Episode 53: America, where everything ends in a tie

Every now and then I lift my self-imposed ban on following current events and decide to put stock in something that I normally wouldn't care about in my post- reporter life. This typically leads to an overly opinionated rant with undertones of anger and disappointment in society. Well, it has happened again following my interest in the Olympic hockey tournament.

My issue today has to do with the overall softening of America's youth, or as my Dad used to call it the "Pussification of America.' Two separate incidents occurred over the past week or so that have got me thinking about this, and both of them have me pretty fired up.

The first incident sent me in to a spiral of blind rage late last week, maybe Wednesday or Thursday, when I was attempting to go with Av to the Post Office to buy a book of stamps. Sounds simple enough. Unfortunately, I made the mistake of leaving the house at or around 2 p.m., which happens to be around the same time that most kids get out of school. Traffic in Salem is bad pretty much all of the time any way, a product of over population and an ancient, crumbling infrastructure that includes narrow, one-way streets, but at school dismissal time you might as well have a bike with a side cart because you aren't getting anywhere quickly. I am used to the gridlock in our neighborhood, which is in very close proximity to both an elementary school and college, so when I got stuck behind a school bus just a block away from my house, I began looking for alternate routes. I had a plan to shoot down a side street and as the bus closed its doors and the kids crossed the street I began to accelerate. Only to be forced in to stopping again AT THE NEXT HOUSE. Once that child was dropped off the bus closed its doors again, moved up five feet and stopped again. Yes, that is three different kids, three different houses, three different bus stops, all right next to each other. You have got to be kidding me.

It has been a solid ten years since I have boarded a school bus, but I can remember just about ever bus stop I have ever had and I am pretty sure the only time I ever got picked up in front of my house was when I was in second grade, and everyone else from the street was in front of my house, too. Most of my memories of bus stops involved walking and waiting with half a dozen kids at the end of the street. I can even recall a time where the stop was so far away I would whine to my Mom for rides on rainy days. The rides home were even worse. When I was in middle school we had fewer buses in the afternoon and I can remember pretty much everyone from the neighborhood being dropped off at the same stop and walking home. Apparently not any more. Are we so afraid of keeping our children safe that we have to just pick everyone up at their homes? Kids can't walk any more? I am willing to bet that this has a lot less to do with the school or the city than it does with overbearing parents, which brings me to my next incident.

Before I get in to it, I have to say that in the two-plus years I spent as an education reporter I quickly learned that the biggest challenge that schools and teachers face is not students, it is not the federal government or regulations or violence or bullying. It is parents. Hands down, dealing with parents is absolute hell. Nearly ever week my voicemail would be flooded with parents worried about this or that. "MY son isn't getting this." "This teacher said this." "The schools are old." "We have to walk two blocks to get the bus." The School Committee meetings were even worse. Even as budget cuts loomed (made possible by the yuppie governor that everyone elected to mismanage the state's funding), parents would flood the meetings insisting that nothing their child was involved in be cut, even as administrators tried honestly to shave the programs with the least amount of interest in an attempt to be fair. Obviously, these actions don't apply to every parent, but now days, especially in the yuppie-infested North Shore of Boston, everyone thinks their kid is privileged. The kid can do no wrong. It is society, the schools, the teachers, pop-culture that is messing our kids up. It can't be the overbearing parents who spoil them, leave them with nannies or refuse to admit that their child has made a mistake.

Case and point. I was driving home from work Sunday afternoon just a few minutes after Canada had beaten the US in the Olympic hockey gold medal game. I had been listening to the game on the radio and the local sports radio station was taking calls following the game. The topic was 'has the exciting Olympic tournament done enough to restore America's interest in hockey.' An interesting subject and one the sports writer in me was intrigued by. Then a woman called in and made a point that infuriated me a thousand times more than that school bus ever could. She said something approximate to the following.

"I am the parent of a 3-year-old boy, and our family is really in to sports. We have been watching hockey with him and trying to teach him about the game. But then I see the guys out there and they are always fighting, and I think it ruins the game. It is too physical, how am I supposed to teach my son not to imitate that?'

Without debating the issue of fighting in hockey (which, by the way wouldd be like eliminating tackling from football or crashes from NASCAR- it is half the reason real fans watch) here is my problem with what this woman said. First, your son is 3-years-old. If you are relying on professional athletes to instill values in your son at 3 he is going to have a very long, disappointing and troubled life. Second, this is yet another reason why America's youth are fat, weak and soft. Sure, teach your son that hockey is too violent because they fight instead of teaching him how the game works and explaining WHY the PROFESSIONALS fight. Why don't you sit his fat ass in front of a computer and show him Flash videos of butterflies instead. Maybe hand him a paint brush and teach him how to draw water color ferries.

Sports, by nature, are violent. Especially professional sports. They involve highly competitive people doing things that are very physical at very high stakes. I say professional sports because youth sports are decidedly not violent. There is no fighting allowed in youth hockey, in fact, many leagues don't even allow checking. Other sports, like baseball, football and basketball carry heavy, heavy penalties for kids who get in to fights. This is fine. I agree with these rules. What I do not agree with are parents, probably much like this woman, who think that sports should no longer be competitive. People who think that every kid should play the same amount of time in a game regardless of ability (as a side note, this rule is fine if you are dealing with kids under 8 or so because, c'mon, who really knows who is good and who isn't at that age), or even worse, people who argue that there should no score to games and the kids should just 'play for fun.' Sports are about winning. If you want to play a sport where there is no score and no one cares who wins try something like bike riding or mountain climbing. There you go.

For the record, I hated nothing more than when my high school basketball coach would go crazy and make us run till we puked and yelled at us up and down the court because we were not winning or not playing well, and I don't agree in any way with those overbearing sports parents who make their kids eat, sleep and live the sport. I do not think this is an effective method of motivation for either, and if a kid isn't having fun, he or she should have the option to do something else. That said, when I played basketball I did not at any point wish that we just didn't keep score, and I did care, a lot, when we lost.

The overall problem is that people in this country have skewed the lines between equality and reality. Yes, everyone should be treated as an equal and have the same opportunities. I agree. But sports are much like the business world in a way. I am willing to bet a lot of these yuppie parents who think their kid should play the whole baseball game even though he isn't that good would be pretty pissed if I walked in to their company and started doing their job for the same amount of money. For that lady who doesn't like violence in hockey, no one is saying that you have to watch it. If your son likes the sport it is your responsibility to teach him the reasons why you think fighting is wrong, and maybe help him understand why it takes place.

As for the kids on the bus. If you teach your kids the basics (don't talk to strangers, look both ways, come right home) they should have no problem walking a block or two to get home. That is, of course, assuming that you didn't leave them with a nanny for their entire lives and show up on Christmas and the weekends to give them whatever they wanted like puppies and iPods. Child neglect is two fold. Yes, there are the drug addict parents or the parents who just ignore their kids all day, but the rich, yuppie parents are just as bad. These are the kids that are growing up to run this country and I'm not having it. All I can see is a future where everyone is fat, relying on cell phones to tell them everything they need to know while they carefully navigate what they think is going to be a perfectly safe, fair world.

I guess the point I am trying to make is that life is hard. It is the farthest thing from fair, just or safe, and the sooner kids realize that the sooner they will begin to learn how to survive it. That is your uplifting message for the day.