Bullying and Scouting.

[Sentinel947]

http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/local/article/Alamo-Heights-High-School-student-was-a-victim-of-6743320.php

Had a mix of reactions to this one. 

 

First picture was a kid in a fishing boat. In my mind I was already thinking.. "I bet this guy was a Boy Scout." 
 

Really terrible story there. 

Is there anything we can do as Scout leaders to prevent tragedies like this one? 
 

Sentinel947 

[Krampus]

My kids were PO'd at me when, in middle school, I told them they won't have any social media accounts until they are a senior...may until they graduate. They hated me...for a while.

 

When they reached 8th grade both thanked my prolifically. They never regret not having social media accounts.

[Stosh]

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0368645/

 

This film came out 40 years ago, people still haven't learned.  Bullying is not limited to just the boys, it happens to every age group in every organization and most of it is tolerated because we have become so insensitive we don't even realize it's potential to hurt anymore..  Take a look at some of the posts on this forum, even Scouters fall prey to this unscoutlike behavior on a rather regular basis.

[qwazse]

I don't want to understate the importance of discouraging bullying and teaching our youth to put a premium on graciousness and distance themselves from those who take pride in malice. But ...

 

First, we need to be very careful about the causal chain in the lives of suicide attempters. There's a lot about depression and hopelessness we don't understand ... Especially in youth. It sometimes drives children to prefer situations that draw abuse. If someone's being mean to me, I have justification for my feelings. It allows me to reinforce my negative emotions and spares me from making the effort to face down my demons.

 

For example, normative kids use social media to allow friends to challenge thier thinking. In doing so they become articulate in defending ideas they value. This empowers them to think in ways that promote self-preservation. In such contexts, pathological kids withdraw, find a narrow circle of social or behavioral situations that allow them to contemplate self harm, and they only announce any intention to a wider audience when it is too late for those potential harm-preventers to act.

 

So, our job as adults who have survived such depredations is twofold. First, teach and preach compassion. Second teach and preach tough-as-tanned-leather meekness in the face of troubles. Or, like Momma told me when I was being bullied (after hanging up the phone with the bully's mom), "Stop crying so much. Get big."

Edited January 8, 2016 by qwazse

[Cambridgeskip]

 

Is there anything we can do as Scout leaders to prevent tragedies like this one? 

 

Sentinel947 

 

I've seen it from both sides. When I was a kid I was bullied at school and scouts was where I was happiest. As a leader I've seen kids that have been bullied.

 

What can you do?

 

1.  Youth leadership is of course a central part of scouting. However there are situations where the adult leaders have to be the alpha male/female. Bullying is one of them. Should any adult leader identify a case of bullying within the troop/pack/unit they have to be the brick wall that the bully runs into. Total zero tolerance. That doesn't mean there should be no way back for bully. There has to be room for changing their ways but the emphasis has to be on making sure it stops. End of story.

 

2.  There's the old saying that you can lead a horse water but you can't make it drink. Same with kids talking. You can't force any given scout to confide in you what is happening in there life. But you can make sure that you are available, that you can be trusted and that you will listen. It's not always easy. We're all volunteers, we have families, jobs other things in our lives. But be available where you can.

 

3.  The scout law and promise. I know of a leader who tells his scouts that the law and promise can be summed up in the words of Bill and Ted..... "Be excellent to one another". And there's a lot of truth to that. Getting the kids to understand that so the problems don't occur in the first place.

 

I'd type more but just about to head off to camp!

[Stosh]

At 4' 11" 98# when I started high school I knew what bullying was all about.  Like Cambridgeskip mentions, we have all gone through it at one time or another and it doesn't seem to be going away anytime soon.

 

So as mentioned, how do we get our boys through the process and keep them safe until they are old enough and mature enough to deal with it appropriately?

 

I have found one area that I harp on consistently that I believe really helps.  (Drum roll, soap box) That is in the area of teaching the difference between Leadership and Management.  To me leadership is "taking care of your boys".  Once the boys take that premise seriously a lot of the bullying dissipates.  The focus is centered on being a caring help to another, the focus is on another person.  Leadership is a person-to-person dynamic.

