Dose of Paranoia - 2026-02-28
It gets worse before it gets worse...
Something a bit different after a hiatus… a story which I think has gotten lost in the never ending shit storm that is today’s America and which deserves to be heard.
Yesterday, Scouting USA (what used to be the Boy Scouts of America) announced that it had “come to an agreement” with the “Department of War” in which the Scouts agreed to:
Discontinue the Citizenship in Society Merit Badge, which from what I can tell basically teaches kids to treat people with respect even if they are different from us. I urge you to read the requirements for this badge to see what our government feels is such a threat to so called American values. Please let me know if you can find anything here - I couldn’t. It basically teaches kids not to be assholes. Oh… wait…
Adding a Military Service Merit Badge. In another timeline, where the US was a country of laws and the military was not the deadly plaything of a senile criminal, I really would not have too much of an issue with adding this badge. The military used to be an honorable career.
End policies which give support to Trans kids participating in Scouting in the gender identity that they feel most comfortable in.
The “Department of War” threatened to stop supporting the Scouts (and I assume would have shut down Scouting on military bases) if the Scouts did not capitulate.
This was a golden opportunity for an organization that purports to teach kids about American values to stand up to the criminals in DC and just say “No.” This could have been a great example of democracy in action, bravery in the face of thuggery, and standing up for ethics.
Did the Scouts do this?
Nope.
They 100% caved to the “Department of War.”
I understand the pressure that the national Scouting body felt - I am sure that the criminals in DC would have caused them all sorts of hell for taking the courageous path. But it would have been the right thing to do - to resist the continuing destruction of civil society in the US and teach kids true American values.
I have a bit of a personal stake in this - I recently started volunteering with the Scouts as a Merit Badge Counselor and worked with the local Cub Scouts to teach them First Aid. Two of those Cubs recently used that training to help a neighbor who slipped on the ice get medical attention and I am going to be handing them an award for their actions on Monday. Later in March I am going to be teaching kids how to get their CyberSecurity and Artificial Intelligence merit badges at a local “Merit Badge Fair.” I love doing this stuff - it allows me to give back to the community and share my knowledge and experience with the next generation. And it is fun!
But in order to do this, I have to be a member of Scouting USA. And I just cannot do that after these changes. Being a member means paying a fee to the national organization and agreeing to following its policies. Hard nope. And I am sure I am not the only one who feels this way. And who is going to suffer most? The kids.
I have contacted the people I work with in the Scouts to tell them I am not renewing my membership. They are genuinely nice folks who I suspect are not all happy with these new policies. But they have spent years building local programs and their kids enjoy the activities offered by Scouting. They are (as I would be in their shoes) desperately looking for a way forward to continue these programs for their kids. The Scouting Reddit is full of anguished discussion on the topic. I really feel for the kids and the parents. Scouting has been on the decline in the US for decades and this is the last thing it needed.
Another example of how the Trump/MAGA cult is reshaping and enshittifying America, and further dividing us.
My solution? I hope that parents will see what is happening here, dissociate local Packs and Troops from the “Trump Youth” national organization and come up with an alternative program for kids. But I fear that this won’t happen due to the difficulty of replacing decades of organization and materials from when Scouting was a force for good. It would be a heck of a lot of work. But it would be worth it. I’d help.
I know that this may seem like a small story, especially on a day when the nation just went to war and we are still reeling from multiple murders of Americans by government agents and have masked secret police roaming our streets. But its not. This is an effort by the government to normalize and entrench its sick and toxic policies in the minds of the next generation and we should be just as concerned about this as we are about the plethora of other horrors inflicted on us daily.