just what you are trying to sell here Wheeler and while you may find a few willing converts to your mission, for the most part you are wasting your time. By in large the kind of people that volunteer for scouting are good, positive, happy people. They do not see the see the clouds of doom that you see. Not because they don't want to, or refuse to, but because we know the clouds are not there. The cloud looms over you because it is your cloud. You have created it, you allow it to grow darker through your own pessimism and insecurities. That may be your world, but it is not ours, and it is not the real world.

 

I will ask again, what is your role in scouting today and what adult leader training have you taken that has given you such a unique impression of who we are, what our purpose is and how we achieve our goals?

 

I sit with the squelch button at the ready,

Bob White

 

 

 

(This message has been edited by Bob White)

[Eamonn]

Of course each and everyone of us has pet peeves and areas that in our opinion need to be improved and there is not a thing in the world wrong with expressing them here in this forum. However at times especially lately in the forum it seems to me (And I could be way off base?) that there are a few who do not share the love of Scouting and as for wanting what is best for Scouting? I just shudder to think.

While at times we can agree to disagree on some of the not so important matters. There are times when I am left wondering if I belong to the same organization as some of the people who post. I just can't help thinking that they have never read the mission of the BSA, let alone understand it!!

It could be that I'm reading too much into some of the stuff, particularly this stuff about Scouting making men out of boys. Boys become men with or without the Boy Scouts Of America. We are in the business of helping them make ethical choices over the course of their lifetime, we do the same thing for the females in our program, yet I have never seen or heard: Scouting makes a girl into a woman !! Why? Maybe it just doesn't have the same ring to it.

This past few weeks there have been several postings saying that "We have to stop being so PC." Is it "PC" becase they just disagree? What is wrong with being "PC"? As I asked "Am I missing something

Eamonn

Note To Proud Eagle:

I "stole" Caring Adult from the Venturing Training.

[Laurie]

Wheeler wrote: "When you expect people to behave like kids they will remain kids. The Boy Scout program is about growing up. Not maintaining childishness."

 

You have not yet responded to any questions about your background in or knowledge of Scouting, and in that one brief quote of yours above, it is clear that you must not have a working knowledge of the Scouting program. Maintaining childishness...that is not what is being suggested by previous posts. Understanding that children are...well, children...that's why the fun is important. All sorts of crimes are committed against children, abuse is reported daily, drugs and alcohol and weapons are making their way into younger and younger hands. Life is HARD. I am one of many who cares enough about my own children and other children to be involved in creating a safe and fun environment for youth as they learn to deal with the tough issues around them. Sadly, for many, that one hour a week of Scouting may be the only fun they do have. We don't know all the challenges a child faces in his daily life, whether it be on the street, in school, or in his home. What we do know is that caring compassionate adults who are willing to carry out the BSA program can help a child to grow into a young man capable of overcoming the obstacles he faces; it does not teach one to maintain childishness or remain a kid.

 

You may know how to quote Plato or Socrates, but you're trying to tell people who already understand the BSA how to do it the right way--or at least that is how your posts come across. That is not support of the BSA; that's a put down to the program and the people who carry it out.

[Fat Old Guy]

"What is wrong with being "PC"?"

 

Because it binds the freedom of expression.

 

 

[WHEELER]

"but they don't need to be serious now. They need to be allowed to be children." This quote is by Laurie who voted down the post "To be a man".

 

These exact same words were spoken to me eight years ago by a college professor at Berea College.

 

Let me count the ways for you:

 

While in Saudi Arabia, though after the war, I caught nine people sleeping on post.

 

When in construction, I had to deal with lots many young men who couldn't do work or shied away, because they sought fun. I got a lot of work out of men that were 30 years and older.

 

At the college we were at, more women applied for the gardening/landscaping, mowing jobs than men. The men tried their hardest to find the easist jobs.

 

When, at the college, we held a public forum about the college and what was happening there, the whole audience except for two men were women. I looked out the window, a band was playing and all the men were down there for it....partying.

 

When, at college, the senate hearings of Waco were going on TV, I watched alone yet downstairs, four men were watching WWF.

 

At most of the government meetings I attend, more women show up than men.

 

Some men never grow up and their whole life is about playing the games of a child because that is where the fun is.

 

When fun is the medium, their whole outlook in life is about doing this over and over again.

