# You don't like it, you be the Brownie leader! **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 12, 2011, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148 "2011-04-12T21:53:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Darth\_Nader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ad7895/32.png) [@Darth\_Nader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darth_Nader)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 2:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/242 "2011-04-20T14:57:50Z")
> [@lorene](#): > > Yeah, we have a “no solicitation” policy at work. (Which of course applies to the employees but apparently not to the hookers who frequently solicit and have sex in the lobby restrooms). Wow, I’d love to work in one of those [buildings.](http://www.aoc.gov/cc/cobs/index.cfm) Which one is yours? 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lady_of_the_Lake)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/243 "2011-04-20T15:14:39Z")
> [@lorene](#): > > Yeah, we have a “no solicitation” policy at work. (Which of course applies to the employees but apparently not to the hookers who frequently solicit and have sex in the lobby restrooms). Why do other work places have all the nice things? ☹ Our work restroom only has aggressive wall air fresheners and people who like to chat while they pee… ---
**Author:** ![PunditLisa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/4af34b/32.png) [@PunditLisa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PunditLisa)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/244 "2011-04-20T15:40:48Z")
> [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](#): > > Why do other work places have all the nice things? ☹ Our work restroom only has aggressive wall air fresheners and people who like to chat while they pee… Our company took down all the air fresheners in the entire city (we have several campuses) because exactly one person complained that she was allergic to them. I really, really hope this was the case instead of what I suspect, which is that some jerk used “allergic” as a synonym for “I don’t personally like it.” We had one person do that at our pre-school. She listed that her son was allergic to dairy foods, so we bent over backwards to make sure that none of the snacks or food served contained dairy. 3/4 of the way into the school year, I was chatting with her and asked whether she had ever run into issues with him accidentally ingesting dairy and what his physical reaction was. She looked puzzled. Turns out that Ben wasn’t allergic to dairy at all, but that she, personally, didn’t like the taste of milk. :smack: ---
**Author:** ![random6x7](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/8baadc/32.png) [@random6x7](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/random6x7)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 4:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/245 "2011-04-20T16:50:10Z")
> [@rhubarbarin](#): > > I was in Girl Scouts for 7 or 8 years, starting 17 years ago. It was basically the same deal then. I would really have liked if we had been allowed to vote on what we did for our ‘fun day’ where we got some sort of reward for months selling cookies, often outdoors in the cold and snow (since this was South Dakota), but our troop leaders mostly decided it for us. Seriously. Our cookie money was probably used to buy crafts, which I would normally support, but we ended up making things like decorative Christmas brooms. ---
**Author:** ![lorene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/65b543/32.png) [@lorene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lorene)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 5:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/246 "2011-04-20T17:11:37Z")
> [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](#): > > Why do other work places have all the nice things? ☹ Our work restroom only has aggressive wall air fresheners and people who like to chat while they pee… Well, I don’t actually work in the buildings on campus where this occurs. Not that lucky, I guess. [2nd paragraph](http://www.mysouthend.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=&sc2=news&sc3=&id=117445) tells you something about the general area, not my specific location. ---
**Author:** ![Flutterby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Flutterby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flutterby)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/247 "2011-04-20T17:24:58Z")
> [@rhubarbarin](#): > > I was in Girl Scouts for 7 or 8 years, starting 17 years ago. It was basically the same deal then. I would really have liked if we had been allowed to vote on what we did for our ‘fun day’ where we got some sort of reward for months selling cookies, often outdoors in the cold and snow (since this was South Dakota), but our troop leaders mostly decided it for us. Girl Guides here, the only time I can recall there being input from us girls on how the money was spent was when we got to Pathfinders (age 13 - 15). Brownies and Guides? Nope, nothing of the sort. The Leaders planned and we followed. Pathfinders were started to encourage input and Rangers/Cadets/Junior Leaders it was expected and part of the program because there was no one else who would really plan it for you. If we spent anything on a party it wasn’t much at all, and was part of our hostessing badge. (Do they even have that badge anymore? Things have changed so much since I was in.. Hell they changed so much WHILE I was in. I have badges from the old and new programs and three different program books from when I was a Guide). ---
**Author:** ![ENugent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/4af34b/32.png) [@ENugent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ENugent)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 5:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/248 "2011-04-20T17:27:59Z")
> [@lorene](#): > > Yeah, we have a “no solicitation” policy at work. (Which of course applies to the employees but apparently not to the hookers who frequently solicit and have sex in the lobby restrooms). Maybe they can just bring the Brownies to observe while they’re working on a careers patch, then. ---
