In what way is keeping a list of men prohibited from being scout leaders due to suspicions of abuse choosing to protect an adult at the expense of a child?

John Mansfield–because none of the adults’names were ever turned over to police. THAT would have been the appropriate child-protective course of action, not writing their names in a file and telling them, essentially, to move along. Professionals who work with children (doctors, teachers, etc) are MANDATED REPORTERS: we MUST inform the police if we have reason to suspect child abuse. It is unlawful for us not to. Yes, it turns up a number of false positives. But it is a safer alternative to just hoping it doesn’t happen again.

You are missing some of the point of the Church BSA union. It fits the Church’s mission in a way most people don’t consider or understand. It allows us to project our “old fashion” values to beyond our membership. Essentially we write the checks for BSA, so we get to pull the strings. As a result their standards are parallel in most areas to ours. We sanctify the curriculum that teach generation after generation of non-LDS boys a lot of character building. There are very few institutions left that still teach old-school values. As to the files.. gee, no surprise that a group that gathers boys is a magnet for pedophiles. And across the hundreds and hundreds of troops across the nation across the decades mistakes were made. As to “not protecting children” that is a very crass reading of the motivation. The are guilty of being narrow minded.. focused on getting that Pedophile away from their troop, or organization. They should have thought more broadly, and used the police to protect all society from that pedophile, and done that by reporting to police. Being narrow minded (or naive) is a wholly different think than not being interested in protecting children.

Without a doubt the BSA is an imperfect organization. With that said, as a single, divorced mother raising a son, the BSA was for him a good organization in many different ways. It increased his self confidence; it increased his knowledge in a variety of different areas; it increased his leadership skills. I could go on. Were the leaders in my ward great? No, but for the most part they made a decent effort. My son needed to be around other males in a positive setting, being in scouts provided a setting for that. He was never abused in scouts (which does not mean that this does not happen with some scouts), he was never hurt physically on scout activities (again, I know that happens sometimes). He did not turn his Eagle papers in until 2 days before his 18th birthday, and yet earning his Eagle is still something he is proud of. My only deep regret with scouts….is that my my wonderful daughter did not have the same equal opportunities as my son. If think this is something that should addressed, but most likely never will be.

I agree that scouting can be great for some kids and that, statistically speaking, the numbers of cases of alleged abuse probably can’t be zero for an organization with the scope of BSA. I just don’t particularly see the need to have it BE a church program. I’d be happy for my sons to participate at school or at another community-based troop, like my daughter does for Girl Scouts.

John–I AM comfortable with my school districts record from that period, but then we are all professionals. We are trained and accounatble. The same cannot be said for the BSA (or the Church) which relies on volunteers. It was a different time, yes, but I think a little empathy goes a long way: if YOUR son was making the accusation, would you take it seriously enough to call the police? I would.

porter–interesting take on the Church support of BSA. I view it as a paramilitary organization, myself, but good of you to focus on the parts no child does.

I think John M is correct in clarifying the meaning, intent, and use of the confidential BSA files. People are imputing meaning and context to the files that just isn’t there, and I think ESO has jumped to similar wrong conclusions.

The paramilitary label does have merit, though that is not a bad thing. One of the major reasons Baden Powel started Scouting was to prepare boys for Military service, specifically to be “scouts” which is a soldier who goes out in the field to “scout out” the enemy or even just conditions that are out in the field of operations.

Ask any commander of our troops in Afghanistan or Iraq, and they will likely tell you that soldiers with scouting/camping experience are better prepared. And even for troops who don’t see direct combat, scouting, camping, teamwork, etc prepare boys for military service.

The world is actually a more dangerous place since the fall of the Soviet Union. There never was a true peace dividend, since all the lesser dictators and crazies that were kept under control by the SU later sprung up to be threats themselves.

Every generation has it’s war or serious conflicts. And between wars, “one swaord keeps another in its sheath”. WW I, WW II, Korea, Cuban missile crisis, Vietnam, Pueblo incident, another one under Ford (forget the name), Panama, Lebanon, Gulf War I (Kuwait), Cole Incident, Embassy bombings, Somalia (Blackhawk Down), 9/11, Afghanistan, Iraq….

And now it looks like something is going to happen with Iran.

Wars can’t be fought entirely with drones and missiles, you need boots on the ground, ie soldiers.

And as long as we’re going to need soldiers, especially if we are going to rely on and call up Reserve and National Guard to fight hot wars like Afgan/Iraq, we need scouting. If nothing else, it’s a natioanl security issue.

More sub-topics in future comments.

Ask any commander of our troops in Afghanistan or Iraq, and they will likely tell you that soldiers with scouting/camping experience are better prepared.

By the time troops reach the field, they should have undergone so much actual military training that any “scouting dividend” ought to be indistinguishable, and if it’s not, then their training has failed to them.

The Church is not just in the US, it’s a global church

Truth. And in other countries if they want to prepare young men for military service they make initial training and reserve duty mandatory. Meanwhile, the churches are left to focus on preparing men and women to live the gospel.

mcq, women in combat roles in the military is an abomination. Women have admirably served in auxiliary and support roles in the military since WW II and before. Nothing wrong with that. But putting them in harm’s way in combat is a sign of a desperate or deteriorating society.

