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 Iron_Captain wrote:
Meanwhile on Russian scout camp:

Russia might be the other extreme end of the spectrum...

But seriously, I do not understand why should you not allow boys to use water guns? A water gun is not a firearm, and using it on people can be very kind on hot days. If everyone is having fun, what is not kind about water guns? They arent dangerous.

The modern ideal American man has a mochafrappolatte in hand 24/7 and wears skinny jeans that leave no room for a pair of balls.

There is absolutely such a thing as "good aggression." You can be aggressive and still be in the right. How do you expect to win a fething fight without aggression? See above.

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 whembly wrote:

I give a gak because of the ongoing wussifications on our boys.

Also, you get bonus points considering you made that statement on a website where grown men meet to talk about playing pretend battles with toy soldiers.

Might want to backtrack there buddy.

He's got that thumb really hooked in the trigger guard

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 whembly wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:
First of all, who gives a gak?

I give a gak because of the ongoing wussifications on our boys.

Quit acting like this (old) "rule" means that no Boy Scout can play with a water gun at any time regardless of whether or not he is at an official Scout function, because it isn't the case. I was a Cub Scout and a Boy Scout and do you know how many times we had water gun fights during a meeting? None. Do you know why? We were too busy learning things in our short meetings than to splash around in the water. When we went camping or canoeing we didn't lug water guns with us, because why the hell would we? I sure as hell wouldn't wanted to have lugged my big ass Super Soaker around in the woods all day. Seriously, get the feth over it.

Are you cranky today? Need caffeine... because your ire is sorely misdirected.

You need to come down on your high horse scooty.

For the record, in my boy scout days, we DID have water guns at camp.

Actually, back then, we got away with fething murder (proverbial speaking) with the gak we've done. And we learned quite a bit too!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Why? Why should we just automatically separate it from aggression? Aggression isn't bad in and of itself. There is bad aggression and there is good aggression.

What needs to be done is teach kids where the line is, not that aggression is bad because thats not true.

Do you have kids?

Also, there is no such thing as "good aggression.". The word you are looking for is "assertive" and it is pretty damn distinct from aggression. In fact, it's the way to be confident and self-assured without being aggressive. It's a pretty standard and required social more that should be taught to children, not "good aggression."

I do, and I disagree with your point there.

Your way isn't always the "right way".

Just as mine and the way I raise my kids isn't necessarily right for other kids.

Thinking more about it, the bug spray flame throwers were probably a bigger concern, safety-wise, than squirt guns would be.

Maybe it was okay because we weren't pointing those at people.

Anyone who's ever done a sport knows the value of aggression.

 daedalus wrote:
Thinking more about it, the bug spray flame throwers were probably a bigger concern, safety-wise, than squirt guns would be.

Maybe it was okay because we weren't pointing those at people.

We did that too....

:shrugs:

The point is, we were kids...

All boys (and girls!) should read "The Dangerous Book for Boys".

From the same organisation that used to have guidelines for how to kill a man, treat severe wounds and deliver children... The times they are a changin'.

I'm just a simple country chicken, but I think that if your boys become "wussified" because an organization with the stated goals of teaching citizenship, developing moral character, and physical and mental fitness doesn't let them shoot water guns at each other while still offering training in outdoor survival, practical life skills, community stewardship, participation in the Explorer program to become exposed to careers in firefighting, law enforcement, engineering, aviation, and many other practical real world activities; then maybe you need to stop blaming others for your "wussified" children and look at the mirror because maybe you are just a gakky parent?

Take responsibility for raising your own damn kids and realize that if they turn out gakky it is because of your failures, not because some random organization didn't let them squirt each other with water guns while learning how to build a fire and how to tie knows and who later on lets you enter a burning structure wearing protective gear to learn how to become a firefigher.

Take responsibility to realize that if your boy thinks that he has to be aggressive or else you will consider him a pussy, then you are doing far more damage than not being allowed to play with a water pistol for a couple hours each week will ever do.

And maybe, just maybe, be a role model to your kids and teach them to actually use critical thinking instead of just believing and repeating whatever bs story you want to believe. 5 years ago the Boy Scouts of America were training to be Obama's version of the Hitler Youth, being trained to take up arms against their parents and fight for their Dear Leader when their transition from Scout to SS soldier becomes complete:


(Pictured above is the Obama Youth Killing Squad, or a Law Enforcement Explorer Squat learning counter terrorism tactics, or how to be wussies, I don't even know anymore)

Either the Boy Scouts of America have a very impressive ability to completely change the scope, mission, and purpose of their organization and everything that it touches, or people are outraged over bs stories 5 years ago the same way that they are outraged about bs stories now.

And newsflash: All of us are the wussies that our fathers bitched about, who were the wussies that their fathers bitched about, who were wussies themselves according to their fathers.

 Frazzled wrote:
Anyone who's ever done a sport knows the value of aggression.

