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Letter to the editor

Wishing for rules of conduct to be restored

By HUBERT MIZELL
Published November 28, 2004

We can preach spectator control. Our sports venues can be girdled by police, attack dogs, barbed wire and Tasers. Athletes can be threatened with expensive, degrading suspensions. But should we not dig deeper into the dirt, vowing to work with the muddy roots of behavioral sadness?

Sportsmanship can seem as out of fashion as Nehru jackets, even if a muted majority appears to be all for it. Civility is a dying art. Consideration for fellow humans has skidded from courteous, respectful and restrained to enraged, disruptive and disgusting. On ballfields and elsewhere.

Too many jocks lack the class, self-control or judgment to take a pass when confronted with a chance to smack an opponent with a cheap shot. Beer ads promote body-slamming reactions to things classified as sport.

Professional leagues are among the guilty, peddling promos and video technology laced with flammable attitudes that can lead to out-of-control mentalities. Greed is a major motivator.

We're too into a culture of checking our common sense at the front door, then reacting to ballfield plays not with mere cheers, hoots and lively suggestions but with physical eruptions and smelly language that can lead to the absurd.

Hey, you in the back row ...

Okay, if you choose to roll your eyes, turn this page and sneer, well, it's a free country. Free but severely challenged with issues that should be addressed not by dozens but by millions. Hey, my misguided neighbors, if you're not interested please do not let the exit gate hit you in the brain cells on the way out.

Now we can talk ...

What we need is to amass those who understand and/or loathe ethics of the sewer. Seeing a powerful need to restructure values and limits. Making it hugely unacceptable to bellow foul language in public, to have little concern for persons who may not subscribe to acts so rambunctious that they border on thuggery.

Three football seasons ago, I attended my first Army-Navy game. It was a few smoldering weeks after 9/11. In the Jersey Meadowlands, where I peered across the eastern wall of Giants Stadium and saw remains of a terrorized New York skyline. Soon there was a thunderous flyover of Apache attack helicopters.

Pride and comfort struck me.

On the grass were sporting rivals taking an afternoon off from training to deal with real war. But never was I more sure that, amid spirited Saturday ballfield competition, humanity and respect and sportsmanship would not slump from optimum levels.

Discipline, class, judgment ...

More constant in our view are rich, famous jocks - swearing they're "just trying to have fun" - doing junk that can lead to shameful episodes. Showing off is not only widely accepted, it is encouraged. Even in TV promos and advertising.

I am positive that, in their souls, at least 90 percent of coaches would smile if showboating and exhibitionism went on a positive wane. These are actions that unquestionably incite.

Surely a running back stopped after a 3-yard gain, arising to see an overzealous defender doing an unmerited victory mambo, could be prone to think, "Next time, I'd like to squash that idiot like a lovebug on a windshield."

We are desperate for old values. Old definitions of heroes. Allow me to list just a few contemporary pros - Steve McNair, Tim Duncan, Peyton Manning, John Lynch, Marvin Harrison, Ronde and Tiki Barber, Jonathan Ogden, Grant Hill - who play bruising games with heart and head but also wonderful restraint. Men likely to excel but quite unlikely to trigger actions that can turn stomachs.

It's not going to get better until public and administrative outrage leads to deep changes in attitudes and demands. Let the NFL, NBA, NHL and MLB reexamine their moral bounds as well as TV promos and sales pitches for videos that can promote unharnessed mentalities. Network bosses and print-media editors should also check their mirrors, looking for signs of co-conspiracy.

All this is an extension of a 2004 society too loaded with rage and nastiness on roads, at shopping venues, in restaurants and saloons and even in our households. We see sandlot tots being encouraged by adults to taunt and tease, causing too many parents on sidelines to gloat and high-five over Junior's animalistic if elementary attitudes.

How much do we care? How much potential damage do we see? How willing are we to stand up to bullies and exhibitionists and inciters, whether on fields of play or in stands? Do we want to change, to flash back to mind-sets and goals more sporting and less outrageous?

Answer for yourself.

Hubert Mizell can be reached at mizell3@cox.net

[Last modified November 28, 2004, 00:42:21]