I am a high school soccer referee. I am also a kids' soccer coach. Both put in close proximity with American kids on a regular basis.
95% of the kids I see are fine. They play by the rules, they are respectful, and they don't cause any problems. However, I've run across two problem kids in the last two weeks.
Well, I shouldn't actually say problem kids. It's really not their fault. The problems lie with the parents.
Example one- I was refereeing a high school match that was rather boring. One team was beating the other team rather handily, and the winning team was quite mouthy. Every time a blade of grass landed on one of them too heavily they complained about a foul. "Ref, didn't you see that?" "Ref, aren't you going to call that?" Well, obviously, my reffing wasn't affecting them THAT much, seeing as how the other team rarely got the ball past the half line and they maintained possession of the ball 90% of the time. They just needed something to cry about, I guess.
Well, I won't go into details, but let's just say that one of the players, after scoring goal #4, looked at me and mouthed off something that was quite disrespectful. I gave him a yellow card, which was just a warning. I figured that would be enough- I mean, for crying out loud, they were up 4-0 with six minutes left in the game. What do you need to be mouthy about?
When I showed him the card, he looked at me in a condescending manner and said, "I guess you're really proud of that one, aren't you ref?" and as he ran by me, patted me on my shoulder. Rule one, sonny- don't touch me. That's an automatic ejection from ANY sport. Don't touch the ref. If that wasn't enough, your mouth just earned you an ejection and a one-game suspension. Out came the red card. He was gone.
After the match, the coach came over and tried to blame me for his player's actions. He explained to me that I couldn't expect a 17-year-old to maintain his composure in a hotly contested district match, and that my attitude was responsible for his ejection. Now, I'm trying to think of what would had happened if I, as a 17-year-old, would have said what that player said to any adult, let alone a ref. My dad would have run down on the field, dragged me off the field by my ear, made me apologize, and grounded me for a week. My coach would have made me apologize and probably made me do pushups and run laps, and probably would have suspended me for another game.
I told the coach that the ejection stood and he needed to teach his players to shut up, especially when given a yellow card. I told him to quit rationalizing his player's behavior or he would never learn his lesson. The next day, I get a call from our referee assigner, saying that the player's little mommy had called him, demanding to know my name, phone number, and why I was allowed to ref. Apparently the player had gone home and told his mommy that big bad mean ref was cussing out the players, and all he did was stick up for himself. Of course, mommy believed her perfect little boy and caused a huge stink. When I explained to him what had actually happened, he muttered in disgust and said not to worry about anything else.
Example two- without divulging too much information, one of the players I coach exhibited terrible sportsmanship a little while ago after a win. During the handshake, instead of saying, "Good game" like he was supposed to, he said, "Thanks for losing, thanks for losing" to all the players, rubbing salt into their wounds. When I confronted him on it, he promised me he hadn't said it, even going to far as to say "I swear to . . . " that he didn't do it. When an adult on the other team pointed him out, I confronted him again, and at that point, he confessed to saying it.
Okay, so bad sportsmanship AND lying to my face. Not a good combo. I told him, "Come on, let's go apologize to the other team." So he followed me over and apologized. Good boy. I was just about to ask him if he had anything to say to me for lying to me, when his mom got in my face and told me in no uncertain terms that I was never to "single her boy" out like that again. I was quite taken aback. Single him out? He had not only insulted the entire other team, exhibiting poor sportsmanship and, quite frankly, being a jerk, but also lied baldfaced to me!
I asked her, "So what I did was wrong. Making a kid apologize to people he's offended is the wrong thing?" She muttered in disgust, turned around, and walked away.
Face to face with American parenting, 2014. There is a very toxic strain of American parenting that says, "My kid would never do anything wrong, and if you have the gall to call it, YOU'RE the bad guy." I have a new sympathy for teachers and educators who deal with this kind of lunacy everyday.
If this is you, as a parent, shame on you. You are crippling your children. You are raising them up to be sociopaths- people who have no conscience, who blame others for everything, who will always see themselves as the victims, who will never respect anyone or anything (including themselves) and who will have no character. You are raising your child up to think he can do no wrong.