Unless you are Mayweather, in which you you win by hugging the guy and running away.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Its Wussification when its total banning of the activity, and actively campaigning against it and all related behavior. If all the SJWs got their way they'd extend these stupid zero tolerance policies all the way into our homes. Kids couldn't point fingers in their own yards and say "blam!".

Maybe because we realized just how fethed up behavior like this is and lead to
1: The sorry state of mainstream porn, where Gonzo is play up like straight rape.
2: Where you have cops with the mentality of "Kill the baddy, its fine"
3: Where we very much have made a culture among young men who believe sex is owed to them and will rape if they cant get it.
4: The Hatred of gay men where we very much treat them like sub human because they dont want this.
Face it this "Channeling male aggression" is very much a big problem.

 whembly wrote:

 ScootyPuffJunior wrote:

 whembly wrote:

I give a gak because of the ongoing wussifications on our boys.

Also, you get bonus points considering you made that statement on a website where grown men meet to talk about playing pretend battles with toy soldiers.

Might want to backtrack there buddy.

Backtrack on what? I'm not complaining about the "wussification" of boys. Sorry you don't find the humor in complaining about that "problem" on a website where a bunch of grown men talk about playing with toys, because it's there.

Are you cranky today? Need caffeine... because your ire is sorely misdirected.

Nope, I'm cranky today. I've actually had a fine day and it's about to get better because I have an X-Wing tournament in about an hour, but thank you for your concern!

You need to come down on your high horse scooty.

I'm not on a high horse, you're just being more irrational than usual over absolutely nothing. The stupidity of the OT forum has grown exponentially lately and this discussion is proof of it.

For the record, in my boy scout days, we DID have water guns at camp.

That's cool, we had BB guns.

Actually, back then, we got away with fething murder (proverbial speaking) with the gak we've done. And we learned quite a bit too!

Yeah, we did lots of things we weren't supposed to. Your point? Oh that's right, there isn't one but you think this validates your outrage over a long standing rule (that you just learned about today) of an organization you don't belong too (and that you made a point to let everyone know you're kids don't belong to) and doesn't affect you or your family (or anyone else in any real way).

I was in the scouts here in the UK from 6 all the way up to 18.

Can't ever remember playing with water pistols. Can remember shooting air rifles and bows, climbing and abseiling, kyaking, white water rafting, canyoning, making rafts, lighting fires, tying knots, learning first aid, setting up camps, building bivvies, going on hikes/expeditions (in the UK, Spain and Germany), jumping over a sandbag being swung round at heights which varied from just above the floor to waist height (and being completely taken out by said sandbag), playing indoor rugby with basically no rules, constructing sedan chairs and racing them, wide games which involved rugby tackling the opposing team etc.

At the end of the day, shooting water pistols has got to be one of the dullest and most pointless activities you could pick to do over other choices which will impart actual skills when you have limited time to use.

Is throwing snowballs nice? Or is that banned to?

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Anyone who's ever done a sport knows the value of aggression.

Unless you are Mayweather, in which you you win by hugging the guy and running away.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Its Wussification when its total banning of the activity, and actively campaigning against it and all related behavior. If all the SJWs got their way they'd extend these stupid zero tolerance policies all the way into our homes. Kids couldn't point fingers in their own yards and say "blam!".

Maybe because we realized just how fethed up behavior like this is and lead to
1: The sorry state of mainstream porn, where Gonzo is play up like straight rape.
2: Where you have cops with the mentality of "Kill the baddy, its fine"
3: Where we very much have made a culture among young men who believe sex is owed to them and will rape if they cant get it.
4: The Hatred of gay men where we very much treat them like sub human because they dont want this.
Face it this "Channeling male aggression" is very much a big problem.

Them's some pretty big claims you got there. I doubt you can find any evidence that those things are caused by letting boys play with toy guns and beat each other up with sticks.

 Laemos wrote:
Is throwing snowballs nice? Or is that banned to?

iceballs Laemos
Throwing Iceballs was bad

 Grey Templar wrote:

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Anyone who's ever done a sport knows the value of aggression.

Unless you are Mayweather, in which you you win by hugging the guy and running away.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Grey Templar wrote:
Its Wussification when its total banning of the activity, and actively campaigning against it and all related behavior. If all the SJWs got their way they'd extend these stupid zero tolerance policies all the way into our homes. Kids couldn't point fingers in their own yards and say "blam!".

Maybe because we realized just how fethed up behavior like this is and lead to
1: The sorry state of mainstream porn, where Gonzo is play up like straight rape.
2: Where you have cops with the mentality of "Kill the baddy, its fine"
3: Where we very much have made a culture among young men who believe sex is owed to them and will rape if they cant get it.
4: The Hatred of gay men where we very much treat them like sub human because they dont want this.
Face it this "Channeling male aggression" is very much a big problem.

Them's some pretty big claims you got there. I doubt you can find any evidence that those things are caused by letting boys play with toy guns and beat each other up with sticks.

Im pretty sure that violent behavior begets violent behavior.

