posted
I was in Cubs in England, and it was the best year and a half of my life. Religion is not a part of Scouts or Guides there (or if it is, it is nondenominationally Anglican, meaning it really isn't except Christmas and the Queen is involved) and having boys and girls together was wonderful.
The camps were amazing; we were allowed to run around in the nearby woods, without supervision, until we were called back by a whistle. There was a World War Two bunker in the woods! It was the most real experience of my life.
At meetings we played wide games in the dark and got chased down and dragged in the mud by what felt like huge leaders. We cooked beans and bacon over candles and we did knots and tracking and everything.
In Canada, I went to Guides ('to make friends'). It was the worst experience of my life. We did badges indoors. I was unhappy- it was the only time in my life I had ever been teased and felt bad about it! Pathfinders, although a little better, was the same. No mud, no wide games, to wild gallumphing through the dark, no feeling of age or experience, only rules and badges.
posted
Tom, I meant that there was no specific religion mentioned....we were all from different backgrounds, and we had both Christian and Jewish scouts in my troop, IIRC.
Religion was always stressed, in that we had a private moment fro prayer before meals, and of course it is mentioned in the Oath, but it was more slanted towards fun activities and community service....both which are within the Boy Scouts stated goals.
It wa sort of like the Masons, to be honest....they didn't care which God you worshipped, as long as you believed in something.
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I have fond memories of Girl Scouts. My troop was not focused on making good wives. I was in it from Daisy through Junior, but right after I bridged to cadet my troop fell apart. For some reason when middle school started the troop just disintegrated.
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posted
I was in the Boy Scouts till I hit star rank, at which point my dad couldn't stand the hyper-religious, hyper-conservative leaders of my troop anymore and we both got sick of the organizations attitude toward gays and quit in protest. I was never a fan of the religious undercurrents of the whole thing, being a rather ardent atheist, but I was good friends with a lot of the people in my troop and had a whole ton of fun with them. So I kept my mouth shut as best I could.
I'm glad I quit though. I wasn't learning much from it that my dad couldn't have taught me, or I couldn't have learned by camping and hiking on my own, which I do quite a bit now. And its freed up a lot of my time for other things I want to do. I've considered a couple of times creating an organization similar, but geared entirely toward wilderness hiking and camping and learning the skills involved. The BoyScouts with all the extra religious/morality stuff removed. But never got around to it.
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Okay, I'm morally opposed because the Boy Scouts here use public schools for meeting places. If they want to be a private club, stop handing out fliers in class, making announcements in class, making kids wear their uniforms to school and hold meetings in a public school. That's all.
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So literally I have been in scouts in one way or another for my entire life. I was a Cub Scout, Boy Scout, Assistant Cubmaster and Den leader, and merit badge counselor, all before I heard that the BSA didn't want me in their organization.
More recently I've learned some of the history of how the current conrtoversy grew. The BSA didn't make an issue out of religion before 1985. In fact, until a few years ago the Boy Scout handbook read: (Under "A Scout is Reverent")
quote: The United States Constitution gives us complete freedom to believe and worship as we wish without fear of punishment. All your life, you will encounter people who hold different religious beliefs or even none at all. It is your duty to respect and defend the rights of others whose beliefs may be different than yours.
I've never encountered anyone within the troops or packs that I've worked with that gave me any impression that I wasn't welcome. I have met scout leaders from the district level who made it clear that religion was a central issue to them. But the religious requirements for scouting are actually fairly minimal. Those that defend the words "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance call it "ceremonial deism," which I think is about right.
But eventually the issues in the news reached a point where I couldn't honestly feel comfortable being a registered member. I still have many friends from within scouting. And I still think it's the best program of its kind in the world. But the current leadership has made a mockery of what the BSA was meant to stand for.
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posted
I guess I was out of scouting by 1990 or so, so any changes around 1985 probably hadn't trickled down to our neck of the woods.
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