I know lots of people don't see the need to go on trips that challenge boys. As someone I know says,
"I'm not totally convinced that young men need to go rapelling in order to become MEN (you could replace rapelling with snow caving, canyoneering, backpacking, etc.)"
To that I say that the video games sure aren't doing the job - young men who only play video games turn into 26 year old's that live in their parent's basement, without a job, and just play video games all day. Scouts need something that will challenge them and allow them to see that they can do hard things. They like to test their mettle and to come out victorious, or to come out with a plan to do better next time. We don't need to take it easy on the boys, afraid that if they fail in something in scouting then they'll be failures for life. If taught right, when they fail in something in scouting they will try to figure out why, and then try again until they succeed.
That's one of the problems with the way people raise kids these days. They think that if they insulate them from failure then they'll never know what it's like to fail. When in reality, we as adults fail sometimes on a daily basis! We have projects at work that don't always work out right, so we change our attack procedures and try to do better.
We're raising a bunch of boys to be adults (notice I didn't say MEN) that will fear failure. They will be unable to handle failure or know what to do when they are confronted with it, so they don't take on challenging tasks in the fear that they won't succeed.
When what we need are MEN who are willing and eager to step up to the plate and take on whatever challenges come their way. MEN who are willing to go out and find work, whatever it is, so that they can support a family so that their wife can stay home and help teach their children these things.
The schools aren't teaching them, sports for kids aren't teaching them. They're teaching kids that we don't need to keep score because it's only important that everyone has "fun". How about we teach them to do their best while they're having fun? And then give them a way to measure how good they've done! That way they can know if they need to work harder next time, or what they may need to do differently next time to be able to win, or score more points, or block more goals, or whatever they're doing.
I've found in my time working with the scouts that most boys want to be challenged. They want to work hard at something and then finish with the feeling that only comes when they have done their best. They want to be stretched and then look back and say "You know, that was hard, but I did it!" Lets give them the opportunity to be challenged, and to succeed!
