Some People…
Posted by Troy Eckhardt on March 31, 2014 at 11:11 am
It is no secret that I am angry at the National Council of the Boy Scouts of America, and I have been since the day they traded our time-honored values in exchange for stacks of money (mostly from AT&T and its CEO Randall Stephenson.) Most people that I know understand that at this point I am in Boy Scouting only for a group of boys, all of whom I love, and for the sake of my own heritage, and that I no longer feel unified with all the values of the National Council. I now simply purchase program from the Council, much like I buy toilet paper from Amazon.com – I do not have to align myself spiritually with a company simply to do business with it.
The rotten fruits of the National Council’s vain effort to be “progressive” are showing up more and more in my circles of influence. Even as I lament the recent decisions, I also must come to the defense of those who built this program from the ground up, and who have remained in spite of the aftermath of the National Council’s traitorous acts.
Recently I witnessed a few things that greatly disturbed me, and I feel that I have to write about them to get them out of my mind so that I can go back to some kind of productive work.
The Boy Scouts of America have a high-adventure program called Venturing which is open to youth of both genders between the ages of 14 and 21. This weekend I participated in part of the intensive training for Venturing, which is open to both adult leaders and to youth who belong to a Venturing crew or Venture patrol within a Boy Scout troop.
One of the adult participants in the training was a woman who recently left the Girl Scouts of America and brought the members of her Girl Scout Troop over to Venturing. The girls in her Venturing crew were also participants in this training over the weekend. So far, so good.
One of the girls was using a backpack with an embroidered patch of the flag of the United States sewn onto its back panel. This was no ordinary American flag, however. Instead of red and white stripes it had stripes in the color of the rainbow. According to recent changes in the value structure of the Boy Scouts of America, advocating for homosexual rights is no longer something that we openly disallow. I do believe, however, that defacing an American flag is probably still something that’s not permitted in the Boy Scouts of America. If I were to bring that up though, it would probably be simply because I am a heteronormative bigot.
That’s not really what’s bothering me, though. The real issue wedged up in my craw is this: During part of the weekend training a man in his 70’s gave a presentation during which he repeatedly referred to hypothetical youth participants as “boys,” e.g., “When you take the boys on an adventure, be sure to…” This is something that many older Boy Scout leaders do because they’ve been involved with scouting for several decades over most of which all scouts were indeed boys. I’m 43 and I still catch myself doing the same. This habit is hard to break, even though for many years now the BSA has had programs that include girls, including Venturing, Sea Scouts, and Explorers. In our defense, female membership has been slow to grow until very recently, and many of us are involved only in Cub Scout packs and Boy Scout troops, which permit only boys. I am happy, though, that the BSA has great programs that include girls. I actually met my wife on a high-adventure Exploring trip in 1988. I’m a committed advocate of allowing girls in some facets of Boy Scouting.
During the presentation given by the older Scout leader, the ex-Girl-Scout-leader-turned-Venturing-Crew-advisor stood up and publicly derided this man (in the presence of both youth and adults) for using the term “boys.” Naturally, I have several points to make about this.
Let’s begin with respect for elders; something we teach in scouting. Maybe he’s due a little grace simply for having lived longer.
Now let’s move on to the reason this woman left Girl Scouts for a program that is part of the Boy Scouts of America. In regard to high-adventure programming, the Girl Scouts of America is rather anemic, particularly in our area. This is not to say that no Girl Scouts do cool things, but that ostensibly this woman found that in our area, there are better opportunities and support within the Venturing program. Perhaps this woman should just be thankful for a program that is rich and robust in its outdoor activities, and that there are scores of volunteers who have dedicated decades to building the program, some of whom are old men who should be afforded some patience when they utter gender-specific faux pas.
Now on to blatant hypocrisy on parade: The Girl Scouts of America openly discriminates against people based on gender. No boys have ever been allowed to join Girl Scouting with very few barely notable exceptions: One small boy whose parents like to pretend he’s a girl was allowed to join recently after much ado, and several years ago a few male youths left Boy Scouting and were permitted into Girl Scouting as a publicity stunt because the boys did not want to honor our duty to God. They didn’t stay long and did not participate in any activities; it was all a show. By and large, however, no boys are permitted in Girl Scouting. Additionally, no men are allowed to be leaders unless they wish to travel in the back of the bus as co-leaders. It’s at best hypocritical that this woman would raise such a ruckus while having her roots in an organization that blatantly discriminates against half of the population of the United States based on gender alone. Maybe she should reflect for a while on how open and diverse the BSA has been for the past decades by allowing girls access to our great programs.
No matter how you slice it, this new Boy Scout leader has absolutely no place publicly castigating a man who has been involved in Boy Scouting since 1957. I believe a little bit of grace and thanks is due a man with that kind of record, not a public tongue lashing by a woman who apparently insists on becoming a victim as often as she possibly can. This type of person always resorts to tilting at windmills in the absence of any real enemies.