What are you going to do, toxic parent, when your child gets fired from his first job? Call the CEO and complain? Sue the company? Swoop in and save your child from his own actions? Probably. You've been doing that all his life- why would you stop now? How will your child ever succeed if he never learns the hard lessons in life? Hard lessons such as- being disrespectful closes every door to opportunity your child might have; mouthing off to adults gets you labelled a "bad kid" and no one gives you the time of day; lying makes people dislike you and not trust you; being a bad sport makes you a very lonely person because no one wants to be around you; and those that can't control their mouths develop the reputation as being a jerk.
Like I said earlier, 95% of the kids I work with are fantastic. Honestly, these two kids would probably be good kids if they had better parents. However, their parents have set them up to fail, and fail hard. A 17-year-old who is old enough to drive, who will be voting next year for our nation's leaders, and who is about to go to college who thinks he can speak to adults in disrespectful tones is going to fail in life. He won't be able to hold a job if he talks to his boss that way. He won't be able to stay married if he talks to his spouse that way. He has learned, by his parents' actions, that speaking that way is okay. They've totally destroyed his future.
Likewise, a younger child who is capable of looking into a grown man's face without hesitation and lying, even invoking the name of God to cover his lie, isn't going to get very far in life. Not only have the parents not taught them the right way, they actively criticize and go after the one who called them on it! Those kids learned two things- it wasn't their fault, and they were victims. Nothing they did was wrong- it was the big bad adult who was trying to "single them out" and make them feel bad.
I hope that these two incidents are isolated, but I'm afraid they aren't. I'm hearing of this more and more- parents who go on the offensive against anyone who dares call our their kid on what everyone else agrees is inappropriate and/or wrong. Kids never develop character; society de-evolves as a larger number of kids become adults who were coddled, told they were perfect, never disciplined, and never corrected.
My condolences to all adults who work with kids- I'll bet you have stories similar to this where you have encountered the "American Parent, version 2014." My prayers are with educators, coaches, youth and children's ministers, and all others whose only reason for staying in the game is that their love for kids is greater than their disgust at APV 2014. If you are an APV 2014, change now. You are destroying your children as well as annoying all the rest of us. Stop it now, and begin building character in your kids. Believe me, they will thank you later.
95% of the kids I see are fine. They play by the rules, they are respectful, and they don't cause any problems. However, I've run across two problem kids in the last two weeks.
Well, I shouldn't actually say problem kids. It's really not their fault. The problems lie with the parents.
Example one- I was refereeing a high school match that was rather boring. One team was beating the other team rather handily, and the winning team was quite mouthy. Every time a blade of grass landed on one of them too heavily they complained about a foul. "Ref, didn't you see that?" "Ref, aren't you going to call that?" Well, obviously, my reffing wasn't affecting them THAT much, seeing as how the other team rarely got the ball past the half line and they maintained possession of the ball 90% of the time. They just needed something to cry about, I guess.
Well, I won't go into details, but let's just say that one of the players, after scoring goal #4, looked at me and mouthed off something that was quite disrespectful. I gave him a yellow card, which was just a warning. I figured that would be enough- I mean, for crying out loud, they were up 4-0 with six minutes left in the game. What do you need to be mouthy about?
When I showed him the card, he looked at me in a condescending manner and said, "I guess you're really proud of that one, aren't you ref?" and as he ran by me, patted me on my shoulder. Rule one, sonny- don't touch me. That's an automatic ejection from ANY sport. Don't touch the ref. If that wasn't enough, your mouth just earned you an ejection and a one-game suspension. Out came the red card. He was gone.
After the match, the coach came over and tried to blame me for his player's actions. He explained to me that I couldn't expect a 17-year-old to maintain his composure in a hotly contested district match, and that my attitude was responsible for his ejection. Now, I'm trying to think of what would had happened if I, as a 17-year-old, would have said what that player said to any adult, let alone a ref. My dad would have run down on the field, dragged me off the field by my ear, made me apologize, and grounded me for a week. My coach would have made me apologize and probably made me do pushups and run laps, and probably would have suspended me for another game.
