Is this usual? Scouts

[Pyjamaramadrama]

Ds goes to Cubs, he enjoys it, leaders seem lovely, no problems.

At the weekend there was an event involving the Beavers, Cubs, Scouts.

I thought that perhaps the way one of the Scout leaders was speaking to the children was a bit off. He was looking after the Scouts, so the older ones and he was shouting like a Sergeant major. Shouting "Right, attention", fair enough but then yelling and I mean properly yelling at a couple of the kids "stand up straight boy", "oi, hands out yer pockets boy".

I genuinely don't know if this is odd for scouts. Personally I'm not keen on that approach at all but dh just thought it was normal.

When ds was in Scouts I can remember being a bit surprised on how a Scout leader spoke to the scouts. Now DS is in the Scouts I would happily pay double just to get him out for a couple of hours!

My son loves the saluting the flag, attention, stand at ease bit of his cubs, goes completely against my own political ethos in general but our leader ( from his wheelchair btw) manages to control a group of very rowdy boys with an occasional blow of a whistle! Complete respect for the man.

I really don't think that telling someone to stand up straight or take their hands out of their pockets is a particularly bad thing on a solemn occasion like a Remembrance Day parade - looking smart and respectful is important. The "boy" thing is context dependent, and as a one-off I wouldn't think twice about it.

Guiding/Scouting do have a military background, but it's incredibly softened these days. I was forced to do CCF at school, proper drill and everything, then one year went to parade with my Guides instead and found the lack of discipline really embarrassing (but I was ~14, so everything not following my internal "rules" was embarrassing).