Care & Feeding: Should I Remove My Son From an Activity He Loves Because I’m Morally Opposed to It?

[minoanmiss]

[content warning, not for this letter but for another. There's a letter on that page which I found very worrying, so be careful.



My 7-year-old son is in Cub Scouts and loves it; me, not so much. It seems to go against everything I’ve been trying to teach my boys. There is a lot of God and patriotism. At every meeting they promise to be clean and reverent, to do their duty to God and be morally straight, which makes me cringe. We are atheists, which the program technically bans. Up until recently the Boy Scouts also had anti-gay policies. It seems like a no-brainer that this group isn’t for us, but my son loves it. Our “den” gives the option of community service instead of going to church for the “Duty to God” badge. Other than the pledge in the beginning, we have really enjoyed the family friendly activities, projects, and group campouts. I’ve heard comments about masks and losing freedoms, I’ve seen a Let’s Go Brandon flag in a leader’s garage, but overall everyone has been friendly and welcoming and hasn’t talked politics.

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I’ve talked to my son about why I don’t think we should continue, but he is 7 and just wants to build cars and go fishing. It doesn’t help that his best friends’ parents are the leaders of the program. With the recent Supreme Court rulings, I just can’t stomach these meetings anymore. He is supposed to march in the Fourth of July parade and I have no desire to celebrate America right now. I’ve checked and cannot find any similar groups in our area. My husband says it would be wrong to make him quit because of my beliefs. But he is 7, isn’t it my job to teach him my morals? I’m so torn on what to do!

— A Mom Just Trying to Do the Right Thing

Dear Just Trying,

Since each Boy Scout troop takes its own approach to the rules and traditions of the national organization, I’m not going to try to explore or debate the positions of the national organization, because that’s not the heart of your question. Your question is really whether your discomfort with the national organization is reason enough to pull your kid out of the local program, so the local is what I’m going to focus on.

It is your job to teach your son your morals, but at some point it’s also your job to let him codify his own set of values, which may or may not line up with yours. Don’t worry, I’m not suggesting that your 7-year-old is ready for that! But I think having an eye toward that future point is your best course of action here. It sounds like you can be reasonably certain that the den leaders, or at least one of them, have different political beliefs than you, but that at least so far those beliefs have not entered the Scout activities. Same goes for the religious elements inherent in the program—in fact your den made some accommodations for your family so that your son could fully participate. Although I understand your discomfort, I’m not sure now is the time to pull him out of the program. If these leaders continue to be respectful of political boundaries and your religious beliefs, then there seems very little danger, at least for now, that your son would pick up anything objectionable to you. And it sounds like both the activities themselves and the other boys in the group are motivational for your son.

I think this is one of those situations where you can let your son continue to be involved with the Scouts while also continuing to speak with him and read with him about the social and moral perspectives you want him to adopt as he grows. Keep an open dialogue and involve him in activism to the extent you are comfortable. In doing so, he may come to question the Boy Scouts’ “shtick” all on his own and find another activity. Or, he may continue to be involved in Scouts, but also grow up to be a rabid liberal, in which case he has learned a really important skill: how to coexist, collaborate, and have meaningful relationships with people who have different views than oneself.

I don’t mean to downplay your discomfort at the rhetoric of certain political factions and recent events regarding a person’s rights—I share it. But I’m also not convinced that the lesson you want to teach your son, or these other parents, is that you feel the need to isolate yourself away from anyone who seems like they vote “R.” So long as these leaders and parents create a respectful space for people of all beliefs, you can wait until your son is old enough to make a decision about his association with the group for himself.

Comments

[movingfinger]

Cub enrollment starts at five, so LW should have been a little more on the ball last year or whenever the child started. I'd suggest looking around for a different organization that would offer similar activities, and if there isn't one, representing your own values extra hard, which will be going upstream against the current the child is swimming in, but which will make a difference in the long run.

[dine]

the advice isn't bad at all, but I'm fairly confused by the boy's being enrolled in Scouts at all. if LW has such objections to the whole organization, why let the child start? unless it was a 'my best friend's doing it, I'mma nag until you give in' situation.

[jadelennox]

right? also, the letter doesn't address if there are similar activities available that aren't under the Boy Scouts; did she look into it?

[azurelunatic]

I’ve checked and cannot find any similar groups in our area.

