by Gina Ronat

Created on: May 27, 2008   Last Updated: October 31, 2008

Youth sports, such as Little League, which are supposed to be about the kids having a good time playing a game, and hopefully gaining good sportsmanship and socialization skills, are not about the children anymore. Furthermore, the rights of our children are being trampled by both parents and league officials. What rights, you may ask? How about the right to play as children? They are not miniature adults to be ordered around. How about the right to feel secure in a safe and healthy situation? An 8-year-old should never have to fear being punished or bullied by an adult simply because he dropped a ball in the field and allowed the other team to score a run.

While it is good to urge your child to do her best, many parents put entirely too much pressure on their children to win at all costs, and as a result it is no longer a fun game. In an article on his website (http://www.mindbodyandsports.com/), Dr. Ronald Kamm, sports psychiatrist and family therapist in Oakhurst, NJ states, "It's gotten out of control. Instead of being enjoyable, for many children it has become an anxiety-filled experience." As if childhood is not anxiety-ridden enough, parents are now insinuating it into the child's fun and games.

Of course, not all parents over-pressure their child to win. That's good, but there are other situations that can make a child feel anxious or fearful. For example, when did it become okay for an over-protective mom to rush out on the field when she disagrees with an umpire's call and screams at him in his face? At what point is it acceptable for a narrow-minded dad to beat up a coach because the coach took his homerun-hitting son out of the game to allow another, less talented boy or girl to play, thus jeopardizing the chances of a team victory in this dad's tiny little mind?

I've read articles from news sites over the last few years, where parents were actually arrested and charged with assault. For example, a New Jersey father was arrested for punching out an umpire over a call in a little league game. In Kentucky, a father walked out onto the field during a game for 5- and 6-year-old children and started a fight with an official, and when the argument came to blows, an innocent little girl playing in the game also got hit in the face. When things like this happen, how is it about the children? And what are the children learning from adults when they behave like bullies?

Lest we forget, it's not always the parents that are at fault. What about the overly aggressive coach who is so desperate to coach a winning Little League team that he will do anything to get there? He pushes a 6-year-old child so hard to excel on the field that the child begins to dread the actual game because he knows the coach is going to browbeat him in front of all his friends when he can't run fast enough on his little legs to make it from second base to the home plate safely? What child doesn't get enough bullying from the big kid at the end of the block that he needs additional intimidation tactics from an adult who is supposed to be his mentor?

It's sad enough that these aggressive and violent actions occur at all. What is sadder still is the alarming rate at which they are happening in all youth sports, not just Little League. It's clearly not about children having fun anymore. Anyone who is so deluded as to think Little League is still all about the children probably needs to see a doctor.

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