 

On the other hand management is focused on getting a task done and people are used to accomplish that goal.  Concern for the other people in the process isn't the #1 priority, but the task at hand is.  Here is where the opportunity for abuse comes into play.  The domineering PL, the unfair duty rosters, etc. all play into, getting the job done and having to deal with the slackers and screw-ups along the way.  I have even seen troops where the SPL is not elected but placed there by the SM.  So who gets the job?  Yep, his pet scout.   An iron fisted SM will have an iron fisted SPL. 

 

I had a boss once who spelled it out very clearly in a staff meeting.  He said his job (management) was to make sure things got done and his role in the process was to "determine whose dog got kicked".  At first it didn't make sense to me, but later he explained, at sometime or another someone's going to end up on the short end of the stick and they are going to pass down the ladder that negative feeling where the guy on the bottom rung has no one to take his frustration out on and finally goes home and takes it out on his unsuspecting dog.

 

I see this all the time.  SM is frustrated at some job not getting done, dumps on the SPL, who inherits the frustration and takes it out on his least favorite PL, who then dumps on Little Joey who's been slacking off in his duties of late.

 

Is that bullying or "good management".  Where in the process are PEOPLE considered more important than the duty roster tasks?

 

Little Joey doesn't do his job assigned to him by his PL.  He wanders off and sits by himself.  (Tenderfoot Requirement #9) Buddy System.  His buddy finds him and yells at him for not helping out, PL backs him up.  Because the job was more important than Little Joey, no one bothers to ask him why.  If they did maybe they would have found out his Grandmother passed a couple of days earlier, or his mom and dad just separated, or a thousand other concerns that overwhelm youth at a tender age.  Tenderfoot Requirement #9 is the first lesson in true Leadership.  It has nothing to do with guys heading to the latrine or trading post as pairs, it's one scout learning to take care of another scout, taking care of someone besides just themselves.  Little Joey didn't get the water for tonight's dinner cleanup, Buddy John goes and finds him and instead of haranguing him sits down and says, "Wanna talk?"  After Joey gets a chance to vent, Buddy John says, "You need get water for tonight's supper.  How's about I help you with that?"  The management of task gets done, and real Leadership tightens the bond between Joey and John that when PL selection comes up sometime in the future, Buddy John doesn't need to make some bogus political speech about how he's qualified for the position.  Joey and those that John has taken the time to care already know it.  Bully Bobby always makes sure the job gets done, but will gain the POR based on SM pet agenda and not on the boys looking for the right person to lead.

 

Yeah, the analogy is a bit over the top and extreme, but to a lesser extent I see the dynamics in my troops working quite well. 

 

As SM I have two pet phrases that my boys tease me about.  When they screw up something, they know I'll always say, "I bet you never do that again." and when they drop the ball with leadership, they know I'll always ask, "Is that how you take care of your boys?"

 

So does it work?  I have a TF PL right now that will call my "space cadet" older scout who comes from a poor family situation every week and remind him of the meeting.  That's how he takes care of his boys.  For a boy that was a Webelos cross over less than 12 months ago, I'm thinking his leadership learning curve is moving along quite nicely.

 

Seriously, I only give an annual briefing to the new Webelos boys about bullying and how it won't be tolerated in the troop.  I seldom have to revisit the issue and then it's for only minor infractions due to the learning curve of caring for others.

[scoutldr]

I am 61 years old and have been bullied about my weight since I started first grade in 1960.  For some reason, obesity still seems to be "fair game" when it comes to insulting and bullying comments.  I sympathize with gay people who say, "do you think I would choose this if I had a choice"?

[Stosh]

If all people are as different as snowflakes, why is it so important for bullies to find intellectual fulfillment in life by pointing out the glaringly obvious?

[blw2]

good thread that warrants compilation.

