Are Some of Our Rules and Reactions Causing Confusion or Worse?

[skeptic]

A comment in another thread and board regarding youth and adults feeling uncomfortable in a more public area made me think about my own experience as a youth. At that time, we did not have separate areas for adult men and youth in public changing areas or restrooms and so on. I can remember showering at the YMCA before I was 10, along with men and boys. In high school (we did not have JH gyms)we changed and showered in communal areas, though the coaches did have their own office area with shower. My brother and I have talked about this once or twice, and cannot remember being particularly traumatized by any of the standards, or lack of, of the times. Maybe we just adjusted, because that was what you did.

 

While I understand much of the concerns in these discussions, I sometimes wonder if we are making things worse with some of our reactions that tend towards paranoia at times.

 

The same goes for many of the institutional responses to various games, childhood interactions, and basic socialization of children and adolescents. We talk of not letting kids be kids, then program everything they do. We talk about kids not learning as well, yet often give them little opportunity to simply play imaginatively. How many here insist that every outing have x number of "skill" sessions? How often do you simply go camping, then let the kids just run around in the natural setting, monitoring for safety without intruding unless necessary. If you have not, try it. You might get a new perspective on things.

 

Please, I do not think every precaution is over reaction. I do wonder though where we draw the line, and if we may be short changing our kids at times. Certainly we have some kids today that are afraid, literally, to do even simple things by themselves, and seem terrified they might make a mistake.

 

Just some food for thought.

[SeattlePioneer]

We have the luxury of worrying about increasing numbers of things.

 

 

Worries expand to fill the time available.

[JoeBob]

skeptic,

 

I certainly agree with you. Let the kids run free in the woods; and they will entertain themselves, learn that falling down hurts, and that electronic games are only shadows of reality.

 

Isn't it amazing that so many of us survived riding in cars without seat belts??

[perdidochas]

Running in the woods and no seat belts are two totally different things.

 

Not wearing seat belts is just tempting natural law (Newton's laws) to kill you. It's common sense.

 

Letting kids run wild in the woods is actually protecting them. It's teaching them the limits of their bodies.

 

In terms of Skeptic's post, I basically agree with the whole shower thing, however, I can recall not being comfortable with it in the 7th grade. That said, we have to learn to live with some things.

 

 

[BS-87]

"A comment in another thread and board regarding youth and adults feeling uncomfortable in a more public area made me think about my own experience as a youth. At that time, we did not have separate areas for adult men and youth in public changing areas or restrooms and so on."

 

I think a return to these more innocent times is a demand of the Occupy crowd, or maybe it was NAMBLA... in either case, I've really no objection to the more conscientious approach of partitioning showers as almost every camp has now done. While one may have grown accustomed to group showers back in the day, I still remember an apprehension and anxiety about such situations every time that I'm glad boys today don't have to encounter needlessly.

[eagle90]

I agree, skeptic. Back in high school we thought nothing of changing and showering in one gang shower. In fact, our six week swimming class for the boys was done naked! They said it was more sanitary that wearing suits! Now our scouts won't even change clothes in the tent at the same time. Better times? Who knows....

[SSScout]

I work as a subteacher. All middle school gym lockerroom showerrooms in out county have become new storage areas.

Can't say for the high schools...

[Scoutfish]

I agree about over schedualing and over padding the boys.

 

Nothing wrong with a den activity while camping, but I want them to camp for the sake of camping and just having fun instead of holding a weekend den meeting around a tent.

 

Matter of fact, we are going all out goofy this weekend. We are havin a relay race where you start out using a stick to roll a hula hoop to the other sie ( about 30 foot) then two more of your team members will wheelbarrow race back, where the 4th team member will sack hop back to a team meber who will come back while carrying an egg ( using gold balls) in a spoon, then the last leg of the relat is a three legged race .

 

After that, we will have a crab soccer tounament. At some point, we will be making wooden tomahawks ( with council's blessing) out of 3/4 inch plywood and throwing them at a styrofoam targets.

 

I am also bring a couple nerf footbalss and 2 frisbees , and a baseball, bat and set of bases if they want to use them.

 

Or they can just run around and see who can get the most sticks and leaves in their hair!

