What if your strategy in life is to pursue whatever arbitrary goal is placed in front of you by some authority figure despite the complete lack of tangible rewards for doing so?
This sounds less like a recipe for producing a successful and resourceful man of the world and more like a recipe for a guy who spends his spare time trying to get all the achievements on Grand Theft Auto 4.
The things you learn and the skills you demonstrate to become an Eagle scout are _Not_ arbitrary. To earn it you have to demonstrate that you can lead a group of people to do something useful, contribute meaningfully to your community, know basic first aid, and have some skill in the outdoors. The tangible awards for this are the skills and experience themselves.
Somewhat crassly stated, but Mike's argument is equally false, even if more polite. Basically, Mike's argument was "either you're afraid of failure and you need to suck it up, or you need to quit because you don't belong in scouts."
The goals of BSA are many and varied; boys don't persue arbitrary goals at all.
And Eagle Scout is awarded to recognize those that go above and beyond; the Scout must perform an important service to the community that is important to him. He gets to choose.
This sounds less like a recipe for producing a successful and resourceful man of the world and more like a recipe for a guy who spends his spare time trying to get all the achievements on Grand Theft Auto 4.