Follow
The long history of the “buddy system” in Scouting has shown that it is always best to have at
least one other person with you and aware at all times of your circumstances and what you are doing in any outdoor or strenuous activity – Guide to Safe Scouting
“Where’s your buddy?” is a pretty common question when we are out camping. (more likely to be directed at a patrol leader or senior patrol leader -“where is that Scout’s buddy?”). Buddies are pretty important and the whole concept is one of those elegantly simple habits that help us keep Scouts safe.
We risk devaluing the intent elegantly simple habits if we stubbornly attempt to apply them without thinking practically, if we make them rules rather than good habits.
Some folks talk about ‘the blood circle’ when instructing safe handling of a pocketknife (it’s not in the Scout handbook and I think it’s a load of hooey). In thirty plus years I have never had a Scout accidentally (or intentionally) cut another Scout with a pocketknife, hatchet, or saw. (The only time they have come close was wielding their open pocket knife spinning around telling other people to get out of their blood circle.) While I’m on the subject I find the rule “I will hold on to my knife until you say ‘thank you'” and cutting the corners off of Totn’chip cards (more things you won’t find in the Scout Handbook) aggravating too.
Boys have limited ability to asses risk. Peer pressure and bravado can lead them to making some very poor choices. Our job is helping them develop the ability to choose wisely. If we make safety (or anything else for that matter) into mindless rules Scouts devalue them. If we teach them to develop a sense of being safe we will have helped them form a good habit.
Here’s every reference to the Buddy system in the Scout Handbook:
For many outdoor activities, Scouting uses the buddy system to help ensure everyone’s safety. You and a buddy can watch out for each other during a campout by checking in now and then to be sure everything is all right.
Scouts never swim alone. Each Scout must stay close to a buddy who always knows where he is and what he is doing.
Hiking with a buddy helps you stay alert to each other’s safety. Your buddy can watch out for you while you keep track of him.
Tenderfoot Requirement- Explain the importance of the buddy system as it relates to your personal safety on outings and in your neighborhood. Describe what a bully is and how you should respond to one.
There are four references in simple language – not big complicated systems – just common sense. Does a buddy need to remain in direct sight? In some instances like swimming and hiking it can be important. In some instances, like camping or any outdoor strenuous activity, a buddy should be alert to where his fellow Scout is and what he’s doing and check in now and then.
It’s always better, we calculate, to be safe than sorry. I think what’s even more important is developing a sense of safety in Scouts where things like the buddy system are not so much unquestioningly imposed on them as reasonable to them. Scouts who learn to actually be alert to each other’s safety, who internalize the idea, are likely to be safer than those who feel as though they are being policed by a set of rules.
No, I am not saying throw away the rules or suggesting we should allow Scouts to learn only from making mistakes. We do need to teach safe practices and see that they are followed but when we do let’s emphasize the development of good habits rather than just policing the bad ones.
The buddy system is huge and one of the most useful things Scouts can learn. The top two things I say on outings are “ask your Patrol Leader” and “where is your buddy?”
I learned the “safety circle” in Scouts growing up. I first heard “blood circle” from my nephews in Texas.
If I saw anyone, including an adult or staff member, spinning around with the blade out, they would be knifeless for the rest of the outing.
I recently found my original Totin’ Chip card. I considered cutting a corner off after a recent kitchen mishap, but I figure that cutting a corner off my finger was enough.
Well, spinning around with the blade open is pretty common with younger Scouts – there’s something about that term ‘blood circle’ and, of course, having a sphere of influence that you have a duty to protect from interlopers.
Nice Totn’ Chip card, but how would you cut a corner off of it? – it really doesn’t have a corner strictly speaking.
Man! Blood circle using and OPEN knife? OY! Closed, only. Jimmy Hoffa, the Teamsters Union boss not seen in Lo These Many Years (early ’80s, or late ’70s) is reported to have said “Never run toward a guy with a knife, or away from a guy with a gun.” Nobody but a doctor and myself has cut me. Same for my late wife. Thing is, it’s awfully easy to do. Be careful.
This post made me laugh. Sometimes the made up rules and rituals in Scouting are more important to Scouters than the actual program.
This sort of thing reminds me of the story of the lady who always cut the ends off of a ham before she cooked it.
On seeing her do this for the umpteenth time her husband asked “Why did you cut the ends off of the ham”?
She replied ,”I guess I really don’t know but mother always did.”
This got her to thinking so she asked her her mother who replied, “I suppose because your Grandmother always did.”
She got on the phone with Grandma and asked “Grandma, why do you cut the ends off of a ham before you cook it?”
Grandma replied, “Well, it wouldn’t fit into my baking pan if I didn’t.”
You know, that Blood Circle thing is amazing. I have never taught that and I haven’t seen any of our adults talk about it. But it always seems to come home from summer camp. Every new class of Tenderfoots comes back from summer camp and the first campout of the year they are all sitting around the campfire carving stuff and yelling, “blood circle, blood circle!” It’s ubiquitous. It’s like when my son’s came home singing the same little diddies that I heard in elementary school.
“Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I’m going to eat some worms!”
“Happy Birthday to you, you live in the zoo, you look like a monkey and you smell like one too!”
“On top of old Smoky, all covered with cheese…”
etc…
Ok, enough of that 🙂
When I was a Scout there was no such thing as the “Buddy System” except in the water. At least I don’t remember hearing about it. We didn’t need it. We never went ANYWHERE alone. Yuch. That would have been boring. Who goes places without their pals. We signed up for the same MB classes at camp. Made all our meals together. Hung out with our patrols in summer camp and on campouts. It just wasn’t an issue.
I have never taught the blood circle either – I think you have it right, it comes from summer camp or Webelos. It’s taught with the best of intentions but I just don’t get it. If I didn’t have a pocketknife to whittle with or cut windows in my cardboard box fort as a boy I got a steak knife out of the kitchen drawer.
A lifetime of tool use as a carpenter, woodcarver etc. and I have never cut another person nor have I ever heard of anyone cutting another person using any tool let alone a pocket knife. I have cut myself a number of times (so has any carpenter or woodworker) but never another person.
The troop record for stitches to close up a knife cut is eight. I would say in 30 years of Scouting I have had about six of seven Scouts cut themselves with a pocket knife, hatchet or saw. Maybe two or three needed stitches.
There is a perfectly reasonable practice, when using an full-sized axe, of holding the head in your hand and taking the axe through the arc of your swing to be sure there is nothing in the way. Holding an open pocket knife, spinning in a circle and screeching “BLOOD CIRCLE!” is about as smart as spinning around with a pot of boiling water hollering “BURN CIRCLE!”.
“is about as smart as spinning around with a pot of boiling water hollering “BURN CIRCLE!”. Oh no!! Now you’ve started something new, Clarke. I’m sure that I will hear these words echoing across the meadows at the next camporee 🙂 “Burn circle, burn circle, everybody back, I say!” This is how these kind of things get started. Be careful out there.
How about spinning around with a torch hollering “FIRE CIRCLE!”?
We could significantly liven up a camporee with that!