 

 

But, I prefer seperate shower stalls myself. You wouldn't know it by looking at my 6'2" 240 pound( been on a diet ) frame and ever guess it, but I was that skinny beanpole kid growing up. Sharing a shower with anybody was a very dreadfull thing. Same goes for the overweight chunky kid or kid who is developing ahead/ behind schedule.

 

 

 

We will eat three meals and have a campfire ceremony. If dens what to do something, that's up to them

[Scoutfish]

Yeah some of the misunderstandings about rules spread faster than the idea people have thinking you have to burn the Stars and Stripes if the touch the ground.

 

2 deep leadership is a good one. Somebody will see a Den Leader with 12 scouts in his den room and start crying that there has to be 2 deep leadership.

 

No, 2 deep is : " Two registered adult leaders, or one registered leader and a parent of a participating Scout or other adult, one of whom must be 21 years of age or older, are required for all trips and outings. "

 

Outings and trips. Not den meetings where there are 13 people total present. No, it's not a bad thing to have 1 or 2 or 3 more adults in that room, but it's not required.

 

Scouts can only sleep in tents with their parents: No, they can sleep with another scout, 3 other scouts or as many as you can cram into a tent. They can't sleep in a tent with a any other adult who is not their parent.

 

 

What adding requirements means: Neeed I say more on that one?

 

Of course, we have to realize that there is a reason these rules exist. Just like the ones on a hairdryer that say :Do not use while taking shower"..the sad thing is, they have that tag because some idiot did try to use it while taking a shower, then sued the hair dryer manufacturer for their own stupidity.

[shortridge]

I don't think we adults over-schedule and over-program kids because of any rule or reaction. I think some people do it because they don't trust the kids not to go drown in the creek during free time. Others are well-meaning but get too caught up in their own positions as "experts" or "leaders," get a swollen head and take a good thing way too far. (Witness the endless requests for ceremonies for presentation of the latest Cub doohickey. Only an adult would try to come up with a symbolism-full ceremony for a 50-cent pin or patch.) And still other adults are control freaks who can't stand the idea of unscheduled time.

[SeattlePioneer]

Personally I'm not a big supporter of "free time." Scouting is supposed to be fun with a purpose.

 

Free time is usually a chance for boys to create their own low quality fun --- usually fighting of one kind or another.

 

What adults and Scouting should provide is a higher quality kind of fun which takes some adult leadership at least in Cub Scouts.

[pchadbo]

'Free time is usually a chance for boys to create their own low quality fun --- usually fighting of one kind or another."

 

I am sorry that this is where your boys are at, left to their own devices the boys in our Pack ususally wind up playing some version of tag/keepaway/cops & robbers. Now do disagreements happen? Yes. Are they the exception not the rule? Yes. Boys can still be boys with imagination if allowed.

[Cambridgeskip]

Similar to Pchadbo, we find some free time works quite well. On a typical week long camp where the kids cook on fire a typical daily time table would be wake up at 7am, aim to be cooked, eaten and cleaned up for 9am flag break/order of the day with a free time period then till either 9.30 or 10am before programme proper. There would then be another period of free time at the end of the day's formal programme at 4.30 before they start lighting fires for dinner around 5.30. It works quite well.

 

Typically it will result in a game of football (soccer! nothing involving touch downs thank you very much ) or cricket or rugby breaking out or else some form of wide game or, bizarely, ditch jumping tends to be quite popular (they will find a drainage ditch somewhere and see who can jump across the widest point, particularly popular with the girls weirdly)

 

On a more general point I do agree, we can be over paranoid. The rules are just as tight in the UK. I understand many of them, eg seperate changing for adults and scouts, are there for a good reason, but equally I think there needs to be a common sense approach with people not reacting hysterically if someone does not follow the letter of the rules.

[Eagledad]

I'm surprised the obvious hasn't been mentioned, the addition of women leaders. Yes, I also come from the generation of skinny dipping in the creek at summer camp. The adults didn't do it with us, but I can't remember them hanging around at all anyway. I also don't remember showers. I do however remember not being allowed in the house after summer camp with any of my clothes and being escorted by my mom strait from the garage to the shower. Can't remember why.