 

@@qwazse, I especially liked your sentence, " Second teach and preach tough-as-tanned-leather meekness in the face of troubles. "

This is exactly something I have been trying to enforce lately with my son.  Sometimes I feel like I'm struggling a bit with some situations on what to say that's positive and constructive....  It's just not appropriate to say something like "grow up", or "don't be such a baby"

 

Anyway, I found the sad story particularly interesting from another angle that I don't think has been brought up

The author wrote that he was a target of bullying since October. Three to four months isn't really all that long to me, but it sure can be for a kid.  Still, I'm surprised it took him over the edge so fast.... I suspect there's a bit more to the story...

[NJCubScouter]

I am 61 years old and have been bullied about my weight since I started first grade in 1960.  For some reason, obesity still seems to be "fair game" when it comes to insulting and bullying comments.  I sympathize with gay people who say, "do you think I would choose this if I had a choice"?

Since this is already in "Issues and Politics", I can say that when you have a presidential candidate who regularly calls other people "fat", "fat pigs" and other bullying and insulting names, and that candidate is rewarded for his rhetoric by receiving far greater support in the polls than any other candidate in his party, that's pretty good evidence that obesity is still "fair game" - at least among a sizable part of the population.

[Stosh]

Works for liars too.  Seriously, hasn't one figured out that everything that is bad for society comes from the world of politics.  Bullying is such a small part of it one hardly even notices anymore.  There's even a term for political bullying, it's call Mud Slinging and it's been around for a long, long time.  Sorry to point out the obvious.

[Eagledad]

Boy, there are some really well written responses here, and I don't want to take away from them at all. I have bullying story that brings the Scouts into the light.

 

One year I attended our biannual Council Leaders meeting where all district leaders attend to get briefed on scouting updates from National and to get continued education for our specific responsibilities. The Council Executive always starts this meeting meeting with the intention of raising spirits and setting a positive tone with a little humor and a lot of praise. He started this particular meeting reading a letter from a mom who was praising the troop program where her son was a patrol leader. She explained that his a very awkward boy who doesn't relate normally with other people and had basically no social skills. As a result, he had very few friends and very few interest where he would mix with other kids his age. What was worse was the way his teachers and school counselors treated him. She didn't go into details much except to say that adults can be as bullying to kids as the kids. She emphasized it by saying that they were in litigation with the school. The point of the letter was that the one place where her son felt was accepted for who he was was his boy scout troop. She explained that it was the one place we he didn't feel judged, much less bullied. He was given the room and encouragement to do the best he could, and as a result, he at the time of the letter was a Patrol Leader, which is turns out was a dream of his. Maybe even hers.

 

During my district and council responsibilities, I was able to observe hundreds of other units. I matured a lot during those years because learned a lot about how different we adults can really be. I was naive to say the least. But because I seem to have a gift for working with people, I was called to deal with difficult situations. As a result I was confronted with, and had to deal with, the behaviors of alcoholism, infidelity, racism, mental abuse, physical abuse, bullying of both adults and youth by both adults and youth and so on. My heart ached for these people, especially for the scouts. I got calls in the middle of the night by the police to help deal with family situations where the boy knew me.

 

I learned a lot those years about our fellow adults. Maybe that is why I'm less patient with some of the tone on this thread. But I also learned that in the vast majority of the cases, the scouts felt safe in the troop. In most, not all, but most cases scouting was a sanctuary from the part of their life that caused pain. I think the patrol method design also insulates scouts away from even difficult adults in the unit. 

