Boy Scouts file for bankruptcy

[Chris in VA]

Because of paying out for sex abuse cases. What a world. 

[MercyA]

Here's their open letter:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/18/us/boy-scouts-letter-victims-trnd/index.html

I haven't been a fan in a long time, for a multitude of reasons.

[mom2scouts]

Yes, it's sad. BSA probably has some of the best child protection rules NOW, but in the past people didn't think much about putting those protections in place. Creeps knew that the nature of the program would give them opportunites to abuse. I'm not a fan of many of the things BSA National does because they don't seem to listen to the volunteers on the front lines, but they're doing this to try to save the program. Hopefully it won't affect local troops much.

[Chris in VA]

17 minutes ago, MercyA said:

Here's their open letter:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/18/us/boy-scouts-letter-victims-trnd/index.html

I haven't been a fan in a long time, for a multitude of reasons.

I did appreciate his saying the victims are believed and should be compensated. I mean, that's an "no duh" but at least he said it. The article I read said the amount of abuse is even higher than that of the Catholic Church. 

It just makes me wonder what the effect on society has been; there are so many now-adult men who went through abuse. 

[gaillardia]

I hope that it isn't seen as an across the board child sex abuse organization. My kids were in it for years and the leaders were always good people and they always did lots of good stuff. The leadership was always "two deep", meaning there were always at least two adults teaching the boys and on campouts there were more and dads went too.

@Margaret in COwhat are your thoughts on this?

@mom2scoutsare you still in scouting? My kids are finished with it so it doesn't affect us now. 

[Chris in VA]

@Margaret in CO Dd's best childhood friend worked at Philmont last summer and was asked to come back this coming. She said the funds for the program "haven't been released yet." You could just hear the sadness in her message. 

[Lanny]

I read that the Mormon Church is going to pull out their  400K Scouts.  Very sad what has gone on in both BSA and in the Catholic Church.

[DawnM]

Boyscouts has been through so much in the last 10 years.  My older two boys have Eagle Scout and it was a wonderful program for them.    My oldest went to Philmont.  All of them went to Summit.  

My husband was very involved.  I was very involved.  

It is all making me so sad.  

 

[Loowit]

I have known this was coming for a while, so not a huge surprise.  Since I joined the BSA over 10 years ago, there has been a huge emphasis on youth protection and sometimes to excess.

Scouting numbers are way down in my area.  Most of our packs and troops are dying and I am not sure there is an active Venturing crew in our district anymore.  We lost a lot of people due to changes to the program over the last several years.

To be honest, while I have enjoyed scouting for the most part, I will be glad when we are done.  Our 17 year old has his Eagle court of honor in a couple weeks, and our 14 year old got Star last month and wants to Eagle as soon as he can and then I think he is done.  He hasn't had a great experience in scouting.  Our numbers are so low, despite our recruiting efforts, that  he often had only himself in his den as a cub and now there are only three active scouts in his troop, including himself and his brother.  We are switching troops next month to join one that has more scouts, but even then it is fairly low numbers.

[Sherry in OH]

5 hours ago, Lanny said:

I read that the Mormon Church is going to pull out their  400K Scouts.  Very sad what has gone on in both BSA and in the Catholic Church.

 

15 minutes ago, Margaret in CO said:

That happened the first of the year. Many of those Scouts were paper Scouts, only registered because they were members of the church. Of the really active kids--those numbers haven't changed much at events. The LDS kids who want to continue are joining newly-formed LDS-centric units, or joining community units where they are being welcomed. Our ASPL is an LDS refugee. The other two similar-aged Scouts from our LDS unit never really did anything. One talked to me over a year ago about his Eagle project. It's never going to happen. 

 

In our area so many of the LDS scouts have flocked to other troops that troops are starting to talk about capping.  It isn't that they don't want new scouts, it is that they don't have the resources to double or triple the size of their troops.   Finding meeting places for new troops would also be difficult.  One of the local Cub Packs pays to meet in a school building as there are no free meeting places that can hold all the scouts, let alone their families.   

 

 

[OH_Homeschooler]

On 2/18/2020 at 8:24 AM, Chris in VA said:

I did appreciate his saying the victims are believed and should be compensated. I mean, that's an "no duh" but at least he said it. The article I read said the amount of abuse is even higher than that of the Catholic Church. 

It just makes me wonder what the effect on society has been; there are so many now-adult men who went through abuse. 