It looks like she has at least checked around

[xenacryst]

I will note that I have college friends who are, if anything, more visibly lefties than I, who have an Eagle Scout son. It's possible, given the right organization. I'll also note that I voluntarily washed out of the Boy Scouts towards the beginning because I found they didn't fit with where I was. I have absolutely no love for the national org, but individual packs vary quite widely.

[cereta]

I kind of want to introduce LW to my kid, who went to Catholic grade school and has as her secondary "family" a family who are politically opposed to us on a level that sometimes makes me wince, and who is still so progressive she'd almost shame my man Beau (almost!).

I'm not saying don't keep an ear on things. Just the opposite, in fact. Ask your son questions. Have discussions. If there are ideas you object to being put forth, you can (a) make an informed decision then, and/or (b) use them as opportunities to express your values. And strap yourself in for whatever will have overtaken TikTok in three years.

[katiedid717]

I've known I was atheist since I was 12, but I stayed in scouts until I was 17. The advice here is good - the individual groups are what you should really judge by versus the national organization as a whole (which I think is also true for any kind of organization, religion, political party, etc). The lessons I learned in Girl Scouts were invaluable - community service, leadership, event and fundraiser planning, etc. I went on a trip to Europe with Girl Scouts, and scouting was a major component in who I became as an adult. I hope the LW can look past their concerns and appreciate the wonderful experiences Cub/Boy Scouts can provide.

[jadelennox]

Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts have exceptionally different sets of values, at least these days, to be fair. Among other things, the Girl Scouts won't boot the kid out if he discovers he's gay in a few years, and the Boy Scouts leave that as more of an open question. But yeah, this individual group seems, at a minimum, to be making an attempt.

I agree that the advice is fine, but I'll add if there are similar groups available where LW is, then transferring the kid to one of them now, while he's young enough that the lasting connections aren't formed yet, that could be a good choice.

[katiedid717]

Yeah I mean my experience in Scouts ended ~20 years ago, but there are also so many things that really depend on the individual troops. My brother's Boy Scout troop would frequently open certain day trips to female family members - I went on a couple hikes, went ice fishing, etc because of this when I was in high school.

The only similar programs I can think of from when I was growing up are the Indian Princesses (run by the YMCA) and something I don't remember the name of that was associated with the Masonic temple. Even then, the Y is still a faith-based organization and one of the tenets of Freemasonry is belief in a Supreme Being, so there really isn't an atheist option anywhere.

[sporky_rat]

The lessons I learned in Girl Scouts served me well when I needed to talk someone though union organizing.

[hashiveinu]

There's no 4-H in their area?

[melannen]

A lot of less rural areas don't.

[ethelmay]

Camp Fire seems the obvious alternative, but presumably they've thought of that.

[melannen]

*Is* the problem here actually with the national organization rather than the local group? There are plenty of Scouts groups around here that don't do the God badge, don't march in parades, and sure as heck don't have a Let's Go Brandon flag in the meeting space. If your problem here is less the Scouts as a whole and more specific things your son's troop is doing, you could shop around for a different Scout group. You might be able to find one led by an anarcho-socialist atheist lesbian these days. There are also multiple groups founded in the past few years by people who wanted a similar experience but without the Boy Scouts' baggage; many of them are still fairly small, so there might not already be one, but most of them would be happy to help you start up a group in your local area.

But the leader of this troop is your kid's friend's parents. LW, if the actual problem is your kid's friend's parents, or if your kid's friend's parent's represent the majority political and religious views in your area, that's a different problem - and one that the Cub Scouts might actually give you a more structured way to talk about with him.

Otherwise, just join the Girl Scouts.

[sporky_rat]

Girl Scouts don't allow boys to join yet (I don't think).

[melannen]

Hmm. They should fix that!

[purlewe]

yeah no boys, but trans girls are allowed.

[delight]

I think trans boys who started before transitioning are also allowed to stay, so there are some boys, but not many.

[purlewe]

very good point. I think that trans kids in general can be in GS. I phrased that terribly above. Thanks for the poke that I was not inclusive enough

[ethelmay]

"It sounds like you can be reasonably certain that the den leaders, or at least one of them, have different political beliefs than you, but that at least so far those beliefs have not entered the Scout activities."

I am way, way, way less certain of this.