 

Fast forward 20 something years to my first campout as a Cub Scout leader (Webelos summer camp) attending that same camp I attended as a youth where we skinny dipped to hide the heat of the day. My first shock was womens restrooms. Not to long after that was the shock of WOMEN! Don't get me wrong, I wasn't challenging the idea of women leaders, I just wasn't ready to see it at my old camp.

 

The next day of swimming was a little surprising as well, one of the Webelos Leaders was a younger very attractive brunette. I can say that because she had the full attention from most of the teenage Boy Scout staff who told us that she was a young very attactive brunette. I hadn't noticed myself, but my coleader, who was also a very active scout as a youth, looked at me and said what I was feeling, we arent in Kansas anymore.

 

It was a surreal, the camp director was a women, much of her adult staff were women. They were very good at their job and ran a very good camp, but it just wasnt what we were expecting from a Boy Scout summer camp, even a Webelos Boy Scout summer camp.

 

To top off the week, all the adults were ordered to a meeting one night in the dinning hall. Dinning Hall, that wasnt there 25 years ago, whats that all about? Anyway the camp director wasnt happy and gave us a stern lecture on youth protection rules and the seriousness behind them. Hey, I had only been a scouter for a month, this was the first I had heard of youth protection. Anyway apparently some adult had violated the rules by mixing with the boys in the shower.

 

My co leader and I looked at each other than shrugged. We werent really sure what the problem was because that was pretty normal when we were scouts. Even with the cut brunette with her trail of Boy Scouts following her around, we still didnt clue into the idea of females in camp. Details werent given, but we scouters, parents really, felt the impact of the camp directors stern words. She was very serious and confusion was also in order.

 

Well as it turns out, it was a mother who went into the showers to check on her scouts that cause the scandal. The boys were spending a little more time in the showers laughing, yelling and just having a good ol time, and frankly she just wasnt used to boys wanting to get that clean. But like a normal mom, she noticed the boys clothes on the dirty floor and like most mothers she hung around awhile to pick them up. She was just being a mother doing what most mothers do and that was pick up behind their kids. W

 

Both my co leader and I almost quit scouts after that camp, but the discussion of things being different in the Troop kept us going and as it turns out, both of us were Scoutmasters of successful programs.

 

Now if you watch close enough, there are plenty of books out today that in one way or another speak on the feminization of males in America. Im not getting into if it is good or bad, the discussion even comes up in this forum now and then. But, comparing my experience as a youth in scouts and today, we have certainly feminized the male culture. The scouting program as a whole has been feminized and there is no going back as far as I can see because close to 50% of the scouters are moms.

 

Im one of those males that believe that boys should go through some rights of passage to grow into healthy adult males. Im not talking about secret rituals with drums and war paint, although that would be cool. Im talking about the experience of going to the bathroom in the woods. Men and boys sharing the showers without the idea that it is risky or wrong and 200 men and boys sleeping together overnight in a gymnasium on their way to Philmont. Even boys skinny dipping in the stream to cool off from the 105 degree hot summer day. However, guys, those days are just about gone. If you dont thinks so, just ask your wife.

 

Barry

 

[OldGreyEagle]

The Council I serve had an outstanding Venturing leader. He was a Camp School instructor and Disney Teacher of the Year. He was a 7th grade teacher who ran a non-traditional nature based curriculum and there was a selection process to get into his class at the middle school where he taught. He was a very effective teacher and people would flock to his Safety Afloat and Safe Swim Defense lectures because they were fun and he was very engaging. He was a Captain in the Army Reserves, a Tank Battalion COmmander, He has a Venturing Crew and they did all sorts of wild things, survival week ends with no food, all the stuff the kids wanted to do and he was a god amoung men. The rules meant little to him and two deep leadership was not in his vocabulary. I was the unit commissioner to his Crew and when I questioned COuncil on his behavior they raised their eyebrows and said, Well yeah, that's just Greg, we are lucky to have him. You can look up Gregory Ritter on Google, he killed himself on the morning he was to plead guilty to sexually assaulting a boy he met while serving as a Medical Officer at SUmmer Camp.

SOmetimes, its not paronoia, sometimes its actions based on past experiences and not wanting to lose millions because after all, we are all pretty ok nice guys.