And seriously consider if this is an organization you want your kids affiliated with.

My son is only four, but at this point, I’d honestly rather he join the Girl Scouts.

My boys don’t do boy scouts.  I don’t know how anybody with a moral conscience can decide to enroll their kids in an organization that actively decides to stand for hate. 

But, I have friends that do…otherwise good liberal friends…even though they have to twist themselves in knots morally to do it.

We’ll go camping and hiking by ourselves, thank you.

I admit that I mas more than mildly surprised at how damn good both 4-H and FFA are once I moved out to the north woods. And despite my own biases and stereotypical attitudes, they do damn good work and are excellent educators. I also found that rural does not automatically mean dumb-fuck-narrow-minded-bumpkin.

The 4-H kids in my neighborhood are a constant source of information and wonder from me as they trot their gorgeous, hand-raised sheep and goats up and down the nearby cow path and the work they do in both competing and volunteering is pretty impressive.

In other words, fuck the fucking boy scouts.

I’m a former Boy Scout.

I’m glad I have a daughter.  She can enjoy Girl Scouts, and I don’t have to tell my child “No, the organization doesn’t live up to the Scout Law or the Scout Oath, you can’t join”

You can bet that the Mormons had a hand in this, they have a large influence in the Boy Scout hierarchy. In addition to your year of missionary work, they require all their kids to join some sort of youth organization, and the Boy Scouts are where a lot of them go… Back when I was a Scoutmaster, our district meetings were held at the local LDS meeting area…

You can bet that the Mormons had a hand in this

You’ve got to be taught
To hate and fear,
You’ve got to be taught
From year to year,
It’s got to be drummed
In your dear little ear
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught to be afraid
Of people whose eyes are oddly made,
And people whose skin is a diff’rent shade,
You’ve got to be carefully taught.
You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late,
Before you are six or seven or eight,
To hate all the people your relatives hate,
You’ve got to be carefully taught!

Oscar Hammerstein