Co-ed Cub Scouts

[Mike]

Wooooooooo! Finally!

This is another step forward for the Scouting program. Starting in 2018, the Cub Scout program will be open to both boys and girls. Additionally, for older children, there will be a program for girls to follow the same curriculum as Boy Scouts to advance through the same ranks and become Eagle Scouts.

It's not perfect yet. It sounds like the program after Cub Scouts will still be divided by gender, which is stupid. But they need some transition time. Give it three or four years, and let mixed groups of Cub Scouts advance together and it will become clear at some point that separate-but-equal is just unfair and a waste of resources.

This is a good thing.

[Kyle]

It's literally not co-ed. It still subscribes to the believe that girls and boys can not co-mingle. I don't look at this as progress, but a half-measure to avoid obsolesence. I don't say this lightly, my sons and daughters have both shown an interest in scouts, but ultimately abandoned it over their position on gays and gender.

[Mike]

Damn. You're right. The article I read implied that Cub Scouts would be co-ed, even though older scouts would not. This is not the case. Packs and Troops can be "co-ed" but they would be segregated into single-gender dens and patrols for most activities. That's bullshit. And pointless.

I take back my woooo. I'm seriously disappointed in this now. It's still a move in the right direction, but yeah... a completely half-assed one that is doomed to fail, because WHY would anyone go to all this effort to establish girl boy scouts when we already have Girl Scouts?

Damn damn damn.

[Kyle]

Sorry. Some of my kids were in Venturing- which is co-ed- after the Scouts changed their position on gays. But then the moved on to other stuff. My problem with the current actions is that it's institutionalizing separation of genders, which is dumb and counter-progressive.

[mimekiller]

Girls joining the Boy Scouts? What's next? What's the next thing that happens? What's next on the docket? What's coming around the corner? W

[Bonefish]

I wanna hope this is good. I really do.

[Mike]

Kyle's right. It's a stalling tactic. There are elements within Scouting that want to see a full unification of Boy Scouts of America and Girl Scouts. There are elements that believe that doing so would be the first sign of the apocalypse. This issue is compounded by the fact that the Girl Scouts are far more progressive than the BSA, and therefore, any sort of merger would require the elements of the BSA that are already opposed to this to have to accept a lot more stuff that in their mind is even worse (transgendered Scouts for example).

So instead, they decide that they'll just let girls into the Boy Scouts. It's a compromise.

Okay fine, but what about camping? What about camping?!?! You can't let boys and girls go camping together! They'll be fornicating everywhere! Nevermind the fact that other organizations have crossed this bridge quite successfully. Nevermind the fact that there are girls of all sorts (mostly siblings and moms) at all kinds of boys camping outings. Nevermind that Venture Scouts (which are already co-ed) are a part of lots of BSA activities. But okay, we'll make sure we keep boys and girls separate to avoid A) all the fornication and B) the possibilities of all our good clean American boys getting cooties. It's a lame-ass compromise, and I hope that in two years time, enough Packs and Troops will realize the benefits of diversity and of shared resources and of increased membership in general. I hope. But what I'm afraid of is that in most areas, girls' dens and girls' patrols will be practically non-existent, because it's up to each Pack and Troop to decide whether or not to organize girls' services. Co-ed doesn't mean that any girl can join. Co-ed means that each locality can decide if they want to expend the effort to allow girls to join. I'm not hopeful.

[Stan]

I saw friends of relatives react very negatively to this. They were all along the lines of "Boy stuff is for boys and girl stuff is for girls." I'd find the opinion laughable if it wasn't so common. It also reinforces my idea that some aspects of social conservatism is driven by simplistic categorical thought processes - nuance and facts that don't fit the simple categories just do not compute for them so they get angry.

[Phoebe]

I have no dog in this fight because my girls are no longer in Girl Scouts and my boy is probably going to join 4-H instead - which is a great co-ed Group by the way. However, the older I get, the more I see girls-only spaces are eroding. I'd like to have the cheerful optimism that this is okay because we won't need girls-only spaces so much in the future. But look what's happening on any given news day and I think it becomes obvious that we still need girls-only spaces. As a woman who has spent most of her life in mostly-all-boys spaces, please don't take it lightly when I say we need this.

[Phoebe]

Reading the newspaper here I see where the Girl Scouts opposed this change. Interesting. They find value in having a girls' organization and don't relish having potential membership poached. I can understand that.

Oooh, there's a pretty spicy quote too:
The Boy Scouts' house is on fire," Girl Scouts told ABC News in a statement today. "Instead of addressing systemic issues of continuing sexual assault, financial mismanagement and deficient programming, BSA's senior management wants to add an accelerant to the house fire by recruiting girls."