American View: Extraordinary times call for extraordinary citizens

Responsible Business27 Jan 2026

January has been exhausting here in the USA. Not just because of the severe weather, but because of the extraordinary domestic turmoil dominating our discourse. Without dwelling on any one tragedy, it’s been nearly impossible to stay focused on work. It’s also been darned challenging to find someone to talk with about all the drama since the different “sides” of our national ideological schism are so far apart as to seem irreconcilable. ^[1]

Taking a step back from painful current events, one aspect of our “interesting times” that deserves a mention is the eternal need for people of good character to step up whenever and wherever they can and help those in need. Even if the “American Experiment” really is broken beyond repair, I wager that our future depends on those selfless volunteers who will step up, help us clear away the rubble, and build whatever comes next.

This idea came into sharp focus earlier in the week. My wife Theresa asked me to ghostwrite a soliloquy for her. She was tapped to deliver a speech in her capacity as an Assistant Troop Leader for the Scout Troop she volunteers with. Two teens were scheduled to receive their Eagle Scout rank at a formal ceremony; as one of the essential leaders, my wife was expected to say something meaningful and emotionally resonant as part of the ceremony. She knows that inspirational rhetoric is more my thing and outsourced the work to me.

I read the canned script that Brice, the troop’s senior Scout Master, had drafted for Theresa and agreed that the platitudes he’d written were so beige as to be instantly forgettable. They’d have all the visceral impact (and, thereby, the motivational value) of a fart in a lift. I promised her that I’d come up with something more emotionally impactful that the Scouts – both those being honoured and those in the audience – might remember long after the ceremony closed. I reviewed some of my older Scout speeches and got to work penning something new.

I should mention that my rhetorical style has long been to never deliver the same speech twice. Even if I must convey the same information and even if it’s to a new audience, I insist that the experience be unique to the moment. It’s probably affectation on my part, but … well, it is what it is. So, I set out to pen something for Theresa that would be unique and hit the audience hard enough that they’d remember it. Here’s what I came up with, based on what-all’s been happening in America since New Year’s.

If you know, you know … and you rage.

[Take mic from Brice. Step away from the speaker’s podium and speak from the stage]

Scout 1 and Scout 2, Scoutmaster Brice and I have the honour to present you the Eagle Scout Charge on this occasion of your elevation to the highest rank in Scouting.

Traditionally, this is the part of the traditional Eagle Rank ceremony where we exhort you to live your adult lives in honour and responsibility. It’s good advice ... in the abstract. However, given the current state of our country, I feel the traditional verses are out-of-touch with what’s happening right outside our venue. Platitudes are inadequate when we consider the fear, confusion, and suffering being experienced right outside these doors.

Right now, people across the world are rightfully scared of what’s happening around them: natural disasters, new and old wars, superpower sabre rattling, famine, and economic collapse are affecting billions of people. As such, I feel strongly that it would be both disingenuous to and a betrayal of the Scout Oath and Law to pretend that everything is normal. Recommending that you “live well” seems as shallow and out of touch as telling a D-Day paratrooper to “dress warmly.”

While you’re technically not adults yet, necessity demands that you learn one of the most important lessons of adulthood: desperate situations simplify the caliculus of virtue. Imminent suffering compels us to cull all our “you should” principles in the cause of pragmatic efficiency and focus solely on the “you must” imperatives. People who are bleeding need bandages, not compliments. People who are drowning need air, not applause. As the poet Justin Sullivan wrote of Thatcherite Britain in 1987 “no-one needs morality when there isn’t enough to eat.”

“Principles are nice things. If you can afford them. I like to think I am a principled man, but then, most men do. The fact is, we all have a price, we all have buttons that can press to make us do things that are not entirely honorable. Principles do not pay the mortgage or clear our debts. A principled man is generally a man who has everything he wants or absolutely nothing to lose.” – C. J. Tudor, The Chalk Man

This is where you two – and all of your brother and sister Eagle Scouts – must now comply with the Scout Oath without reservation and without hesitation. Lives depend on it! I charge you to do your duty to God and your Country as you’ve recited in a hundred troop meetings. The Eagle rank is supposed to be a symbol of selfless virtue and pragmatic preparedness, a beacon of hope for people in need. Whether you’re emotionally ready or not, it’s time to step up and prove that to be true.

You’ve proven that you know how to cook a meal, how to staunch a bleeding wound, and how to make responsible choices under the worst of conditions. We didn’t teach you these skills and these principles to make you a more attractive candidate for higher education. The adult volunteers and the Eagle Scouts that came before you mentored you to prepare for this moment: there is fear and there is suffering outside these doors right now, and someone must do something about it. That “someone” is us! There is no one else coming to our rescue. It’s our charge to step up and top help our neighbours.

The Eagle rank badge you wear is a small but inextinguishable light in the darkness that scared and vulnerable people the world over gravitate to for help and reassurance. Eagle Scouts are the reef that defiantly breaks the crashing waves of despair. Where others shrink and hide, we face the gale and push on because people need us. We do this not for reward or glory, but because it’s the right thing to do, full stop.

When you two new Eagle Scouts leave this church today, I commend and command you to go forth and rise to fulfil your responsibilities to your god and your country. All mankind deserves your compassion. Wearing the Eagle rank shows that you stand for community, for honesty, for humility, and for fair play. This rank badge confirms that you have skills the world requires; now it’s your moral duty to employ those skills whenever and wherever they’re needed. Do your duty.

[Pause for dramatic, then pass the mic back to Brice]

To be fair, I wasn’t expecting to get a standing ovation for that speech.

Theresa gave me one of those looks and sighed … hard. She paused, collected her thoughts, and diplomatically told me that she understood what I was going for, but didn’t think she could pull off the material. She gently reminded me that our rhetorical styles are as different as “public speaking” and “motocross chainsaw juggling.” I mean … she’s not wrong …

To be fair, Theresa didn’t give me any parameters or key points t; she just asked me to “write something better.” To my mind, anything I wrote for her should serve three purposes: it should fire up her imagination to inspire what she wants to say; it should give her a rhetorical structure to build on; and it should serve as a working script for me for the next time that I’m asked to deliver a speech. For my money, the best way to always have an original take on a familiar subject is to already have several different drafts on the topic ready-to-go. To quote the professional wrestler and civil rights activist Sputnik Monroe, “Win if you can. Lose if you must. Always cheat.”

The next time I’m asked to speak at an Eagle rank ceremony, I’ll probably use this material or something close to it. I strongly believe everything I wrote: the world is going to blazes and people all around us do need help. We can’t count on the old institutions to save us; it’s likely going to be neighbours helping neighbours from sea to polluted sea. We need, I contend, to inspire everyone we know to step up and help whenever and wherever they can. We can, therefore we must.

If the Scouts aren’t prepared to rise to that challenge, then I don’t see why they should still exist. Fortunately, from what I’ve seen in my time volunteering, most of the volunteers seem to agree with me and are teaching their charges accordingly. That give me some hope for the future.

^[1] I wrote an entire column drilling down on this subject Sunday morning, then spiked it myself. It was too incendiary even by my usual standards.

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