I joined the Tiger Cubs at an early age, about 6 or 7 years old. Back in the late 80s/early 90s, Tiger Cubs was sort of a pre cursor to the regular Cub Scouts, now its just incorporated into it fully as a junior rank. My first Tiger den leader was a woman- one of my friends mothers. She was great, no issues with that. Went on to Cub Scouts, then Boy Scouts all the way to 18. Got busy with ROTC and Fire Explorers- never finished my Eagle. I do regret that but it is what it is. My Cub Scout and Boy Scout troops were great. Led by real admirable men, military vets/hard workers, the kind of men you can look up to in life and can teach you alot.
Fast foward to today.
My wife is a Girl Scout leader, our only daughter who just turned 10 is in her troop. I have 2 sons, almost 6 and 2.
My wife calls me and says that one his new kindergarden classmates mom is the leader of a cub scout den, and is looking for boys to join.
I want my son to experience what I did, but I just dont think thats possible anymore… sad as it is.
The new “Scouts of America” has clearly at the organizational level been corrupted by leftism. Its no longer an organization ment to teach boys life skills and prepare them for manhood. There are still troops in our area that do a good job to keep up with the old ways though. Even though girls can join the troops are segregated. You’ve all heard the modern issues Im sure.

We have a friend whos daughter is in both a girl scout troop and a “Scouts of America” troop, she earned both her gold award and eagle award this year. Just an outstanding young woman who just got into shooting sports as a direct result of positive exposure through the SOA.

So my dilemma is this. Do I let my son join and see how it pans out, or just avoid the organization as a whole. Its not like SOA is gonna get better or go back to their roots. Thise days are long gone. It can almost certainly get worse, but there is some small value in it.
My feeling are “screw the SOA and their BS, you let them take the only thing that boys could call their own.”
My father in me says “let him see whats out there.”
This ones really tough for me, I want my sons to be 4th Gen Scouts, but I dont want him taught things that were in direct contradiction to the original purpose of the BSA.

Wise words and wisdom would be helpful- thanks.

I was a leader in Cub Scouts for 7 years until Feb of this year when my youngest was supposed to go into Boy Scouts. He chose not to, just not his thing. I will say we had absolutely zero involvement from the national organization into any of our decisions. Whether or not you have a good Pack depends 100% on the local leaders who lead it.

The most frustrating thing about the whole experience is parents don't want to do shit. It's like pulling teeth to get them off of their asses. I did lots of fun things with my boys and the other boys in the dens. Tons and tons of quality time.

As long as local leadership is solid, don't see how it can be a bad thing. Wish my folks would have given me the opportunity.

quote:

Originally posted by 1967Goat:
I was a leader in Cub Scouts for 7 years until Feb of this year when my youngest was supposed to go into Boy Scouts. He chose not to, just not his thing. I will say we had absolutely zero involvement from the national organization into any of our decisions. Whether or not you have a good Pack depends 100% on the local leaders who lead it.

The most frustrating thing about the whole experience is parents don't want to do shit. It's like pulling teeth to get them off of their asses. I did lots of fun things with my boys and the other boys in the dens. Tons and tons of quality time.

Ive seen that as well. There is maybe 1-2 moms in my wifes troop who will lift a finger to help, the rest seem to view it as free babysitting for an hour. Its really sad, my wife plans outings and fun stuff all the time, she gets no help and parents flake at the last minute all the time. The cookie sale thing is bonkers- they bust their asses half the year just to hand over 90% of the profit to the Girl Scout org. Very little stays in the troop fund. That 90% does some good- pays for upkeep and maintanence of certain properties and camps that the GS owns.

Have you heard of Trail Life USA? It may be worth looking into:

https://www.traillifeusa.com/



.

quote:

I will say we had absolutely zero involvement from the national organization into any of our decisions. Whether or not you have a good Pack depends 100% on the local leaders who lead it.

We are active in Scouting, and this is exactly how it is here. We have turned out an amazing group of young men over the years.

To answer your question you'll need to know who's involved locally. Take a good look.

No.

Our daughter loves scouting although she did not care for girl scouts as she wasn't into crafts/etc.

She joined both Venturing and Sea Scouts. She earned the top award in both. In fact, she now works for the Boy Scouts in Washington DC.

I wouldn't hesitate to do it all over again.

She has traveled all over the world with the Scouts. In fact right now, she is one of the contingent in the horribly organized/ill prepared South Korea World Jamboree.

quote:

Originally posted by medic451:
The new “Scouts of America” has clearly at the organizational level been corrupted by leftism.

I would say so.

The Boy Scouts first dived into the commie world in 2015 when it started to admit gay males, also marching in the San Francisco Gay Parade that year. Trannies in 2017, biological girls the following year.

This year at the 2023 National Jamboree, the organization set up a huge tent for their LGBTQ scouts, reportedly thousands showing up to grab pride bracelets, pronoun stickers, etc. Todd Starnes reports only 15,000 scouts showed up, compared to 40,000 in the previous year. It is also reported a new diversity merit badge is required for Eagle Scout.
https://www.theblaze.com/news/...at-national-jamboree
https://www.washingtonpost.com...s-national-jamboree/

The theme of this year's jamboree was "Forward". Sound familiar?




Here is the Jamboree logo, lookie at the red stars.

I'd say let him join. It's not like signing up for the Military, you can leave anytime. I had a good experience being a Scout as I was into outdoorsy things, and in my day hunting and shooting was part of the deal with no raised eyebrows from the community. None.

It saddens me to see what was a really good experience for BOYS has been diluted with politics, woke ass-holes and lazy ass parents.

Scouts was a huge part of my life and a huge contributor for turning me into the man I am today.