[azurelunatic]

I would also be, and as someone who is clocked as, as one former co-worker put it, "You look like a person who might watch Steven Universe", I would not feel safe around anyone who is Let's Go Brandon-ing rather than glorying in the ironic perfection of Dark Brandon.

Comments about "losing freedoms" and wearing masks screams GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT to me.

[ethelmay]

Yeah. I mean, there's a pretty high chance of contracting Covid from anti-maskers, for starters. And I don't think a Let's Go Brandon flag is at all an anodyne sign of voting differently. I would consider that an extreme badge of an extreme position.

[azurelunatic]

One of my BFFs went on a mini-break with her former roommate last weekend. Her former roommate is a Black woman who is the opposite of Terminally Online and has never heard the phrase Let's go Brandon. My BFF basically went "No, you have to care about this one, it's a safety issue, all you need to know is avoid them as if it was a Confederate flag."

[cimorene]

Exactly. The national org is kind of a charity/nature thing and there are plenty of troops with no politics or leftist politics. It's easy to have playtime, social consciousness time, and learning about the outdoors time without any patriotism, religion, or politics getting a look in. I don't like the sound of these troop leaders.

But that said, they don't really sound worse than a lot of scout troops where I come from, including one my sister was in in elementary school. I don't think there's much risk of the adults brainwashing her son or anything, necessarily. A parent with strong progressive views usually is enough to inoculate a kid against being accidentally influenced like that, at least, if they have an open and communicative relationship with their kid.

[ethelmay]

Well, no, it's not that the national organization is just fine. Individual troops are sometimes run much better (I know a guy who made Eagle Scout in a local troop that didn't pull any crap - he is now, incidentally, married to another man), but if you don't see any evidence that the individual troop is resisting the overall extreme conservative bent of the organization, it's best to assume they aren't. And kids do absorb the general ideas about what's normal and not normal from the people around them in activities like Scouts. That is, after all, a considerable part of what such activities are for.

[cimorene]

Yeah, the national organization is deplorable, but they don't necessarily have much influence on the individual troops. Because they are staffed with volunteers and it's possible for the amount of contact with the larger hierarchy to be quite low, there's a huge variation there and you can't assume the political content of each troop by default. It isn't necessary for troop leaders to actively do anything to resist the national organization to make their troops their own, because the day-to-day life of scouting is club meetings, outings, lessons, and that kind of thing, in the company of area children and leaders. They don't necessarily spend time on flag worship or memorize the promises and laws and so on - that's entirely up to the leaders. And the default state of most children is a focus on their day to day lives, so they're not typically that informed about the national organization unless their troop leaders have made an effort.

Children absorb behaviors, accents, and social norms from the cultures around them, sure, but having active parents who communicate to them about their values is generally a decent innoculation against simply absorbing the ones around them. They'll pick things up, of course, there are lots of important conversations to be had, but their parents will notice things and talk to them and they'll ask their parents questions if they have a good, open, and trusting relationship, and they'll ultimately grow up informed about their parents' moral and ethical positions and be reasonably likely to come to similar ones... or to examine them and then reject them as they grow up, but that is also a process involving conscious awareness and self examination. I and my sister and many of my friends were raised by progressive parents from outside the south, but surrounded at school by authoritarian racist fundamentalist culture from a wide variety of authority figures. My sister's Brownie scout leader was one. I observed a lot of northern expat kids of my acquaintance notice and realize things about southern culture and experiment with ideas acquired from it over the years, but ultimately basically mostly... reject it and move as far away from it as possible. So yeah, of course the purpose of Scouts and group activities like that is partially to indoctrinate children into a worldview, but they're designed from the assumption that it's a worldview shared with the children's parents. They probably work quite well at that. And of course, in the absence of a strong influence - or a good relationship - with parental figures, kids are going to be more influenced by other role models. But is a child of politically active, passionately progressive parents who likely work hard at communicating with their kid in a lot of danger of being brainwashed into the right wing by weekly-ish contact with a scout leader while they're still living at home and seeing their own parents daily? I don't think so. I still wouldn't want my kid in their troop, but I think it's not likely that big of a danger.

[shirou]

I think it would help LW to try to articulate the actual harm here is. Who is being hurt, and how? That might make the decision easier.

I am not presupposing the answer. I can't quite figure it out, which leads me to believe that LW hasn't thought objectively about how scouting might be harmful and would benefit from spelling it out explicitly, but I'm not assuming that it is or is not.