New Economy

[SAGReagan]

The United States is increasingly becoming a world economic player, specializing in the white collar professional areas. As developing countries suck up the manufacturing jobs tensions have boiled over with the Labor Unions and the protectionist crowd. At least in my Troop, Boy Scouts has been dominated by the children of manufacturers, unionized laborers, and tradesmen; the people that stand to be most affected by this change in the capitalist system. How will the institution be affected in an ear when most American Flags are made in Taiwan?

[EagleInKY]

I believe your "world view" of scouting is limited to your own personal identity. If you venture outside of Cleveland, you'll find areas where folks are both white collar and blue collar, living in harmony. Our troop reflects the makeup of our community. It's probably 50%-60% white collar, 25% blue collar, the rest are military, retired, or stay at home.

[Eamonn]

I spent a lazy night last night watching the telly.

The West Wing is about the only show on TV that I really watch. If I know I'm not going to be home I get OJ to record it for me.

I keep saying that I will read the book that explains how the new DVD recorder works, but I don't use it enough to worry about it.

Strange how things that we don't care about can change and we can not worry about them.

Independent Lens was on PBS.

It showed how a group of Benediction Nuns were coping with change.

I don't know very many Nuns, I see a few at church and know their names and say Hi.

I think if I was to tell the truth I'm a little scared of them. The Nuns I had at Holy Cross School back home were tough cookies.

I watched the show and I was really surprised how these woman were not only aware that things were changing but how many of them seen the changes as something that was good. Some of the ideas that they expressed were a long way from what I thought a Nun might have.

The show ended with shots of a burial of an elderly nun and the ordination of a new nun. A Lady who looked as if she was in her late 40's or early 50's. Earlier in the show she had said in an interview that she had two grown up kids and her husband wasn't around.

My point is that if the Benediction Nuns can embrace change, I'm almost certain that we can.

Now I have to find that instruction book. OJ informs me it's easier to set than the VCR was!!

Eamonn.

[SAGReagan]

"Living in Harmony," you act as though they're people from two different countries. According to the US Labor Department "Youth clubs run by organizations other than the School Systems are 3x more likely to appeal to the children of Tradesmen and Organized Labor."

 

I quoted a situation that supports this, you quoted one to refute, however, the BSA as a whole is much larger than EITHER of our closed experiences. I quote one, you quote one, the labor department qoutes all, and predicts a 30% loss of manufacturing jobs over the next five years mainly from General Motors, Delphi, and Ford, the former pillars of the American manufacturing base. The question still remains, will Boy Scouts change from its more "rural" reputaion as the people considered most likely to value that reputation slowly see their labor skills become obsulete?

[Kudu]

As developing countries suck up the manufacturing jobs tensions have boiled over with the Labor Unions and the projectionist crowd. At least in my Troop, Boy Scouts has been dominated by the children of manufacturers, unionized laborers, and tradesmen; the people that stand to be most affected by this change in the capitalist system.

 

The potential change that stands to effect the BSA most profoundly is the YouthScouts challenge to the protectionist policies that establish the religious right with a monopoly on Scouting in the United States. If the YouthScouts challenge succeeds, it will open the door to European-style decentralized models of Scouting which will directly undermine the BSA bureaucracy, indoor uniform, Patrol Method subservient to Leadership Development, and the religious-fundamentalist interpretation of Duty to God.

 

Niche Scouting associations will appeal to some libertarians and moderate Republicans, perhaps for unexpected reasons such as a Scouting program open to girls. If convenient, some liberals will eventually tag along :-/

 

http://youthscouts.org/news.html

 

Kudu

[SAGReagan]

Indeed. Now, will the religous right truely loose its control over the instituation as within the last 30 years labor and blue collar position holders have become increasingly more liberal, less interested in spiritual life and thoroughly digusted with the foreign world?

[Kudu]

1) Since when do most people act in their own economic interests? :-)

 

2) Scouts and their parents don't vote on BSA policy. That is done by the institutional heads of the sponsoring organizations. So if the majority of the institutions that sponsor BSA Troops are conservative churches, then it stands to reason that the vote of these institutional heads will be consistent with their church's official policy. Someone who understands the inner-workings of BSA national policy can explain this more accurately, but my guess is that even if the families of the Scouts in a Troop sponsored by a local Catholic church are 50% protestant and 50% liberal Catholic, that churchs vote on the national level will be consistent with its official policy and not the opinions of the Scouts and Scouters.

 

3) The BSA's policies are what they are. Liberals often complain that their churches & institutions would never sponsor a BSA Troop because of the BSA's current fundamentalist policies. My guess is that historically, when the BSA's policies were perceived as being more mainstream, liberal institutions did not sponsor Boy Scout Troops as consistently as conservative institutions. Maybe EagleInKY's experience is the opposite of mine, but my perception is that when most liberals, leftists, and libertarians think about how to serve youth, they do not think in terms of getting their knees dirty around a campfire once a month. So we exceptions to the rule tend to volunteer at Troops sponsored by more conservative institutions (I am libertarian, but I volunteer in a Catholic Troop--go figure).

 

4) As long as the BSA can hang onto its religious monopoly on Scouting, this trend is not going to change. The BSA will please the religious right with its politics (which--as far as I know--have no effect on my recruitment efforts). Until the BSA stumbles on some new gimmick , it will continue to try to keep its numbers up with pop culture activities that dilute traditional Scouting. Currently this includes stuff like "Scout Nights" at sports events, campouts on sports playing fields and local parks, pop corporate-management training which makes it easier for dad to get time off from work to attend Wood Badge, soccer leagues rather than traditional Cub Scout programing, etc.

 

5) If the BSAs religious monopoly on Scouting can be broken, niche Scouting will allow liberal institutions to sponsor Scouting free of the BSAs dogma. European-style Scouting is based on Baden-Powells admonition to keep Scouting all-volunteer, which means that you have low overhead because you do not have to support local and national offices full of paid workers.

 

My best guess is that the success of a decentralized, no-frills form of Scouting will depend on its appeal to moderate Republicans--maybe the general world-trend in Traditional Scouting toward a rigorous "Boy Scout" program open to girls, for instance. Generally speaking when you are trying to organize an alternative Scouting program on the local level, the efforts of one moderate Republican equal 10,000 liberals :-/

 

Faced with real competition in the marketplace, the BSA will act in whatever it considers to be its economic interests, as it did when it mandated racial integration despite the Mormon's threat to leave over the issue.

 

Of course first the monopoly has to be broken. Watch the battle between Pan Am and TWA in The Aviator, then multiply that by the "religious war" factor to get an idea of just how nasty this is going to be!

 

Kudu

[Kahuna]

>>Of course first the monopoly has to be broken. Watch the battle between Pan Am and TWA in The Aviator, then multiply that by the "religious war" factor to get an idea of just how nasty this is going to be!