**Author:** ![lorene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/65b543/32.png) [@lorene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lorene)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 5:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/249 "2011-04-20T17:33:16Z")
> [@ENugent](#): > > Maybe they can just bring the Brownies to observe while they’re working on a careers patch, then. It IS Take Our Daughters and Sons to Work Day next week… ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/250 "2011-04-20T19:13:30Z")
So I thought and thought about this. Does it deserve this much attention? Probably not. But I have come to the conclusion that a Spa Day is perfectly OK, and here’s why. Every girl may not be into that sort of thing but certainly many many are. So maybe you do something you don’t entirely want to, and maybe you end up liking it. Who knows? Even though I was not into that sort of thing I can’t see how it would have hurt me to participate in it for one day. Now that I am all grown up I am much more of a girly-girl and am having to learn all of that stuff - makeup, nails, perfume, hair…it would have been nice to have some background in it. Fact is, looking good and learning how to do it is a big part of most adult woman’s lives. And isn’t the core tenet of the GS to teach girls how to be women? Every aspect of ‘woman’? As long as the girls are doing a wide spectrum of things and not just relegating themselves to only girly endeavors, I think it’s fine. So the tomboy has to put up with a spa day - but the super girly-girl could do with a camping trip, too. So there you have it. I know you were all on pins and needles waiting for my opinion. :dubious: 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/e19adc/32.png) [@Lady\_of\_the\_Lake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lady_of_the_Lake)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/251 "2011-04-20T19:27:20Z")
> [@PunditLisa](#): > > \We had one person do that at our pre-school. She listed that her son was allergic to dairy foods, so we bent over backwards to make sure that none of the snacks or food served contained dairy. 3/4 of the way into the school year, I was chatting with her and asked whether she had ever run into issues with him accidentally ingesting dairy and what his physical reaction was. She looked puzzled. Turns out that Ben wasn’t allergic to dairy at all, but that she, personally, didn’t like the taste of milk. :smack: Bwa…so she put down that \*he \*was allergic to something that \*she \* just didn’t like. This boggles my mind. > [@lorene](#): > > Well, I don’t actually work in the buildings on campus where this occurs. Not that lucky, I guess. [2nd paragraph](http://www.mysouthend.com/index.php?ch=news&sc=&sc2=news&sc3=&id=117445) tells you something about the general area, not my specific location. Hookers, random bodies and unregistered sex offenders, oh my! (Thanks for sharing that - it was an interesting read.) ---
**Author:** ![Dangerosa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Dangerosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dangerosa)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 8:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/252 "2011-04-20T20:11:27Z")
BTW, doing a toy spending spree for themselves would be outside of what the girls are supposed to do (one for the Children’s Hospital would be ok). But not all leaders follow policy (not all leaders know what the rules are). ---
**Author:** ![boozilu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4da419/32.png) [@boozilu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boozilu)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/253 "2011-04-20T20:41:57Z")
Boy has this thread helped me, and I’m sorry if my original post didn’t have enough (or maybe too much?) info. I hope people don’t stop supporting Girl Scouts due to this discussion. For the record, our cookies are $4 per box. $3.35 goes up the chain to Girl Scouts, and they use the money (less payment to the bakery) to send underprivileged girls to camp, support camp sites and programs, training programs for girls and adults, supplies for local and national programs, etc. 65c goes to our troop. Our particular troop is learning about water conservation this year, so we are doing a stream clean-up and talk a lot about how we can save water in our daily lives. We also do crafts, dancing, and songs in our meetings. We’ve sent care packages to the troops, collected food for a local food bank, made bird-feeders, made our own candy, gone camping, gone fossil-hunting, etc. We mostly use annual troop fees and some of the cookie money for these activities. It seemed reasonable to use a portion of the cookie money for a fun & frivolous activity. We’ll see how it goes when I meet with the mom who has the problem. I’m torn, because while I think she has some valid points, I hate to give in to her bullying (and that’s what it has become). ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/254 "2011-04-20T20:45:31Z")
> [@boozilu](#): > > We’ll see how it goes when I meet with the mom who has the problem. I’m torn, because while I think she has some valid points, I hate to give in to her bullying (and that’s what it has become). If she doesn’t have a problem with Build-A-Bear, it’s hard to see why she’d have a problem with makeover day. Did she assume that the built bears would be donated to a children’s charity or something? If not, the two activities seem fairly equivalent in my book. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/255 "2011-04-20T21:12:38Z")
Build a bear might be frivolous but, for a lot of people, make up for 8yr olds, crosses a line that makes some uncomfortable. Different strokes and all. Hey, some people might quit supporting GG’s because of this thread, it’s true. But you shouldn’t feel bad, all you did was inform people of something they weren’t aware of, what they do, as a result of that, is on them, not you. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/256 "2011-04-20T21:23:15Z")
