It's gonna be a LOVELY shiner...
My son, age 15, got in his very first fight ever today at school. Right after Rugby/football practice. For some bizarre, off the wall reason the football teams and the rugby team practice "together"... or rather on the same set of practice fields.
My son arrived at this school in April. The head coach of the football program took one look at my 6'4" tall, 190 pound, built like a brick outhouse son and decided that my son was GOING to play football. My son took one look at the head coach and informed the coach that he had no intention of playing football because in order to play football you have to wear "pussy pads" and my son prefers rugby (essentially... football played backwards and without the pads).
It's gonna be a LOVELY shiner...
The head football coach is... erm... I'll be POLITE... an abusive asshat.
The coach set several of the football players to harassing my son. Now, I don't raise children who are the least timid.. they tend to be an opinionated and independant crowd. My son's reaction to the harassment was to proceed to ignore the morons harassing him to the best of his ability. I am rather impressed that he lasted 6 months without opening a can of whoop ass on someone. I really AM.
It's gonna be a LOVELY shiner...
He opened that can of whoop ass on someone tonight. The kid who has done MOST of the harassing as a matter of fact. Hubby and I arrived just as the fight was breaking up. So did the parents of the OTHER kid. MY reaction was to raise an eyebrow and ask my son WHAT my "rules for life" are. (They are simple rules... 1. Respect for self and 2. Respect for others. Short, sweet and they cover darn near ANY situation. )
The mother of the OTHER child, precious little darling that he is, proceeded to read me the riot act because my son dared to "beat her innocent son up" and informed me that my son "should be locked up".
It's gonna be a LOVELY shiner...
There was almost another fight. MY reaction was to look at the woman and say "Listen Bitch... YOUR precious 'innocent' son has been harassing MY son for MONTHS... playing Bully Badass... and MY son has a BLACK BELT in Kuntaw so you are FUCKING LUCKY that YOUR precious little peckerhead of a son isn't in a fucking HOSPITAL bed... OR THE MORGUE!"
Tomorrow I will be having chat number FOUR with the head football coach... THIS time I'm insisting that the Athletic Director sit in on our little chat. If I get nowhere I'm going up the damn chain until I reach someone with brains enough to comprehend just how shaky the ground the head coach is standing on is.
My son is NOT the first child this man has had the football team harass... and I'm NOT the mother of the OTHER children who have been harassed. I'm MY son's mother. You can do darn near ANYTHING to me and I'm not gonna do so much as whimper... you mess with one of my babies and your ass is MINE!
It's gonna be a LOVELY shiner...
I wonder how many people I am going to have to choke the life out of tomorrow in order to bring this crap to a screeching halt?
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noillusionsindc
Andy Heizeler
Diary of a Hopeful Starving Student
Placebostudman
nanatehay
gal80
Salon.com
Comments
Be proud the lad knows *how* and *when* to stand up for himself, and that he *didn't* put the idiot kid in hospital.
You know my opinion on it though.
love ya
Webbi.
Congratulations and best wishes to your gentleman son.
Kidding aside. Great piece. What is it with coaches and sports obsessed parents these days? No civility. Sad.
R
Horrified at the football coach.
If I remember correctly, the Riot Act does exist. It was passed by the British Parliament. It gave local authorities the power to declare any group of more than a dozen people an unlawful assemblage.
A law by that same name was passed in the United States. It involved the president and his use of the militia.
Webbi, that he does. Like I told you last night... the phone was ringing off the hook most of the night from other parents whose children have been harassed under the direction of this particular coach. It's GOING to stop...
Thanks sweet.
dicea, I don't think that any of us have "perfect" children but I am rather amazed that it took until the last week of practice for my son to react to the harassment.
John... it's not just coaches and sports obsessed parents... these days the grandparents are getting into the act and putting still more pressure on the kids. It's ridiculous when you consider that sports are SUPPOSED to teach kids teamwork and sportsmanship.
vzn... Tell me... How many (the precise number please) high school principals do YOU know who are still AT the school at SEVEN at night? I have attempted, on THREE separate occasions since JULY when practice started to discuss the harassment with the coach involved and with the principal... on ALL THREE occasions the harassment against my son has escalated. My son did NOT swing first. He has a black eye, and a cut under his nose, BECAUSE the other kid did. How precisely is DEFENDING HIMSELF *not* respecting himself? There's FORTY witnesses who tell me that my son was ignoring the kid at the time when the kid decided to try using my son's face for a punching bag so I'm pretty sure that my son didn't "provoke" the other kid into hitting him. I'm VERY proud that my son *didn't* put the kid in question in the hospital.
Understand that the other kid involved (a)is legally an adult and (b) has done any number of things which are illegal. We aren't talking about simple "boys will be boys" BS here... and it's GOING to stop even if making it stop results in both the coach and the kid going to prison.
madecelt... He's SUPPOSED to but the asshattery has been going for months. Remember the days when sports were for FUN?
I don't know where the guy is from... but he's got a serious testosterone overload going. What is almost amusing to me is that the Varsity football team has a 1 and 6 record... and the Rugby team has a 7 and 0 record. Kind of amuses me.
Schools will do anything for a winning sports team. The high school my daughter attended hired a sex offender with a felony who is now in prison for raping another underage girl. The superintendent knew about the charges against this man at Vanderbilt and hired him anyway. High school sports is insane.
And adults that promote this are like people that entice children to smoke. In my humble opinion.
I can't blame any teenager for WANTING to play football, but I certainly blame every adult for promoting a sport that is unreasonably dangerous.
Rugby, who the hell knows. But at least people play it for their own reasons and their own enjoyment and not the madness of crowds. More like a couple of dogs going at it on their own and settling it like dogs, rather than in a ring with betting and spectators with blood lust.