Nicknames

[ozemu]

Oh you blokes are missing out on a lot.

 

All Scouters here have a knickname (Scout name we call it). I believe that you sometimes use them but not as a rule. It is obligatory here.

 

In our Troop the adults are Emu, Tigger, Kingfisher, Bandicoot and Coyote (she may change to Dingo after the last camp).

 

Amongst the Scouts we have BJ, Big Red (falling into disuse as she has let the colour grow out), Nibbles, Chief, and a few others that come and go as the adventures progress (Chaffin' Chicken turned back into BJ as the walkathon receeded in memory)

 

Everyone gets right of refusal. None have taken it yet but we would rigourously enforce that right if requested.

 

Nibbles (as explained on another thread) sought of came out of the last camp and his lack of success but determination surf fishing, Chief has been in existence for years. I think that started when he was the smallest and youngest but most intellectual Scout. Big Red died her hair, BJ was the second Ben in the Troop.

 

Bandicoot is farmer (could be a silly coot too), Tigger bounces around, Kingfisher owns a fish farm , Coyote was American but she got better (she had a close call with a dingo last camp and some are calling her that - we'll see).....

 

and I am a silly looking ground based bird with long legs.(This message has been edited by ozemu)

[Eamonn]

At one time in England the nickname for most Scoutmasters was Skip or Skipper.Many an upset Scout changed it to Kipper.

Eamonn

[SMT376Richmond KY]

We use nick names in the troop I'm rafiki since I used the line from The Lion King (it doesn't matter it's in the past) to settle a dispute amongst Scouts on our very first outing as a Troop. We now have little bit (answer to anything is "just a little bit",owl(always was askin "who's that.",buck(likes knives),high eagle(Eagle patrol leader). Generally we ask the boys during our first campfire of the fall if they want to choose, keep or change Scout names of if something memorable occurred i.e. burning the food thus Cooky chosen by boy that burnt it.

 

Although after two wrong turns on outings (due to new roads being built and not on the map)the boys were calling me the lost Scoutmaster on the last trip. Oh and rip van winkle cause during summer camp I did managed to get a nap in during some morning MB classes. So I see no harm in Scout names as long as the boys are no ribbing each other or being mean. I think it adds the fun in scouting to say be at school and say across the hall in passing "hey buck you going this weekend to the camp out." "Yeah road kill I'll be there. How about hight eagle, owl, and cooky." "The said they'd be there. Do you think rafiki will get the conoes ok?" etc

[hops_scout]

Let's see....

 

I am Hoopla in the troop, Mighty Mike in COPE,

 

We have:

 

Schaf---slightly different than his last name

Sticks---always sitting ontop of sticks

Zero---always digging holes for no reason

Weasal---first name is Wesley

Coltron---real name is Colton

 

 

Thats all I can think of right now, but most of the people in the troop have a nickname of some sort.

[baschram645]

The one nickname that has really stuck in our troop is "Pinky". The boy got it after emptying the igloo cooler of cherry bug juice (pink teeth, tongue, lips and fingers). The boys give each other silly monickers but most last til the outing is over.

 

 

[dsteele]

I think that a nickname given and cheerfully accepted by the recipient is a good thing. I also believe that a nickname given and not accepted (particularly if it's an unflattering in the eyes of the recipient) is hazing.

 

I've had both kinds. Fortunately, I only remember the ones I liked.

 

Unc.

[NJCubScouter]

As I was driving my son home this morning after his week at summer camp, he informed me of something relevant to this thread. The SM, having apparently decided that the "nicknaming" in the troop was beginning to bear a suspicious resemblance to "name-calling," decreed that there are to be no more nicknames other than what a boy chooses for himself, or agrees to. My son was particularly gratified about this new rule (though one might say it really isn't a new rule, it's just an effort to make sure the boys stay on the right side of the Scout Law), having earned an unfortunate and unwanted nickname last year at summer camp after oversleeping a couple of times: Sleeping Beauty. I believe that this was originally done in a light-hearted manner and in fact I believe it was an adult leader who first said it last year, without any malice toward my son. My attitude toward these things is that if kept within reasonable boundaries, at worst it is a minor annoyance and one has to learn to live with minor annoyances. Unfortunately some of the boys who picked it up, crossed the proverbial "line" and made "Sleeping Beauty" into a taunt against my son rather than a light comment. Other younger boys were similarly targeted, resulting in the SM's action. Personally think it's a good idea that the SM has drawn a line like this, and not just because it is my son. Of course one would wish that drawing such a line were not necessary, but sometimes it is.

[torribug]

I got mine in elementary, although nobody in the Troop knows me as such. Growing up in the Arizona desert, there were a lot of nasty, crunchy little creatures, from scorpions to cockroaches (the kind that are the size of a Cessna) to black widows. Yup, I was afraid of them all - even those that weren't so nasty (no way to tell unless I got close enough, right?) I guess I borrowed the motto, "kill them all, let God sort them out!" I was frequenly seen/heard screaming "Bug!" and promptly stomping on them.

- Bug

[KoreaScouter]

Most of the Scouts in my last Troop had nicknames we all used, but almost none in my current one do...I don't know why...

 

Funniest one: we had two identical twins, Malcolm and Nelson. I swear you couldn't tell them apart, and they would often impersonate each other for sport. Our ASPL, exasperated at trying to figure out for the umpteenth time who was who, decreed that from that day forward, they would be interchangeably known as

[Chippewa29]

Most of the kids in my troop don't have nicknames (other than shorted versions of their real names). However, at one time when I was a Scout, we had four of us (out of twelve Scouts) with the same first name. They had to nickname all of us to tell us apart. Even though the other guys with my name left over the years, my nickname persisted until I was well into college. Occasionally, someone from the old days will stop by and refer to me by my old nickname.

 

This past week at camp, I refered to three of our 13 year olds as Athos, Porthos, and Arimus. When I told them those were the names of the Three Musketeers, they loved it and started using it themselves.

[Big_Dog]

Ok KoreaScouter, I give. They were forever known as????

 

This is a good thread. A while back we had a thread addressing the use of 'Mr.' and 'Mrs.' and for a long time I've been a believer in that. Someone referenced B.P. saying that SM's and ASM's should be like big brothers, and I don't know about you, but I never called my brother MR. Lofton! (even if he was fifteen years older than me). That comment made me reconsider my view. I'm still kinda uncomfortable with the scouts calling me by my first name, but Big Dog, I can live with.

 

bd

[Laurie]

Korea Scouter--you got cut off, or are just toying with us?

[NJCubScouter]

I was wondering the same thing, Laurie. At first I thought it would be a combination of the two names. (Mason?) But there would be no reason not to say that, and the fact that the post stopped at exactly that word seemed a bit too coincidental to be an accident. Now I think maybe the interchangeable nickname had nothing to do with their actual names at all, but would be one of several common "terms of endearment" that KS found inappropriate to repeat in this forum. It's just a guess.

[Eamonn]

The Troop back home was very diverse, with lots of names that came from the "Old Country". Yes I got one, that people have a hard time with. No one can spell it and it's easy to know who the telemarketers are by the way they try to pronounce it.

Where I'm at now we have a lot of Polish names some seem to contain every letter in the alphabet at least once.

The last Jamboree Troop was strange we had six Nathan's and two Nathanial's. I wanted to call them all Nate but they weren't going for it.

This next Jambo we have a little Lad, who when his Scoutmaster told me that the Lad was going he informed me that he had the same name as me. When I checked he is a Amin.

Eamonn.

[boleta]

I vote for Mason.