 

I hope that the effect it will have is that situations where it is brought to light makes it easier for people, and especially victims, to discuss. I hope it takes the stigma away and I hope child sexual abusers stop getting away with it. 

 

[Sherry in OH]

39 minutes ago, Margaret in CO said:

Our LDS have become quite ingenious in finding new chartering organizations. One group is now chartered by a hotshot fire crew, called the Hellfighters! It was quite humorous to see their trailer at Klondike! I have an Eagle book to review from one of their boys now.

We tripled the size of our troop the day that ds crossed over. It was rough, but the parents stepped up, and it all worked. Interestingly enough, none of the boys from the after-school Webelos den Eagled, but 3 from the evening den did. It all came down to parental participation and commitment.

What is the average size of your community troops? I think once a troop hits 50 they should split anyway.

 

My sons' troop currently has 35 scouts on the roster.  It is one of the smaller troops. There are several troops in the area with more than 60 scouts.   Scouting is very popular here.  

[ScoutTN]

BSA is thriving in my area too. The local council owns our camps, their office building etc. outright and is in solid financial health. Numbers are up (without counting girls). Our area has lots of troops, small, medium, and large. My son is in a small one and it's a great fit for him.

BSA has made a lot of poor decisions over the last 10 yrs or so that are coming back to bite them. I think many aspects of our current culture make Scouting a less popular choice than in generations past. Sadly.

 

[Lucy the Valiant]

We got a letter from our state-level council about it; not sure how much of that is true or exactly how it will work out, but I'm *so* disappointed for DS. He has seen a lot of things happening at the national level that are (thankfully) not reflected at the local level; I don't really understand the separation between the 2 levels, to tell the truth. BSA has had a significant and overwhelmingly positive influence on his transition from boyhood to manhood, and I'm so deeply thankful for our troop leaders and the men who invest their lives into our local boys.

It angers me that the perverts who robbed boys of their innocence and childhood years ago are STILL wreaking havoc indirectly on the boys who are current scouts. 

DS was approached just this week about being SPL next year; that's a huge honor for him, and one we're thinking about as a family. Not sure what Scouts will look like for my younger guy, TBH.

[mom2scouts]

I have been involved in Scouting for 23 years and dh is an Eagle Scout and long time Scouter. The program gave my oldest son some amazing experiences and he's an Eagle, and my others were also very active. My youngest son just got Eagle, is in OA, staffed NYLT, and is a Sea Scout. It's been a great program for him. He will age out of the troop later this year, but plans to stay in Sea Scouts.

We've been getting more and more unhappy with the decisions from National over the past few years and how those decisions affect the volunteers and Scouts. They keep gutting the program because high adventure is risky and they let insurance dictate too much. The sudden and large increase in fees was unfair to Scouting families and is really just them putting the cost of the lawsuits on the backs of today's Scouts. Like Margaret, I'm angry about them putting Philmont at risk. That piece of property belongs to generations of Scouts and should not be lost because of poor decisions made in regard to The Summit. DH is the Scoutmaster of one of our local troops, but I'm hoping that as ds ages out, he will give up his position as Scoutmaster. We got involved because we wanted our children and their friends to an excellent Scouting experience, but most of the parents in our troop barely do anything and it's too much work for dh, especially as our children are in their teens and involved in many other activities and ds won't even be in the troop anymore. The problem now is that there's nobody else willing to step up as Scoutmaster and dh feels obligated to stay when he'd prefer to do more with ds and the Sea Scout ship now.

BSA is still doing well in our area. Our small city has three active troops, a girl troop, 4 Cub packs, and a Crew. Our Council has 10,000 Scouts and three camps and none of the sex abuse claims come from our Council, so hopefully there's little impact locally.

Edited February 20, 2020 by mom2scouts

[mom2scouts]

16 minutes ago, Margaret in CO said:

It's a problem all over. I stepped down as CC and dh is no longer a SM (but still ASM) but the guy who took over CC is taking a sabbatical for a year (professor). Frankly I don't know what we're going to do. The other parents are quite content to let the hard workers do it all. I declined to host the district dinner this year (not my job) and the DE is NOT happy with me. MY kid Eagled over 10 years ago!!!!