 

Of course there are a lot of not so good stories opposite of the letter the SE read to all the district leaders of the council. But I think you will find that in general, scouting is a refuge for boys in many ways. See, while the SE didn't know that the SM of that troop was in attendance of the meeting, I also didn't know the letter was from a mother of a scout in our troop. I knew the scout very well because he was a very awkward boy who stood out from the crowd. I knew his parents well because they were extremely supportive with their resources without ever asking for anything in return. They were a nice family. I did start putting two and two together when the letter gave some details of the program that I obviously found familiar. But I'm not sure anyone in our troop knew of this scouts struggles in his private life because the family never mentioned them. I only knew of the law suit from the letter. As different as he is, the scout never stuck out so much in our program that we would have guessed is personal situation. Not that he wasn't challenging, he thinks differently than most of us. To give you an idea of his intelligence, last I heard was he was is an engineer on a nuclear submarine. To give you and idea of his behavior challenges in in our troop, he nearly stroked out on us at Philmont because he decided water wasn't important for his diet. His crew mates interceded and saved his life. Actually they save him twice because I was tempted to kill him for pulling the stunt. But truly folks, he was that way.

 

There are a lot of wonderful youth organizations that our kids can join and grow positively from the experience. But I can't think of another organization with something like the patrol method. When used correctly, the patrol eventually bonds into a whole where each member contributes to make the whole better. They can't help but grow so close that members are willing to ignore the awkward ways of the others and accept and respect each other for what they contribute to the group. In most cases, no matter how different the members are in personalities and lifes experiences, they bond and grow. I have heard more than once that Boy Scouts is for nerds. Well I think it is much much more than that of course, but maybe it gets the reputation because so many of awkward boys join scouts to find themselves and be accepted for what they are. This wasn't our only scout with a challenging character, so I'm convinced  the patrol method is special and very powerful when used by its design. 

 

I drifted off the subject just a bit, but I felt I needed to add this somewhat long post to such a quick and short point. Thanks for your patience.

 

Barry

Edited January 8, 2016 by Eagledad

[Hedgehog]

The story is a tragedy and I suspect there is more to it than what was in the article.

 

That being said, I think the emphasis of schools and society is misplaced.  The emphasis is on stopping bullying rather than empowering kids to deal with it.

 

If we raise kids knowing they are loved and teach scouts that they are inherently valuable, nothing anyone else can say will change that.  There also is empowerment in knowing right from wrong -- knowing that the other kids are not acting in a Scoutlike manner makes you superior and stronger than them.  

 

My son knows he is smart, handsome, dorky, geeky and an absolute goofball.  He is OK with that and knows we love him for who he is.  Whenever I've talked to him about this sort of stuff, his response is "I'm happy with who I am and that is all that matters."

 

I also see the power of adult association.  I think of he guys in our Troop like a rag tag band of misfits and appreciate the uniqueness of each of them.  I"m pretty sure that most of them know that "Mr. Hedgehog thinks I"m alright."

 

There is a very quiet scout in our troop.  A week after working with a group (including him) on the camping merit badge, I stoped him and told him that I was glad he was part of the group because we needed someone who really knows his stuff.  I could tell that he wasn't used to people telling him he was the best at something.

 

There is another kid who is a real pain sometimes.  He is the troop clown.  I often have to reel him in and focus him.  I know that he is a smart kid and a good kid and remind him of that.  I think the fact that I expect a lot from him makes him expect more from himself.

 

How about the 12 year old kid that was on the verge of tears when I arrived at summer camp on Wednesday?  A quick talk, acouple of blister pads and some creative problem sovling regarding his tub of clothes that got drenched in a rain storm because the lid was left off, he was like a new kid.

 

There is an amazing power to the phrase "I believe in you."  

 

At the end of our 50 mile backpacking trek this summer, I said something like this to the guys "We just did something amazingly difficult.  At some point each of us hit a wall -- emotionally, physically or psychologically.  But we kept going.  Remember this whenever life gets difficult and think, 'I've made it through a lot worse.'  Remember this whenever you think a task is impossible, that doing the impossible begins with taking the first step."  

 

My parents raised me with the saying, "if at first you don't succeed, try, try again."  There have been a lot of times in my life where I've been challenged to my core.  I'm sure from the outside it looks like I have had a perfect life, but I can't count the number of times I've listened to Peter Gabriel's "Don't Give Up" to strengthen myself against desperation.  

 

Over Christmas, we gave our son a wooden plaque with a quote from Mary Anne Radmacher that says “Courage does not always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.† Too true.