 

When a man has a serious outlook, he participates in serious things. When a man has an "I want to be amused outlook", then that is what he searches for.

 

I am out there in the real world, I had to put up with this. Observe.

This was a dangerous trait I learned in the Boy Scouts when I had to learn how to track and how to identify plant species in the old way. It trained my mind to observe. The other culture that loved to hunt was the Spartans. It was a technique to train the mind to observe. One learns to observe very well this way. Observation is a key to manhood.

 

Why no participation in the serious things of life but wrapped up in the trivialties of life?

[Fat Old Guy]

Wheeler, I will agree with you in part. We concentrate too much on letting "kids be kids." The idea of the ideal childhood is relatively new in human culture. Before the 20th century and for a good part of that century as well, children, especially teens, worked their butts off. They played but they tended animals, harvested crops, did chores, worked in mines, etc..

 

Now we have a really strange attitude toward teens. In one breathe parents will say, "He's 16, he can make his own decisions about going to school" but if that same teen commits a crime they say, "Don't be too harsh, he's only a kid."

 

The problem is that you shoot yourself in the foot. You talk about life being more than fun but look at yourself. You avoid gainful employment so yo can study, which for you is fun.

[Laurie]

Wheeler, with all due respect, you don't seem to understand children at all. As for the post I voted down, Red Feather's post in that thread sums up my reason well. As for this thread, those of us who do know the BSA program understand this: we work with children using age-appropriate activities. Men aren't born as "little men" who just need to focus on the day they are "taller men". They start as babies, totally reliant on their parents, and when the parents (and those the parents partner with: BSA, school, churches, etc) do their jobs well, bit by bit those little babes become self-sufficient men. However, if you were trained through the BSA, you'd know this already. Many of us are parents and already working within the home to train up our young boys into mature young men of strong character, citizenship, and fitness. We then take a role as a leader in local units because we believe the BSA is a good helper in this task, and is a good way for us to give back to an organization that is giving to us--as well as to be involved with our sons. Wheeler, if you truly care about the BSA or young boys growing into men, you won't be effective by proclaiming poverty as your reason for not being involved. You'll rise above the obstacles you face, and in doing that, you will demonstrate to the boys and young men about you how to do so. What you don't seem to realize is that many leaders in the BSA aren't just filling time, wealthy, or have little else important in their lives. They are people who deeply care about today's youth and want to help them grow into mature men in a world that is full of challenges and really quite difficult.

 

Eamonn, my apologies I've taken this thread off course.

[WHEELER]

Being Cheerful is not the same as being fun. Being cheerful, is about having a cheerful attitude whether one is at a campfire or scrubbing the patrol's pans in cold creek water. Are we confusing the terms here?

 

Cannot one have a cheerful attitude when one is doing his duty?

Are we climatizing boys to expect that if it ain't fun, I'm not participating in it.

 

This concept of "having fun" is not the same as "being cheerful".

[NJCubScouter]

Wheeler, I think you are missing one very important thing about the Boy Scouts of America: It is voluntary. We, as parents, make our children go to school even though it may not be fun, we make them help around the house even though it may not be fun, we make them be polite and to fulfill other responsibilities to God, country, family etc. even though it may not be fun.

 

However, we don't make them be a Boy Scout. True, when a new Tiger shows up at a pack meeting it is generally the parents' idea, as a 6 or 7 year old does not get a lot of decision-making power. However, somewhere along the line a boy is going to start deciding what it is he does and doesn't want to do after school and on weekends, and if he becomes dead-set against doing something, at some point his parents are going to say, "Oh, ok."

 

That is why Scouting needs to be fun. A boy is going to quit otherwise. As Baden-Powell said, it is "fun with a purpose." (Or someone said something like that.) And it is not all necessarily fun, there is responsibility and duty mixed in with the fun from the very beginning, and more as the boy goes along. I watch the 14-year-old SPL of my son's troop and some weeks he is not having very much fun, trying to keep some control of a roomful of boys, half of whom are older than he is, who have their own idea of what they want to do. But he must at least be getting some satisfaction out of it, as he gets better and better (sometimes imperceptibly) at doing his job... otherwise he could just quit. But for an 11 year old or an 8 year old Cub who has not really "committed" himself to the program as this SPL has, the program had better be "fun" or the boy isn't going to keep coming back every week. Eventually, being there every week, all the "non-fun" stuff -- character, citizenship and fitness -- is going to happen, but only if the boy is there.