Second, the church does support scouting in other countries where it exists. But it is pretty much an Anglo-American tradition, and hasn’t been adopted by many other cultures as it has here. Austrailia, Canada, New Zealand, and South Africa may be some of the exceptions.

Your second point sounds like you think the church can start up scouting on its own in other countries where it doesn’t already exist. I don’t think that is the case. There are a lot of administration and political and cultural issues involved. There is a lot of organizational infrastructure that would need to be built up in a country that does not already have that tradition. Plus a lot of it would not translate well to some cultures.

That your local scouting program is in a state of decay is sad. Many LDS troops are liikely in similar condition. There are still many non-LDS troops doing a good job, and keeping scouting going, and fulfilling its potential.

Not all scouts go into the military, and not all soldiers were scouts. But there is something about keeping the spirit of civic duty and some degree of military-style preparedness going.

The decay of civilizations is gradual. Effeminization and decline of civic duty were factors in the fall of the Roman Empire.

From what I see locally and from what I read, scouting in the church is declining. But that doesn’t mean it should decline, rather, the implementation needs some reworking, especially outside of the Mormon corridor where you can’t fully staff and populate a whole troop with kids and adults from just one ward. It effectively becomes an LDS-only troop, and I don’t think that is necessarily optimum.

I still think scouting is a good way to keep urban and suburban boys from getting too soft. Of course its not actual military training, but its preparation to a degree, so that young men are not completely unfit and mentally unprepared for real military training.

One more thing I forgot. The Church’s youth struggle in countries where they Young Men don’t Scout. Go look at the Yahoo LDS Scouting group for evidence.

Porter, my understanding is that LDS troops are only a minority of all BSA troops. Yet, I keep reading comments that the LDS church essentially keeps BSA afloat financially. Does that mean church headquarters writes out huge checks to BSA on a regular basis that is out of proportion to the number of LDS scouters?

From what I read earlier about Friends Of Scouting fundraising, and the high cost to boys and families for participation (high cost for books, supplies, uniforms, accessories, camping fees, etc.) it sounds like the BSA organization is really top-heavy and bloated and suffering from excessive executive salaries. I realize its expensive to maintain Administrative buildings and camps, and full time staff has to be paid employees,etc.

Are BSA budgets, national, council, local, open to the public?

But then, I highly doubt BSA could survive without LDS involvement.

Yes, sadly BSA is a bit top heavy. I dont like paying all the salaries for national employees.

LDS does carry a heavy budget load. Part of it is that we register (and pay) for all boys of that age. So in essence Salt Lake HQ isn’t cutting them checks, but most wards are making the payment, not that it matters. Personally I definitely think it is worth it.

as to cost.. it isn’t that much. Have you paid for a season of Parks and Rec soccer lately? Everything is expensive now. BSA is not that much. Most places have uniform recycling and you can get used uniform for free of reduced cost. And for us, camp is $250 for a week, food included. That is pretty reasonable for a week. Awards are way overpriced, but families don’t have to pay that, wards cover that.

Idiat, I just Wiki’ed BSA and found that report about halfway down: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boy_Scouts_of_America

I assumed that “unit” meant troop and most wards/branches have their own troop/unit, right? That seems accurate according to your description… Anyway, Wiki’s total number of LDS boys were 421K. The finance section was also interesting as it listed BSA the 12th largest non-profit organization in the U.S.

well Chad, I see you are not short of humility. I am the best scoutmaster that I can be, and I am happy with that. I also happen to be the best scoutmaster in my ward, but then again I am the only one.

It’s also probably worth mentioning that 2013 will mark a 100th year anniversary of the Church’s partnership with BSA… Not a significant factor, to be sure, but given their long-term relationship, I think the Church would be hesitant to bail amid perversion reports, unless they feel it becomes absolutely necessary.

women in combat roles in the military is an abomination. Women have admirably served in auxiliary and support roles in the military since WW II and before. Nothing wrong with that. But putting them in harm’s way in combat is a sign of a desperate or deteriorating society.

Sorry, I can’t let this pass. Women have been serving in combat roles for quite a while now in the US and UK. They don’t serve in the infantry, but are frequently in harms way in many other combat situations and have performed admirably for years. To call that an abomination is a disgrace. You owe an apology to all women who have served our country in combat.

John raised an interesting point. What is the record in school districts. A statistic is more meaningful if you can compare it. So should we also ban the public school district?

For the record I think internally the church would be better off pulling away from scouting and replicating a few parts of the program on their own. But I’m also certain a large part of what the church is paying for relates to the good bsa does outside of the church.

I don’t feel disrespected. I often think “thank God I’m not a man” because a lot of the stuff you guys have to do does not look fun to me at all. Including getting shot at. Changing tires. Lots of un-fun stuff. I’m a princess :).

ESO: The BSA is apparently so terrible that kids need to be “protected” from it yet you don’t mind your kids participating in it (comment #10). So what’s your REAL problem with the BSA? You had to be a den mother once or something?

Bookslinger a troll? Surely not.