Scoutmaster Podcast 42 – Hazing

Comments

1. Larry Geiger says

   November 11, 2010 at 2:41 pm

   Good stuff as usual Clarke.
   I probably shouldn’t have told that story from one of my early campouts in the section on hazing, as it might seem to make light of an important subject. The thing is, I don’t know what happened to the other kid that was out there with me. I don’t remember. For all I know, he is one of those “two out of three” guys that were in Scouts and got hazed.
   Anyway, I was pretty immune to most of that stuff, but
   recognize that many guys are not. I think about hazing mostly in terms of older Scouts and not adult leaders, as I’ve never run into much of the adult kind, though I know that it exists.
   The phrase “right of passage” came up in the podcast. I have a couple of thoughts about that. (Surprise 🙂 )
   1. I think that there are some people who are just sort of mean and nasty. We don’t need to go there.
   2. I think that there are some guys who think that young men need some “shaping up” or “tightning up”, or some gauntlet time, or some other passage thing. They know what they went through as kids so they feel that they need to “invent” some appropriate ceremonies, tests, challenges, etc. for the young men to help
   them along. They are partly right but misguided.
   3. I think that there are some guys who think that young men need some “shaping up” or “tightning up”, or some gauntlet time, or some other passage thing. I agree with them and Scouting is the way to accomplish this. Once more, the unique way of Scouting is perfect for this. But Scouting, if done right, comes without the baggage and negative connotations of the first two ways mentioned above.
   For what is a Scout’s first summer camp, or a trek to Philmont, if it’s not a test. If it doesn’t shape up a Scout’s mental, physical, and spiritual makeup. If it doesn’t tighten up our boys.
   I live in Central Florida and we go to summer camp in North Carolina. A trip, without mommy and daddy, at 11 years old, all the way to NC is enough, all by itself, to scare the beejabbers out of a new Scout. He surely doesn’t need a Snipe hunt to do that.
   You mentioned that your troop is about to go backpacking. Taking a young Scout on his first backpacking trip, miles into the woods with nothing but a trail and some blazes to find his way back is plenty of growing up right of passage.
   Standing back and surveying a disastrous Saturday morning breakfast and thinking “I’m going to starve to death before Sunday dinner” is enough to give a hungry 11 year old fits.
   Walking into the woods with a bunch of Scouts that you
   don’t know and have just met, most of them older and more experienced than you, and some of them adult sized is intimidating enough.
   Do Scouting right (adult leaders, older Scouts, SPLs, and Patrol Leaders) and the young men will talk all their life about how Scouting helped them grow to be the successful person they became.
   To summarize what all that means, it means that for almost all of our young men, the normal, everyday challenges of Scouting are more than enough “right of passage” for most young men.
   And for those unique young men for whom it’s not enough.
   The normal, everyday challenges are just not enough for them.
   Well, we’ve got a couple more in our hip pocket:
   1. Earn their Eagle Scout! They want a challenge, go for it.
   2. Lead, train and inspire some fellow Scouts to achieve First Class rank. Mentor a couple or a couple of dozen new Scouts to get to First Class rank. Now there’s a challenge for them!!