I am the parent of a high school varsity wrestler. His mother and I have shown him nothing but support for his chosen athletic activity. He is at school at 6:00 AM some mornings for weight lifting, and he doesn’t get home until after 6:00 PM at night. On Friday nights he wrestles a dual meet, and every Saturday during wrestling season we watch him wrestle in tournaments that can last 10 hours—and on top of all of that, he is on the honor roll. He is one of 15 teenagers (male and female) on the wrestling team. They are some of the hardest-working kids I have ever seen, often the first at school in the morning, and the last ones to leave at night. But my son and his teammates are not the story here—I’m just setting the stage for what my ex-wife and I see and hear from the mouths of other parents during these tournaments. What happens at my son’s school happens all around the country: Kids working hard at a sport that does not bring in revenue, and that no one comes to see except their parents.
Some of you may recall, if you watch ESPN, that the WIAA (Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association) caused a bit of a stir when it sent out a memo to athletic directors reminding them of the code of conduct for spectators of high school athletic events. It read, in part:
"Any action directed at opposing teams or their spectators with the intent to taunt, disrespect, distract or entice an unsporting behavior in response is not acceptable sportsmanship," the December email from WIAA director of communications Todd Clark said.
The email detailed certain phrases it considers unacceptable, including: "You can't do that," "Fun-da-men-tals," "Air ball," "There's a net there," "Sieve," and "We can't hear you" -- as well as "scoreboard" and "Season's over" jeers during tournament play.
A student athlete was suspended for tweeting a bad word about this policy, which has been in place for more than 30 years (I still remember Mr. McPike walking around hockey games enforcing it). This is not a new policy.
But the problem isn’t the students. I don’t think student fans cheering Airball or Season’s over! are where the problem lies. Now, the parents? That is where the problem with taunting lies.
As the parent of a two-sport athlete (football and wrestling) I attend a lot of high school athletic events, and I have been attending youth sports events since my son was in kindergarten. When I coached flag football I had parents screaming at me for losing every game. But the kids were in first grade, and as a coach I was more concerned with them having fun than I was with winning.
I have heard parents threaten officials and opposing coaches. I’ve seen verbal and physical assaults on coaching staff. These are not isolated incidents either. It happens all of the time, and all across the country.
At wrestling tournaments I have had a mother yell to her son, who was wrestling my son at the time, “Rip his fucking head off!” On other occasions I have heard, “Rip his arm off and beat him with it!” This past weekend at the Big 8 Conference Championships held at Janesville Craig High School, a parent sitting behind me who was upset over his son losing shouted out, “He’s a fucking pussy! We’ll beat his ass at Regionals next week!” When I checked, the father had not been down on the mat with his son wrestling. Not two minutes later another father shouted out after his son lost a match, “It ain’t fucking over! It ain’t fucking over! Kick his fucking ass!” I saw more than one father take his son off the side of the gym and scream at him for losing.
As parents we have a responsibility to teach our children right from wrong. They learn by watching us, and how we act in public is how they will act in public as adults. If we scream obscenities at their opponents at sporting events, then they will do the same thing when they become parents. It is one thing to support your child’s endeavors. It is quite another to threaten coaches, scream obscenities at your child’s opponents, and act like an ass in public. I will be supportive of my son regardless of him winning or losing. I will not belittle his opponent, the officials, the coaches, or the team manager.
I sometimes wonder, as I sit listening to the parents in the stands, if it would be better if parents were banned from high school sporting events altogether.