We’ll just wait and see how well you do at resisting the cookie crack next season. In a few months this thread won’t seem nearly so important. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 10:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/257 "2011-04-20T22:24:30Z")
> [@rhubarbarin](#): > > We’ll just wait and see how well you do at resisting the cookie crack next season. In a few months this thread won’t seem nearly so important. Next season? I’m already jonesing. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/258 "2011-04-20T22:36:39Z")
> [@Beadalin](#): > > You know, for a lot of girls (certainly for me) selling those cookies was no fun whatsoever. I hated going door to door. I hated manning a booth outside a grocery store. I hated talking to people in my parents’ offices. I was shy, petrified of having to give the little speech and annoying people… the whole thing was a ton of work on top of being scary. Having a reward for hard work is appropriate, and I just do not care how frivolous that reward is. It’s meant to be **fun**. You know, I hadn’t thought about that but you’re right. I was a pretty shy kid, and I remember selling those cookies being pretty soul killing. I’ve seen the light, dammit. Let the girls get pampered! ETA Not literally, of course. ---
**Author:** ![rhubarbarin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/eb9ed0/32.png) [@rhubarbarin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rhubarbarin)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 11:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/259 "2011-04-20T23:27:30Z")
I actually hated being in Girl Scouts. Camp was the only redeeming part (we had a Boy Scout troop leader who used to come to ours and teach us how to tie knots etc), but even that wasn’t hardcore enough. I had to spend time with a bunch of rather girly girls (my whole troop) who thought I was gross and acted too much like a boy, and make crafts and sell cookies and act like I liked people _shudder_ while Boy Scouts got to USE KNIVES and BUILD FIRE and camp for real and run around in the woods hitting each other with sticks. These days there is a type of fellowship program that allows girls to participate in Boy Scouts but either it didn’t exist in my day or I never heard of it. I would have wanted to crawl under a rock if we ever had to do a ‘spa day’. But most girls that age are into that stuff. ---
**Author:** ![elbows](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b3f665/32.png) [@elbows](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elbows)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2011, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/260 "2011-04-20T23:54:38Z")
> [@](#): > > I hate to give in to her bullying > [@](#): > > So if you don’t like it, BITCH, you can volunteer to be the leader. Otherwise, STFU. Okay now, that’s an interesting contrast, even though I recognize you were just blowing off steam. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [April 21, 2011, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148/261 "2011-04-21T00:51:18Z")
> [@boozilu](#): > > We mostly use annual troop fees and some of the cookie money for these activities. It seemed reasonable to use a portion of the cookie money for a fun & frivolous activity. I’ve found from my fund raising experience that it’s actually the opposite; that donated money should go to the cause and your own money goes to the fun & frivolity. Theoretically, it shouldn’t make a difference, but it does to those who are giving. I’ve found the more specific I can get with how the money is being used, the better the response. When I was raising money for land mine removal, we were working with Rotary groups and we would break down the project into village-sized micro projects for individual Rotary groups. So, if a club thought they could collect $15,000 they would sponsor Village A. (Of course, that would only be a fraction of the money needed, but then we would get matching funds from governments and international agencies.) It’s apparent that there are people who feel that selling the cookies is a burden to them and I don’t really see any sense of gratitude toward those who purchase the cookies as donations. This is actually quite common in non-profits, both those who are more charity based and ones which are (in the case of scouting supposed to be, or in other cases supposedly) more geared toward worthwhile causes. Among the second type, the “worthwhile” ones, are many very questionable causes, yet it’s really easy to see a sense of entitlement develop among the participants. It is hard work raising money (unless your parent is strong-arming subordinates at work but that’s a separate issue), and there is the question if it’s OK to just have fun with the money. If that answer is made without considering the donors’ perspective (whose money didn’t grow on trees) then I wonder if it’s the right question to be asking. I also wonder if 7 and 8 year old girls have the maturity to realize this, and thus the need for adult supervision. If such a high percentage of the money is going to the parent organization and it’s that unpleasant for the girls or the parents are putting pressure on subordinates to purchase, etc., then one really has to question the system and if this is the right way to do this. It’s obvious that you are doing a wonderful job with your girls, which I respect. I’m looking forward to when my kids get that age and I can take them camping. I’ll let my wife handle the spa days. It will be interesting to see if my son wants to join. 😉 (On a side rant, people think that companies are screwed up, they have nothing on non-profits and the conflicts within them, so I feel sorry for you and having to deal with the other mother.) [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/you-dont-like-it-you-be-the-brownie-leader/578148.md?page=14)