I would feel out the local council, pack, and troops. Many are apparently still solid. If it looked to me like yours were good I would be all for it, otherwise I would look elsewhere.

Given the circumstances though, if you do join up you need to be very active as an adult so you are there to help ensure they stay on a good path.

My son was in the scouts from the time he was old enough until he went to boot camp. It was a great experience for him. His Eagle project was a great responsibility that he shouldered and did well.

I agree with other posters that your local chapter make up is far more important than whatever the national branch is supposedly doing. I never paid a lot of attention to what they were doing, nor did the state or local leadership.

If the local chapter passes the smell test, go for it. In my opinion if you don’t, he is missing out on a lot of fond memories, and life skills he’ll learn earning badges. I also feel that despite missteps by the National branch, and all the anti-woke hype that might steer parents away, that your local chapter is about like schools. Without good parent support and involvement at the local level, scouting as we know it dies forever and the right messages don’t spark change from the inside.

This is about the young boys and the impact scouting makes, and nothing else to me.

Scouts was a big part of my life growing up, along with a variety of other clubs and sports. The Pack then the Troop, that I was apart of was very fortunate that there was a lot of parents, particularly fathers, that were eager for their sons to have a positive experience. Our Troop was very outdoor oriented, camping/backpacking trips every month, to include a 10-day 50-miler backpacking trip in the Summer; our bid for Philmont never came up when I was in.

The overall experience begins at the deck plate-level, it's up to the parents to shape expectations and experiences. There was saying amongst the parents, "Scouting is boy led but, parent driven'. It also helps if the parents come from a variety of backgrounds, they get along with each other, don't form cliques (interesting to see who's an adult), and maintain a position that its all about providing the kids an organization where they can grow and experience things. While the issues happening at the national level are disappointing, how a troop operates is up to the parents. Like a lot of organizations, you can't influence things if you're not involved; you'll never make changes if you're not involved.

I believe that DrDan is a leader in his son's group.

I suggest you reach out to him and get in touch. He will have recent and accurate information on the state of the organization.

A

My nephew is close to earning his Eagle Scout. From what I have seen it’s the local leaders in his troop that matter. Don’t worry about what is happening at the national level look to your local organization.

The only way I would let my son participate in Scouting these days, is if I was there at meetings and camp-outs with him.

I have no offspring, so my thoughts can be discounted for that reason, but I do remember much of the things I was taught and experienced when I was a child.

Unless you move to an island with no contact with the outside world, sooner or later your children will be exposed to ideas that you probably won’t like. One thing that seems obvious to me these days is that those ideas are often left unchallenged by the parents who don’t like them. They seem to find it easier to try to limit the exposure to bad ideas rather than educating their children why they’re bad.

Unfortunately, learning what ideas they’re exposed to and then working to confront and explain why they’re bad is difficult. Part of the difficulty is that parents usually have a lot of other things to do and therefore they’d rather just try to prevent the exposure in the first place rather than monitoring what they’re being taught and confronting it as necessary. But keeping them shielded from exposure to bad ideas forever is impossible. And I believe that the longer children are simply shielded from particular bad ideas, the more likely it is they will accept them when they enter that inevitable stage of life in which they start exercising their independence and start believing they know more than their parents who may (much belatedly) let their objections to those ideas be known.

The other difficult part of countering the bad ideas children are exposed to is knowing how to do it. For example, if a child comes home and announces that socialism is the answer to all of humanity’s ills, parental authority and, “That’s bullshit, and I don’t want to hear that crap in this house again!” may shut them up for a while, but it won’t change their mind—at least not permanently. It is possible to explain why socialism is a bad political/social system, but that requires not only the time and willingness to sit down and discuss it, but also a good personal understanding of what socialism really is, and why it’s a bad idea.

Good fortune to you and your children with whatever your decision is.

I have been involved in Scouting for ten years, including four as a Cub Scout Den Leader and three as Scoutmaster of my son’s troop. I am currently serving on the Committee of his new troop after COVID killed off our old one. My son joined at age six as a Tiger, currently is a Life Scout, currently working on finishing his Eagle sometime next year. He just returned from Philmont Scout Ranch, was elected his troop’s Senior Patrol Leader and just wrapped up his second year mentoring Cub Scouts at Cub camp. He’s attended summer camp twice as a Cub and five times as a Scout, and also went through National Youth Leadership Training. He’s sixteen.

Your concerns are overblown. Scouting is first and foremost a basically conservative organization. Troops are run by your local Council, not the National Organization, and are very much individual from Troop to Troop. Our current Scoutmaster is a local police sergeant and our treasurer a Naval Academy graduate and former helicopter pilot. Our charter organization is a church. These are not lefty people, not that it matters because it wouldn’t matter to them if you were. Politics isn’t their jam.

We have an associated girl troop—the only one in our town, and are proud of that. Their program, however, isn’t our program. Our troop is 100% boy-led and adult mentored. The same was true of my old troop. All are welcome because we as adult leaders have a job to do.

I firmly believe Scouting does what it always has—-create functional, moral, high quality American citizens with leadership capability. In todays Internet age it’s the best thing you can do for your son (or daughter). It has done wonders for mine and created a bond between us that will never break. He’s learned much about his country and seen the value of servant-leadership. Quite honestly, it’s the best thing you can do for your son (and he’ll have a blast).

Our experience has been that it depends on your local leadership. I would suggest that you find some current members in your local council and ask them what they think.

I would not have made a good parent,
Especially now days.

No adults get control of my preteen child un less I am within striking distance.

Me trusting adults with me is a whole different world than me trusting someone with my child's life.

If you ain't there ,
You don't know.

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