Our ASM is a former SM whose son aged out 7 years ago. He enjoys seeing the boys grow into men and learning new skills, but he's getting older and has some health issues that prevent things like backpacking. Another former SM stays involved as a merit badge counselor and attends some camping trips and Klondike, but his sons aged out years ago. The Venture crew leader was a former SM and his sons are all adults. There's one more adult active with our troop. He's always willing to backpack or hike but, you guessed it, his sons aged out over a decade ago. Current parents want all these activities, but they never step up to help and don't seem to understand that the people doing all the work have jobs, houses, families and busy lives too. The boys have all these ideas of things they want to do and said they would do more if they had more dates available to work around their busy schedules.  DH told them to bring him parents that would help because he can't be available every weekend. DH has started telling parents that if they want events to happen, he's not always available and they're going to need to do it themselves. 

[Terabith]

22 hours ago, Margaret in CO said:

We're going to continue on, but frankly, we feel betrayed. The National guy stood 6 feet from me in June, at Philmont, saying that there would not be a mortgage on Philmont. They'd actually signed it in March. We were told LAST WEDNESDAY that Councils would not be hit, but today, we were told otherwise. They went WAY over budget on The Summit, and I fear that we will lose Philmont to salvage Summit. The one good thing the Chapter 11 will do is it will establish a date that claims have to be brought forth (unless still under the statute of limitations) so we all can proceed. I have no doubt that abuse occurred, but the policy of paying out millions on claims from many, many years ago, with no proof whatsoever, cannot continue. Spurious claims only hurt actual victims as it becomes hard to believe anyone. We have to remember why we're there for the youth, week after week, month after month. We will continue offering a great program. 

I know an actual victim who is much older than me.  He says it happened to pretty much all the boys in his troop.  Not sure these are spurious claims.  

[Chris in VA]

14 hours ago, OH_Homeschooler said:

 

I hope that the effect it will have is that situations where it is brought to light makes it easier for people, and especially victims, to discuss. I hope it takes the stigma away and I hope child sexual abusers stop getting away with it. 

 

No I don't mean what effect does/will the bankruptcy have, I mean I wonder what is sort of the "cumulative" effect of having so many men in our society that have be abused. What does it do to a society when so many members have this experience? Maybe some things have been accepted as normal that are not. Maybe it has shaped their interactions and that has shaped our society in some way that wouldn't have been, had they not been abused. I am sure it is similar to the ways alcohol shapes families (Adult Children Of Alcoholics, for example, cope with life differently than people who grow up in healthy families), and that shapes our society. 

 

 

[OH_Homeschooler]

7 hours ago, Margaret in CO said:

My point was that some ARE, and those take away the belief in the reports of truth.

 

How do you know that? What evidence do you have?

[vonfirmath]

10 hours ago, Margaret in CO said:

Yep, that's us in a nutshell. Our SM's boys have both Eagled. Crew Assoc Advisor is the only adult who has a crew member still here. Her ds aged out 3 years ago. Dh is the Crew Advisor, and dd aged out of Crew at 21 last fall. Dh has to miss a lot due to hospital visits. The CC still has a boy in the troop, but they're the ones leaving for a year. Right now, we don't have a second adult for camp, and I really didn't want to go, but I kind of have to now. Let's see--parents of boys from up valley. One dad works in Denver, one works in AZ, and one just never seems to be around. Never actually MET the wife. We have a willing mom who lives up the road from us, but her ds has massive special needs, so it's not like she's going to toddle off to Philmont with him! We have one dad with 2 Eagles, and 1 at First Class, but he's useless at organization and bookkeeping sorts of things. He's always up for an adventure, but someone else has to do the logistics. The boys love him. 🙂 I was told off by a Philmont staffer last week that the reason that younger parents don't want to help is that we meet in a church! Um, what? It's not even where we're chartered--it's just that they're kind and give us the space. 

 

You don't have to go. IF there aren't two adults to go, the camp gets cancelled. The parents need to learn to step up.

[Chris in VA]

2 hours ago, OKBud said:

 

Childhood sexual abuse absolutely effects individuals, families, and communities over the long-haul. 

To the bolded: I see no way that this could possibly NOT be the case. The importance of recognizing this--both the abuse for individuals, and the lasting and widespread nature of its effects-- can not be over-stated. 

It's like the generation after a large war. 

I agree--I am just wondering what those effects ARE. 

[Chris in VA]

2 minutes ago, OKBud said:

I dunno. Just as we have to ask a whole lot of sexually abused girls to get an idea of how it has impacted their lives, and therefore the larger community, we probably have to have a critical mass of some kind of abused boys to talk about their experiences and how they think it has effected them. As far as I know, there is not that scale of research yet for men and their families. 

