The Boy Scouts aren’t what they used to be
By paleck. Filed in Common Sense, Life, Screwed |
Back in 2002 a Boy Scout troop out of the BSA Great Salt Lake Council inadvertently started the East Fork fire with damaged/destroyed 14,000 acres. By all accounts it was an accident and the source of the fire was from a campfire that had been doused with water and buried as is usually the recommended procedure for ensuring a fire is out. Now fast forward 5 years to yesterday where it was announced that the BSA Great Salt Lake Council and the State of Utah have reached a settlement. For this I applaud them rather than dragging on another 5 or 10 years in pointless court battles they have finally finished it. What I do take great exception to is one of the terms of the settlement…
The state originally sued for $606,424 to recoup the costs the state incurred in fighting the fire. The settlement terms that I have been able to drudge up so far from local newspapers and the radio are for the most part a very good compromise. The terms that have been announced are as follows: the Greater Salt Lake Council will pay approximately $300,000 to the state, oversee the planting of 9,000 seedlings(not sure if it is only in East Fork or in general), develop specific training for troop leaders and videos/training for the scouts themselves and last the Great Salt Lake council admits no wrong doing for the fire. That last one is the one that I have to take issue with, the fact that the Great Salt Lake Council will not admit any wrong doing goes against the very ideals of the Boy scouts. Unfortunately, the Boy Scouts of America are not acting any better. According to the Deseret News article There is still a pending lawsuit between the BSA and the federal government for $13 million that they spent fighting the fire. Besides not admitting any fault of their own as far as I have seen the BSA has also filed a lawsuit that claims the “unknown Scouts, on their own free time” started a different campfire that then spread and started the 2002 East Fork Fire.
Now I am an Eagle Scout and today I am now ashamed of the organization from which I earned that rank. From both the Mission Statement and the Vision statement the BSA currently has on it’s website two lines that essentially repeat each other which would imply that it is important to them. “The mission of the Boy Scouts of America is to prepare young people to make ethical and moral choices over their lifetimes by instilling in them the values of the Scout Oath and Law.” from the Mission statement and “Instill in young people lifetime values and develop in them ethical characte as expressed in the Scout Oath and Law” from the Vision Statement. With all of their concern with instilling ethical and moral values in the scouts by not admitting any wrong-doing, they have shown their true colors. In my opinion they have lost their own moral compass by looking after their own ass instead of doing what is right and leading by example. One final note before I sign off on this post, Yes I know that if they do publicly and on the record admit liability it is possible for them to open themselves to other liability claims, but by denying it entirely they cannot profess to be setting a good example for the scouts that they are trying to teach these same values to.