Do you think wrestling, fencing, or any other martial art is "violent" and begets more violence?

Those are examples of healthy violence. There is aggression, but it doesn't lead to more violence. I fenced for over a decade, we gave and received no quarter. I still have some scars, we fenced a little rough. But we were friends through it all, I'm sure nobody involved with that became a mass murderer.

Ok, then how do you explain the rise of gonzo porn, right now the most popular porn genre there is now. Where men brutalized aND destroy women?

I don't know, I never even heard about it before today, but I sure as hell wouldn't make a claim that its caused by kids whacking each other with sticks and pointing toy guns at each other. Thats a huge stretch.

No, but it speaks to how violent our culture it. And how getting kids to love violence perpetuates it.
and you probably seen it, just don't know that is what it is called

Thats funny, because research actually supports the opposite.

Violent crime is at an all time low and trending to get even lower. http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/violent-crime

Notice how I never mentioned crime? No, I'm talking about violence. We still very much live in a violent culture.

Here is a link to a book I enjoyed reading about how violence in poor has risen actually. I only have the conclusion though.
https://ecommons.ucsc.edu/access/content/group/c69e8eee-4608-4bca-b78e-064734bd7805/Faculty%20Presentations%20and%20Readings/purcell2.pdf

So people are more violent, but that hasn't resulted in an increase in violent crime. That isn't a logical conclusion.

If people were becoming more violent, we'd see more violent crime.

If a kid is confusing an actual firearm with a water gun, this is just an example of godawful parent who shouldn't be raising kids. Not some stupid restriction on using water guns lol.

Crossposting from my Arnie fundraiser thread for relevancy:

"The truth of it all is that, to a certain extent, we LIKE dangerous stuff. Motorcycles, fireworks, guns, skydiving, etc. The hint of danger, or at least implied danger brings excitement to what is otherwise kind of an amazingly safe world, and being made safer every minute. I don't think our brains are really wired for such a thing. We need some sort of adrenaline provoking situations. We must, otherwise we wouldn't seek them out. If we don't like that stuff, why are horror movies and FPS games so popular?

The difference here is that, in reality there's much more to the world than that, and while those things are good, anyone who wins this will already understand it. For the kids, it's about showing them that there's more before they're in a situation where they feel like that's all there is, and then enabling them to hopefully make the choice for the better."

 Grey Templar wrote:
So people are more violent, but that hasn't resulted in an increase in violent crime. That isn't a logical conclusion.

If people were becoming more violent, we'd see more violent crime.

or we have found other outlets, but just as bad. Such as porn or sports.
Does that mean it is good? No. Especially because we are a lot more forgiving of violent crimes, like how the qb from the stubenville rape case got a standing ovation when he returned from juvie. Or Micheal Vick allowed back to play.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
So people are more violent, but that hasn't resulted in an increase in violent crime. That isn't a logical conclusion.

If people were becoming more violent, we'd see more violent crime.

or we have found other outlets, but just as bad. Such as porn or sports.
Does that mean it is good? No. Especially because we are a lot more forgiving of violent crimes, like how the qb from the stubenville rape case got a standing ovation when he returned from juvie. Or Micheal Vick allowed back to play.

Sorry. Not buying your explanation as it contradicts the evidence.

So, despite me not claiming that violent crime is going down, but we still glorify violence, you are still claiming I'm saying it is about violent crime?

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
So, despite me not claiming that violent crime is going down, but we still glorify violence, you are still claiming I'm saying it is about violent crime?

How are you defining "Violence"? What is it? Do you have quantified data on "violence"?

The only way to really measure it is to measure something related, like Violent Crime. And thats taking a meteoric plunge, not a slow and gradual decline, its heading for the floor at mach1.

How can you say with a straight face that violence is increasing, yet somehow violent crime is going down?

I was in scouts years back, even made eagle loved every minute of it but some of the politiical correctness BS that tried to creep in back then was pathetic.

At one point a busy body mother suggested that the troop no longer be allowed to carry any sort of pocket knife or hatchet on camp out because boys might injure themselves or others. Given that 90% of the dads in our troop were current or former military this made for about a ten minute laugh before they eloquently said feth-no. Scouts is about teaching kids personal responsibility and also focusing on understanding the proper way to handle dangerous items like knives. If you can't safely handle the most useful multi purpose tool in the world then you have no sense being in scouts. Asking to take away a scout's knife that's like asking then to ban clothes because they might be a choking hazard.

We also used real guns, bows and arrows and even spears as we did target practice at camp with them. Same situation with knives they taught use how to treat a weapon properly and use it safely and respect the danger.

Banning squirt guns is asinine, we played rough games in scouts that included contact tackle. That was part of building character, yes kids sometimes got scratched or banged up a bit but it was always supervised and like most sports it was about character building. You get a boo boo you figure out how to get over it, not cry and retreat from the challenges of life. I can't stand how much parents coddle their kids these days especially when they are supposedly enrolling them in scouts so that they can learn how to be molded into young men and not boys.