About a lucky man who made the grade
And though the news was rather sad
Well I just had to laugh
I saw the photograph
He blew his mind out in a car
He didn't notice that the lights had changed
A crowd of people stood and stared
They'd seen his face before
Nobody was really sure
If he was from the House of Lords
I saw a film today, oh boy
The English Army had just won the war
A crowd of people turned away
But I just had to look
Having read the book
I'd love to turn you on
Beatles
The Boy Scouts program is becoming Scouts BSA in February 2019 to reflect the decision to include young women, the Boy Scouts of America announced on Wednesday.
The organization's name will remain the same; only the program for older youth will change its name.
The Boy Scouts of America, or BSA, announced last fall that it would begin allowing girls to become Scouts — much to the frustration of the Girl Scouts, which has advocated for single-gender scouting.
News Release NPR Report
I could not help but think of the Beatles song "Day in the Life" when I saw the Boy Scouts were now the "Scouts". I had started a blog post on "Fraternities", as I mentioned I would when blog follower Phil Gocke commented about our Fraternal Life on my last post before heading to Florida. Since I had so many fond memories of my male bonding "Boy Scout" experience the news that Boy Scouting succumbed to the "reality" of our modern age was just to timely and surreal to simply let it pass. Adding to the nostalgia was getting the news from a cousin of mine who Barb and I visited on our last two days in Florida. It became a topic between us that also reflected on the polarization and political "realignment" that became so evident in the last election.
Before commenting on that aspect I want to spend a few minutes on what scouting was to me.
I joined a scout troop located in a neighborhood outside of my own back in 1963. The scoutmaster, Fred Glover, lived in a rowhouse in our neighborhood. He was the father of 2 girls, and had no boys of his own. He was a lifelong "Boy Scout" and remained active in a Troop located in the Kensington section of Philadelphia. The Troop met in a Baptist Church at Frankford and Allegheny Avenues in the heart of a Blue Collar neighborhood. You probably have all seen a glimpse of the area if you watched "Rocky" which was based on a character from that neighborhood and was filmed 2 or 3 blocks from that Baptist Church. Many of my fellow scouts lived in houses that formed a backdrop for the movie. I spent countless hours of my life in and around those scenes from Rocky. Funny most of our members were "Catholic Boys' since the Catholic Churches Scouting Programs were timid in comparison.
Fred Glover ran a rather unique scouting program. First and foremost he believed in "high adventure" scouting. We NEVER summer camped at scout camp. Fred had a connection through work with Scott Paper company which owned thousand of acres of forest in Northern Maine and let him use an old cabin on the shores of Flagstaff Lake (you literally drove 30 miles on a crude dirt road to reach it) where we camped for 2 weeks most summers. No running water and we built our own diving raft to push out into the lake. We fished, water skied and ate food we lugged on our backs the last 2 miles to the camp. We brought rifles so we could learn to shoot.
Every third year we went to Algonquin Park in Canada where we canoed and portaged our canoes back into the wilderness 50 miles from the nearest road. (Fellow Blogger "Whitey" and I along with two friends made a trip there when we graduated from Lafayette).
Our Friday scout meetings often ended with a game of "Buck Buck" where we divided into teams and each team took turns jumping on the backs of the opposing teams who formed a linked an attempt to break them. On other nights we played a game where we formed a circle with our eyes closed and heads bowed. Fred or his designate would walk around and place a leather belt in someone's hand. He would then signal and the individual with the belt was to start wacking the person next to them on the ass while they chased him around the circle twice. I can tell you "ADD' was never a problem in our scout troop. It was frankly a great time and I cannot recall any parent raising hell about our how we ended our meetings.
In high school I had the pleasure of repaying some of those belt wacks when I played football against my fellow scouts in our neighborhood rivalry against North Catholic High! My Father went to Maine my last year or two and on one of those Canadian trips. He even hunted at that Maine campsite a few times after I left scouting.
While we had a few "Eagle Scouts" Fred was not big on "pushing" kids to advance in "Rank". I only made "Star" rank but I will always remember the night I was named "Scout of the Year" by my fellow scouts my Junior year in High School.
Such scouting memories unfortunately did not become part of my Boys life. My oldest son James was a scout for a year or two but never embraced it. He found his "male bonding" by embracing Football. Eric was a cub scout but never had a real interest....his ultimate "male bonding" occurs at age 21 at Parris Island SC. I would be the first to acknowledge that Boy Scouting (at least my brand) was not the same for everyone.
"Boy Scouting" was doomed in a society that began to believe that such "Gender Isolation" was a means of making men too "masculine" and "gender" conscious. Toss in half the boys today without meaningful fathers and boom where do you recruit "leaders" (Fred was an interesting exception). Finally toss in the Gay and Transgender issues and walla...boy scouts as they were known simply did not have a chance. While I get some of the demographic and social issues I am still left saddened by it all.
Many today might see the passing of "Boy Scouts" differently than my cousin and I. That brings me to my "political" observation.
Interestingly my cousin was a lifelong Democrat. He was and is a member of the Philadelphia Laborers union who voted for President Obama twice. He is a lifelong hunter, and while not devout a regular attendee at Catholic Mass. In chatting with him he admitted he voted for Trump this year, and was surprised I did not. I can tell you he sure did not understand my "Hail Mary" vote. Oh of course he was a boy scout at one time so we did share remorse on that issue.
On one of my Gender wars posts I mentioned that the Trump Derangement protests and the failure to see what huge swatches of working class people of the country were feeling and voting on was only going to increase the polarization in our political process. That feeling was reinforced when I left Florida....more on that another time!
Until next time
Adieu
PS While in Florida my Faithful and Obedient Companion saw a Beatles Tribute to Sgt Pepper...that weighed in I am sure on my musical selection!
I also saw that Boy Scouts were soon to be just Scouts.
ReplyDeleteAll I can say is ,......
Our society is moving toward stupid!
Tim was not really a dedicated scour but thru the effort of an incredible leader, made Eagle. But probably the best times we ever had together was sea kyacking off the coast of Maine and canoeing in New Hamphire with his troop during their summer trips.
I love my daughter too. But having girls on those trips would have destroyed the atmosphere of those all male trips had.
Again I say - this change to a gender-less organization is just stupid.
Thank you Jim for allowing me to vent.
As F&O companion, I concur that this is so 'new age'. I am proud to be a woman who participated in GSA and Juliette Lowe is rolling over in her grave. Murray failed to report that his cousin's wife had been employed by GSA and had been a scout leader most of her adulthood. She is very upset what this will mean to a 'female' organization. I just don’t understand why girls/women want to lower themselves to be boys/me! Can someone explain this to me?
ReplyDelete