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Boy Scouts push for new relevance By Howard Witt
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | (MCT) HOUSTON - The scene on a recent weekend at Camp Strake, a Boy Scout overnight camp in the woods north of Houston, looked ageless and familiar: A group of teenage scouts, their tan uniforms neatly buttoned as they emerged from their tents, lined up eagerly to watch several fathers demonstrate skeet shooting. But this was not a scouting tableau as Norman Rockwell might have pictured it. The African-American teenagers came from some of Houston's toughest inner-city neighborhoods, where they sometimes must dodge gang shootouts to make it to weekly scout meetings. Their uniforms, tents and sleeping bags were donated, because the boys' families have little money to afford them. And most of the fathers on hand were not their own, but rather volunteers and professional scout leaders recruited to stand in for the many boys in the group growing up without them. Even the shotgun lesson was extraordinary - the first time officials at the Boy Scout camp had permitted urban scouts from Houston to try their hands at shooting. "They've always said our kids and guns shouldn't go together," said Amal Davis, a senior leader of the Houston-area Boy Scouts. "There was a lot of resistance from some people. And they still won't let our kids bring pocketknives, which is pretty much a scouting staple." But Davis wasn't angry. He was beaming, because the two dozen youths he had brought to the camp were experiencing a whole new world just 50 miles from their troubled neighborhoods. His program, to open the Boy Scouts to kids who otherwise would never have access to it, is on the cutting edge of the 98-year-old scouting organization as it reaches beyond its traditional suburban strongholds. Bruised by America's culture wars, battered by lawsuits alleging that it discriminates against atheists and gays, and beset by eroding enrollments, the Boy Scouts of America is approaching its centenary in 2010 determined to regain its footing as the nation's premier volunteer program to help boys grow into responsible men. The list of merit badges has been updated and expanded. Coed programs for high school students have been introduced. Laptops are as common as rucksacks at many troop meetings. And the scouts have begun targeting Hispanics, the nation's fastest-growing minority group, in a new recruiting drive. "The Boy Scouts of America is either going to figure out how to be relevant and important and exciting to Hispanic kids and their parents, or we're going to be out of business," said Rick Cronk, the Boy Scouts of America president. The Boy Scouts of America counted nearly 2.86 million boys in its program in 2007, 15 percent fewer than in 2000 and a steep drop-off from the group's enrollment high point of 4.35 million youths in 1970. But Cronk views the scouting math more optimistically. "We're excited about the possibility of reintroducing scouting to America," he said. "There are about 50 million living Americans who were either Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts. If you assume that each of those 50 million scouts has two living family members, that's 150 million Americans - half of the country - who in essence understand scouting, even if they can't precisely repeat the scout oath and laws." It was the scout oath and laws, of course, that got the Boy Scouts of America into trouble over the last 20 years. More than 30 state and federal lawsuits have been filed against the scouts, variously alleging that the organization discriminates against girls, atheists and gays. Particularly troubling to the American Civil Liberties Union, which has been involved in many of the lawsuits, are the parts of the Boy Scout Oath that require a scout to do his "duty to God" and to keep himself "morally straight." Scouting officials do not deny that they expect their members to believe in God, although they insist the movement is non-sectarian and open to followers of all religious beliefs. And the officials acknowledge that they don't allow openly homosexual men to become scout leaders because they believe they would be inappropriate role models. Instead, officials say they take a "don't ask, don't tell" approach, refraining from questioning either scouts or leaders about sexual orientation. The Boy Scouts prevailed in nearly every lawsuit challenging the membership rules, including a landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in 2000 that determined the organization has a First Amendment right of freedom of association, which meant it could determine its own requirements for members and leaders. But those legal victories drove critics to try to cut off the Boy Scouts' access to public and government-supported venues, such as schools and municipal facilities, on the grounds that the scouts' membership restrictions violate government non-discrimination rules. Some of those legal battles are ongoing. "No group - the Boy Scouts or any other - should be able to discriminate on the government's dime," said Daniel Mach, litigation director of the ACLU's Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief. The legal challenges outraged one Eagle Scout in particular - Texas Gov. Rick Perry. In February, Perry, a conservative Republican, published a book about scouting's struggle against what he termed "liberal elites" and the advocates of "free love and the quick fix of hallucinatory drugs." He's donating the proceeds of the book, "On My Honor," to the scouts' legal defense fund. "The Boy Scouts didn't go looking for this fight," Perry said in an interview with the Chicago Tribune. "The ACLU came after them. ... This attack on scouting is part of a larger cultural war. The Boy Scouts are basically just the sentinels standing watch for traditional values." Scouting, Perry added, "isn't about sexuality. It's about teaching individuals to be men of character, being trustworthy and loyal and kind and friendly. If you have an openly homosexual scout leader, the issue is going to be forced upon the young men in the troop. Scouting is not a place for those lifestyles to be discussed." The Boy Scouts' legal troubles, although largely over, continue to cast a pall over the fundraising that supports many local scouting activities. Some large corporations, for example, have deleted the Boy Scouts from their charitable donations, asserting that the organization runs afoul of their own corporate anti-discrimination policies. "It has definitely affected our fundraising efforts, even going to door to door in the neighborhood," said John Betick, a parent and volunteer scout leader with Troop 878 in the Houston suburb of Spring. "When someone says, `The scouts discriminate,' we just move on. It's not worth getting into an argument." The kids themselves seem only vaguely aware of the controversies over the Boy Scouts' membership policies. The high school-age boys in Troop 878 said no scout officials had ever asked them about their religious beliefs or sexual orientation. The youths said they were more concerned about explaining to some of their skeptical peers why Boy Scouts are not nerds. "Some kids think the Boy Scouts are not cool," said Jay Rose, 14. "But I tell them, `If you break your leg or your arm, I know what to do.' And that's because I learned first aid from scouting." The controversies are even less relevant for the urban scouts, who know only that the scouting program is providing them with a safe and exciting alternative to the streets. "When you have nothing to do at home, you have something to do at the Boy Scouts," said Anthony Carter, 12, as he waited his turn to try shooting down a clay pigeon at Camp Strake. "Scouting for me is a real opportunity to become a young man." Every weekday JewishWorldReview.com publishes what many in the media and Washington consider "must-reading". Sign up for the daily JWR update. It's free. Just click here.
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Mitch Albom | |||||||||||