I told the coach that the ejection stood and he needed to teach his players to shut up, especially when given a yellow card. I told him to quit rationalizing his player's behavior or he would never learn his lesson. The next day, I get a call from our referee assigner, saying that the player's little mommy had called him, demanding to know my name, phone number, and why I was allowed to ref. Apparently the player had gone home and told his mommy that big bad mean ref was cussing out the players, and all he did was stick up for himself. Of course, mommy believed her perfect little boy and caused a huge stink. When I explained to him what had actually happened, he muttered in disgust and said not to worry about anything else.
Example two- without divulging too much information, one of the players I coach exhibited terrible sportsmanship a little while ago after a win. During the handshake, instead of saying, "Good game" like he was supposed to, he said, "Thanks for losing, thanks for losing" to all the players, rubbing salt into their wounds. When I confronted him on it, he promised me he hadn't said it, even going to far as to say "I swear to . . . " that he didn't do it. When an adult on the other team pointed him out, I confronted him again, and at that point, he confessed to saying it.
Okay, so bad sportsmanship AND lying to my face. Not a good combo. I told him, "Come on, let's go apologize to the other team." So he followed me over and apologized. Good boy. I was just about to ask him if he had anything to say to me for lying to me, when his mom got in my face and told me in no uncertain terms that I was never to "single her boy" out like that again. I was quite taken aback. Single him out? He had not only insulted the entire other team, exhibiting poor sportsmanship and, quite frankly, being a jerk, but also lied baldfaced to me!
I asked her, "So what I did was wrong. Making a kid apologize to people he's offended is the wrong thing?" She muttered in disgust, turned around, and walked away.
Face to face with American parenting, 2014. There is a very toxic strain of American parenting that says, "My kid would never do anything wrong, and if you have the gall to call it, YOU'RE the bad guy." I have a new sympathy for teachers and educators who deal with this kind of lunacy everyday.
If this is you, as a parent, shame on you. You are crippling your children. You are raising them up to be sociopaths- people who have no conscience, who blame others for everything, who will always see themselves as the victims, who will never respect anyone or anything (including themselves) and who will have no character. You are raising your child up to think he can do no wrong.
What are you going to do, toxic parent, when your child gets fired from his first job? Call the CEO and complain? Sue the company? Swoop in and save your child from his own actions? Probably. You've been doing that all his life- why would you stop now? How will your child ever succeed if he never learns the hard lessons in life? Hard lessons such as- being disrespectful closes every door to opportunity your child might have; mouthing off to adults gets you labelled a "bad kid" and no one gives you the time of day; lying makes people dislike you and not trust you; being a bad sport makes you a very lonely person because no one wants to be around you; and those that can't control their mouths develop the reputation as being a jerk.
Like I said earlier, 95% of the kids I work with are fantastic. Honestly, these two kids would probably be good kids if they had better parents. However, their parents have set them up to fail, and fail hard. A 17-year-old who is old enough to drive, who will be voting next year for our nation's leaders, and who is about to go to college who thinks he can speak to adults in disrespectful tones is going to fail in life. He won't be able to hold a job if he talks to his boss that way. He won't be able to stay married if he talks to his spouse that way. He has learned, by his parents' actions, that speaking that way is okay. They've totally destroyed his future.
Likewise, a younger child who is capable of looking into a grown man's face without hesitation and lying, even invoking the name of God to cover his lie, isn't going to get very far in life. Not only have the parents not taught them the right way, they actively criticize and go after the one who called them on it! Those kids learned two things- it wasn't their fault, and they were victims. Nothing they did was wrong- it was the big bad adult who was trying to "single them out" and make them feel bad.
I hope that these two incidents are isolated, but I'm afraid they aren't. I'm hearing of this more and more- parents who go on the offensive against anyone who dares call our their kid on what everyone else agrees is inappropriate and/or wrong. Kids never develop character; society de-evolves as a larger number of kids become adults who were coddled, told they were perfect, never disciplined, and never corrected.
My condolences to all adults who work with kids- I'll bet you have stories similar to this where you have encountered the "American Parent, version 2014." My prayers are with educators, coaches, youth and children's ministers, and all others whose only reason for staying in the game is that their love for kids is greater than their disgust at APV 2014. If you are an APV 2014, change now. You are destroying your children as well as annoying all the rest of us. Stop it now, and begin building character in your kids. Believe me, they will thank you later.
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