 

Now, to relate this back to something I posted, I asked you (Wheeler) a number of questions about yourself. You made a post in another topic that answered most of them. But you have not (unless I missed it) said whether you have any children. Given all the world traveling and everything that you have done, it sounds like you have not taken the time along the way to "acquire" a family. Living in monasteries is not the best way to find a wife, I guess. Not that there's anything wrong with not being married or having children. I have a brother who, although his age starts with the same digit that ours does, has never been married and has no children. The difference is that he does not try to give out a lot of advice about child development and what children need growing up, because he realizes that people with children don't really need the benefit of his inexperience. Will you realize that?

[WHEELER]

I have never been married nor do I have any children.

 

To the question do I refuse to be gainfully employed:

 

Book of Sirach:

 

3:24 "Many are decieved by their own vain opinion."

 

38:24 "The wisdom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure: and he that hath little business shall become wise."

 

31:9 "A man that hath travellled knoweth many things: and he that hath much experience will declare wisdom. He that hath no experience knoweth little: but he that hath travelled is full of prudence. When I travelled, I saw many things; and I understand mroe that I can express. I often times in danger of death: yet I was delivered because of these things."

 

38.27 to 39.4 "So every carpenter and workmaster, that laboreth night and day: and they that cut and grave seals and are diligent to make great variety, and give themselves to counterfeit imagery, and watch to finish a work...

"The smith...setteth his mind to finish his work, and watcheth to polish it perfectly...

"So doeth the potter sitting at his work...and everyone is wise in his work...

 

"(v32) Without these cannot a city be inhabited: and they shall not swell where they will, nor go up and down: they shall not be sought for in public counsel, not sit high in the congreation: they shall not sit on the judges seat, not understand the sentence of judgement: they cannot declare justice and judgement; and they shall not be found where parables are spoken .

 

"But they will maintain the state of the world, and [all] their desire is in the work of their craft.

 

39.1 "But he that giveth his mind to the law of the most High, and is occupied in the meditation thereof, will seek out the wisdom of ALL THE ANCIENTS, and be occupied in prophecies. HE WILL KEEP THE SAYINGS OF RENOWNED MEN: and where subtil parables are, he will be there also. He will seek out the secrets of grave sentences, and be conversant in dark parables.

 

 

 

[evmori]

Wheeler,

If we would have wanted the opinion of an ancient Hebrew teacher, we would have looked it up!

 

Those who answer questions with quotes of others have no mind of their own.

 

Ed Mori

1 Peter 4:10

[Bob White]

"But he that giveth his mind to the law of the most High, and is occupied in the meditation thereof, will seek out the wisdom of ALL THE ANCIENTS, and be occupied in prophecies. HE WILL KEEP THE SAYINGS OF RENOWNED MEN:

 

But take heed, he that knoweth the sayings but knows not the skill of the carpenter, the smith, or the scout leader, should not tell them how to do the work that he knows not of.

 

I do no not question your skill to quote dead philosophers, but you know nothing of the skills or tasks of the BSA and its leaders.

Perhaps in your studies you came across this American Indian proverb.

 

Don't judge any man until you have walked two moons in his moccasins.

 

At what point will you learn about scouting, so that you have the knowledge you need to discuss it?

 

Having an opinion on what the finished piece should look like does not allow you to call yourself a craftsman, or to tell the craftsman his job. Learn the tools and their usage. After you pick up a tool and build something, then you can talk to the craftsman.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[WHEELER]

To evmori

Do you desire opinion or knowledge? Do you want to remain ignorant? I can pull up the same things from Socrates.

 

Aristotle Virtues and Vices, Vol 285, pg 499

"To profligacy belongs choosing harmful and base pleasures and enjoyments, and thinking  that the happiest people are those who pass their lives in pleasures of that kind, and being fond of laughter and mockery and jokes and levity in words and deeds. 

"Profligacy is accompanied by disorder, shamelessness, irregularity, luxury, slackness, carelessness, negligence, remissness.

[OldGreyEagle]

Wheeler so I get this straight, are you saying Ed has the choice of getting opinions, which are offered quite freely by nearly all of the forums posters, or does he seek knowledge of which you are sole distributor?

 

Sorry Ed, I had to ask