The Boy Scouts Of America

[Tom]

Thankyou for your tenacity, indulgence and generosity, wildsawmill.  There will be a Star in your crown.

[urbanlumberinc]

Hearst is in the business of selling papers, not smearing the Boy Scouts.  I don't know all of the facts, as I'm sure few here do, so I'll reserve judgement.  I will say this though:  If the scouts are guilty of anything, first and foremost it's poor P.R. work.  If they're truly doing something that meets their own ethical standards, and is environmentally sensitive, and conservation minded, they sure did a poor job of presenting that picture to the public and the media.  In any case, I'm not bothered the least by the scouts or Hearst (who reads newspapers anymore?)

[crtreedude]

Any organization of any size has bad apples. When you reach into the barrel, almost all the time with a good organization, you come up with a good apple, people committed to the kids and showing a good example. But, you will at times get a bad one.

The proper response is to go through the barrel looking for the bad apples, clean them out, so that the good apples stay good.

Perhaps the problem now a days is no one has barrels of apples anymore, so don't know what needs to be done?

All my experiences with the BSA have been good ones. Any organization of any size has problems, but I never hit any. And I had nothing but admiration for the leaders that I had.

I discount much of what I read in the newspapers as muckraking, whether I agree with the organization or not. The media thrives on making a mountain out of a mole hill, so when they cry wolf, I tend to ignore them.

[Tom]

Something that is seldom considered is that the Newspapers (media) might do well to dig into their barrel and look for bad apples too.

My opinion is that the media seldom considers anything news unless it is a natural catastrophe or someone is being chastised.

There was a time when news also included the scout who helped the little old lady across the street, the 16 year old girl's coming out party, the big birthday party put on by several parents for their 5 year-old children, the local high school's tennis tournament trophy, the big fish caught yesterday, an advertisement for the church bazaar, the eulogy of the local citizen who never thought he was important, and the price of eggs.

Most media outlets, especially the printed press, have gone out of their way to ignore local issues and serve as a historical recording of local events, in the search for national and international notoriety.  I deem that and the inability of reporters to report without editorializing, a great loss.

[Phorester]

My local daily newspaper has one or two Eagle Scout project pictures every month.  Each summer they have a 1 page or bigger article on our local Boy Scout Camp.  They cover all Council award dinners, etc.  Good positive coverage.

Our Scout Camp was listed in the "top Ten logger" list in that Hearst article. (Shenandoah Area Council).  Hearst doesn't understand this, but that's something to be proud of, actually.  The local paper hasn't bit on that article yet, but I won't mind if they do.  I guarentee it will be a positive "expose' " about Scouts and their science-based conservation efforts.