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Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

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Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#41

Post by freedomben »

ilamont wrote: post #24
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, sure. I was a quiz bowl captain, president of the national honor society, and placed yearly at the state science fair and I didn't list those on a professional resume either. It takes very little effort to be an Eagle Scout. I completed all requirements including the community project aside from the board review before I turned 13. Our scoutmaster suddenly quit on us to attain his MS in engineering (his employe…

> It takes very little effort to be an Eagle Scout. I completed all requirements including the community project aside from the board review before I turned 13. It really varies from troop to troop. Ours is old-school, by the book, multiple leadership positions required for half-year terms. No one got an Eagle who was under 15 and the projects are very involved with construction or logistics. Tearing down and rebuild…

Likewise. I was 15 when I finished and it was a monumental amount of work. The troop you're in matters a great deal.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#42

Post by EVdotIO »

kiernanmcgowan wrote: post #15

I'm just thinking back to my time in scouting and can only imagine what it would be like to teach a bunch of 14-16 y/os the 1920s equivalent of MMA. Probably about 30min of fun until kids just start hitting each other as hard as they can with sticks. Still sounds more fun than the basket weaving merit badge though.

Hey, basket weaving and leather work were super fun, and I have all cool ones like shotgun, archery and rifle. The most boring are probably your citizenship badges. Don't knock it till you try it.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#43

Post by ddoolin »

kjanssen wrote: post #32
kiernanmcgowan wrote: post #15

I'm just thinking back to my time in scouting and can only imagine what it would be like to teach a bunch of 14-16 y/os the 1920s equivalent of MMA. Probably about 30min of fun until kids just start hitting each other as hard as they can with sticks. Still sounds more fun than the basket weaving merit badge though.

Hey man, my first year at summer camp all I did was basket weaving, leather working, and pottery. I originally planned to do swimming and some other adventurous stuff but was too overwhelmed by the swim test to be allowed in the lake and had a bit of a meltdown before changing course. I spent the whole week chilling in camp or the crafting grove working with my hands - it was great. A few years later I went to a diff…

I wasn't at all worried BEFORE that swim test, but afterwards I can safely say that was legitimately difficult and pretty terrifying. Especially when you realize the lake we did it in was full of leeches, which was completely foreign to me at the time.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#44

Post by ilamont »

omegaham wrote: post #35
ilamont wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It takes very little effort to be an Eagle Scout. I completed all requirements including the community project aside from the board review before I turned 13. It really varies from troop to troop. Ours is old-school, by the book, multiple leadership positions required for half-year terms. No one got an Eagle who was under 15 and the projects are very involved with construction or logistics. Tearing down and rebuild…

This was also our troop. You couldn't make Life Scout before you were 15 thanks to the leadership requirements, and that meant that the earliest you could get Eagle was sometime at age 16. The vast majority of them got it just before they turned 18. The projects were intended to be ambitious and demanded that the Scout do the bulk of the planning and dealing with the bureaucracy. Imagine my surprise when our troop we…

That's the way it is for our troop. Most of the kids aren't able to get Eagle before they are HS juniors and are 16 or 17. A few just made it in before turning 18.

The bureaucracy is a mistake. I know why Scouting does it - BSA organizational culture, abuses in the past, trying to apply standards across local troops - but a lot of it falls on troop volunteers to and parents to nag scouts to death and fix the inevitable problems that crop up. It's not right.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#45

Post by depaya »

jimbob45 wrote: post #4
eckmLJE wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did you apply that being an Eagle Scout counted against you?

The problem is that people who become Eagle Scouts tend to be successful enough individuals that the jobs they apply to don't understand why they would put such a low-grade achievement on their resume (compared to the other higher achievements they most likely have). It's like putting that you won an Olympic Gold in gymnastics when applying to be CEO of a Fortune 500 company. Yes, it's impressive to everyone, but at…

When you look at the direct benefit over the course of your lifetime I agree the benefit of things like Eagle Scout of Honor Society are minimal, but I think that's missing the indirect benefits.

Speaking personally, I firmly believe that being an Eagle Scout and HS Honor Society student helped me get into a good college.

I frequently discussed being an Eagle Scout (and scouting in general, which I was deeply involved) during engineering internship interviews and the interview for my first job out of college. I do believe this contributed to starting off my career strongly.

Now about a decade removed from college I don't bring these topics up, but I do still feel the positive contributions they had on my trajectory. Not even to mention the benefits they had on my soft skills.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#47

Post by micromacrofoot »

themodelplumber wrote: post #22
micromacrofoot wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the liberal complaint about scouting?

For the big ones, read about the history of scouting, including when BSP visited Portland OR. You'll understand right away.

what's BSP?

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#48

Post by jvanderbot »

I really love this.

I am a firm believer in everyone studying _some_ martial art (player's choice).

For the following reasons:

- It teaches an insane amount of respect when two people have to hold themselves back to practice

- It teaches self-discipline, mostly in the long-forgotten art of keeping yourself from becoming so angry you cannot function with form.

- It gives a crazy amount of confidence to know you are at least a little bit prepared for bad situations

- It removes a lot of the panic instinct in all kinds of intimidating situations, from actual fights, to presenting to a review board.

- You quickly learn to operate through pain and discomfort and intimidation, even if you are not being actually injured (e.g., not actually sparring).

- Everyone should feel that they are legitimately their own first line of defense. Even if that defense is to create space and get away.

My sport was boxing. I'm a knowledge worker, still.

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#49

Post by colechristensen »

themodelplumber wrote: post #2

Holy smokes! Reading this over, I'll bet there were more than a few injuries among the groups that practiced it. Imagine sending your kid off for a fun weekend and then watching them come home Sunday morning with an acute elbow injury from an arm bar... Scouting was dangerous enough without that stuff. You could get lost and even die in any number of unexpected ways. I watched a friend take a full swing of a wood axe…

It’s not a quick take, it’s just modern infantilization of children to the point that many people in their 20s have difficulty with basics.

Everyone starts as a beginner and age doesn’t change that, except maybe by making things harder as you get older.

Do you object to the pacing or the starting age or are you imagining that the people teaching this were reckless?

Re: Master at Arms Badge for Boy Scouts (1925) [pdf]

#50

Post by fishtoaster »

ilamont wrote: post #10

Some merit badges involve strenuous physical challenges, such as hiking (multiple long-distance hikes including a 50-miler). The canoeing MB requires learning how to get back on an overturned canoe while in deep water, which is bloody hard. They still have badges for shooting and archery, too. There are also some badges that were unexpected - plumbing, fixing farm equipment, computer game design.

I remember getting my computer badge- in the late 90s, iirc. I had to write up a document in a word processor, create a simple spreadsheet, and one or two other things I'm probably forgetting. Even then it felt a bit basic and behind the times, but I was happy to get an easy badge!
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