Saturday, July 15, 2000
Violence 101
Dads' rink brawl not surprising
I happened to be vacationing in New England last week close enough to Reading, Mass., to feel the shock waves after one father was charged with beating another to death after their children's pickup hockey game.
People were appalled that it could happen there, that six children's lives could be so easily devastated by adults' seeming inability to control their tempers. There, as here, the focus was on children's sports, with fears that parents were ruining a healthy outlet for their kids.
That is lamentable. But it is hardly the worst effect to come from the ugly behavior cropping up among parents. And it is hardly confined to ice rinks and soccer fields.
On a number of occasions I have sat waiting for an interview outside a principal's office only to watch an irate parent burst forth, spouting threats. Teachers and administrators are well-used to being threatened, but in the past it has been with calls to attorneys and promised lawsuits. Now it is with physical violence. And it happens at the nicest of schools.
Few communication skills
Custody battles, family fights and neighborhood grudges also spill over into schools. Teachers, once taught how to break up a fight between students, now are trained what to do if Mom and Dad slug it out outside their classroom.
One of the lessons demonstrated horribly well at the Massachusetts hockey rink but largely overlooked is how pitifully few communication and mediation skills parents have, and how quickly they resort to fists. It is no surprise that we see a rise in student violence. What children see at home is what they do at school. Schools teach conflict resolution skills to children, but who is teaching peace to parents?
There is also a growing tendency for parents to jump in to defend, promote, and, frankly, exploit their children. Hockey games are no longer just hockey games, and cheerleading tryouts are no longer just cheerleading tryouts. Who is chosen valedictorian or overlooked for it, or who becomes homecoming queen can be the stuff of parental fury.
Living through their child
As workplace standards are ratcheted up and adult achievement is harder to come by, parents have taken to living through their child. As one wise school administrator told me, in many communities parents now “make the family name” through the child. Parents' social standing and circles of friendship are often built upon the success of their child. It leads to all sorts of nasty behavior, from paralyzing pressure on the child to perform well, to hotly competitive atmospheres in the classroom, and finally to violent clashes between parents.
But just as violent acts seem the result of some new twist in modern thinking, they are also the result of some very old attitudes. Physical outbursts and a violent end to disagreements have been the American style for generations, especially for males. Ironically, fighting on the hockey rink will often get professional athletes camera time, which may be why some people have trouble understanding that off the rink it will get them jail time. “Taking things outside” has long been a manly way to settle things. And many parents believe a sound beating builds a child's character.
New Englanders were shocked that one father would allegedly beat another to death. Sickened that it should happen over a children's hockey game. But the saddest aspect is that close observers of American families weren't surprised at all.
Write Krista at 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202, or at Krista_ramsey@hotmail.com.
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