That's a good point. My dd is researching abuses in the music ed world. Maybe Part 2 to her research could be something of this nature. 

[Chris in VA]

31 minutes ago, HeighHo said:

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2018/09/17/648710859/childhood-trauma-and-its-lifelong-health-effects-more-prevalent-among-minorities  this was just first link that popped up; mostly what they are saying is the adult mental health and physical health is affected.  The more childhood trauma combined with less resilence, the poorer the quality of life. 

Yes, for sure it affects the individual. I am thinking about the society those individuals live in and how it affects SOCIETY. (lol not meaning to shout...I can't switch yo italics for emphasis)

[OH_Homeschooler]

9 hours ago, Chris in VA said:

No I don't mean what effect does/will the bankruptcy have, I mean I wonder what is sort of the "cumulative" effect of having so many men in our society that have be abused. What does it do to a society when so many members have this experience? Maybe some things have been accepted as normal that are not. Maybe it has shaped their interactions and that has shaped our society in some way that wouldn't have been, had they not been abused. I am sure it is similar to the ways alcohol shapes families (Adult Children Of Alcoholics, for example, cope with life differently than people who grow up in healthy families), and that shapes our society. 

 

 

 

Right, I just meant that I hope all these people coming out will help take some of the stigma out of it and more people will come forward. And that people will start believing that it's possible abuse occurred even if it happened 20 years ago instead of last night. I didn't mean to make you feel bad, I was just sharing my own personal wishes.  

I find it hard to believe that CSA is a new thing. It is far more prevalent than we even know, and I'm sure it always has been. But it probably seems more prevalent now than ever, as people become more comfortable talking about it. And maybe that will help lead to its decline. 

This is a good site if you want more information about boys who have been abused: https://1in6.org/

 

[BarbecueMom]

25 minutes ago, Chris in VA said:

That's a good point. My dd is researching abuses in the music ed world. Maybe Part 2 to her research could be something of this nature. 

I’m glad she’s doing this.  Because of this, my music ed career screeched to a halt before it started, and my life turned upside down, and I wasn’t even an actual victim.  I’m surprised the lid never blew off publicly the way it did with the Boy Scouts, athletic programs, and the Catholic Church scandals, probably because it’s not a recognizable, unified culture you can stick a name and logo on.  And it gets lumped in with other individual abusive teachers, despite the fact there’s specific cultural issues that probably make student musicians more vulnerable.

[BarbecueMom]

9 minutes ago, Plum said:

 

If it’s anything like my experience, there’s a lot of teacher and tutor sexual abuse going on. 
At least my band teacher and music tutors waited until I was 18 and graduated to start asking me out on dates. I had only heard stories of other band teachers.  

Its not just music teachers though. We just had a drama teacher that was arrested. Really, it’s any of those teachers that spend a lot more outside time with their students and with that there’s more opportunity to get students alone. 

Yep.  IME, there's was a perfect storm of factors.  I don't want to get into specifics, because internet, but... yeah.

[Chris in VA]

On 2/20/2020 at 10:08 PM, OKBud said:

What's going on in musical education??

Yes, what Plum said. 

Private music lessons are one-on-one, mismatched power situations (sorry I can't think of the phrase--unequal power?) where there is often ample opportunity for abuse. I have to say it never occurred to me that that was a "risky" situation but abuse happens more often than is thought. I don't know if the research also covers group situations, like maybe verbal sexual harrassment during orchestra or something. 

ETA  Ah--their research surveys music ed majors and asks if they have experienced sexual misconduct at any time

Edited February 22, 2020 by Chris in VA

[Liz CA]

On 2/19/2020 at 12:00 PM, ScoutTN said:

BSA is thriving in my area too. The local council owns our camps, their office building etc. outright and is in solid financial health. Numbers are up (without counting girls). Our area has lots of troops, small, medium, and large. My son is in a small one and it's a great fit for him.

BSA has made a lot of poor decisions over the last 10 yrs or so that are coming back to bite them. I think many aspects of our current culture make Scouting a less popular choice than in generations past. Sadly.

 

 

I was wondering if this had something to do with dwindling numbers in some areas. A lot of hard work is required from the Scout and the parents over many years from what I am hearing. Current culture seems less supportive than in the past.