January 18, 2016 at 1:57 p.m.
Shoutouts & Callouts
My view on sportsmanship: Get loud, be proud, but don't be a jerk
Shoutouts & Callouts
That's the final conclusion I've come to in light of the controversy conjured up by an email the WIAA sent to schools in late December regarding sportsmanship at sporting events (see sidebar) and one student's inappropriate Twitter response to the memo.
In case you missed the uproar, here's the Reader's Digest version. The WIAA reminded member schools about the organization's sportsmanship guidelines and listed several examples of chants that could be deemed inappropriate or offensive. April Gehl, a girls' basketball player for Hilbert High School, crafted an expletive-laced tweet which mentioned the WIAA in response to the email. The WIAA became aware of the tweet and alerted Hilbert about its contents. Hilbert's administration then decided to suspend Gehl for five games for what it deemed to be a violation of its athletic code.
ESPN, Sports Illustrated and others caught wind of the story and twisted it into the following narrative: WIAA censors fans and student-athletes.
Because, you know, no teenager has ever gotten bent out of shape when he or she feels he or she is being told by an authority figure what he or she can or cannot say or do.
Once the story made national waves, the WIAA backtracked, saying the initial email was merely a reminder of policies already in place, not a crackdown on over-exuberant fans.
"The intention of the message was misconstrued and morphed into something far beyond what it was and what it was intended for," WIAA executive director Dave Anderson told The Associated Press last week.
To me, the real nut of the WIAA's email came in the following line crafted by its communications director, Todd Clark:
"An enthusiastic and boisterous display of support for a school's team is welcomed and encouraged at interscholastic events when directed in a positive manner."
In other words sports fans: Get loud, make some noise and support your teams, just don't be a jerk about it.
If Clark had stopped there, I'm probably not writing about this today. Where he got in trouble, and the national media has had a field day, was with the list of potentially offensive chants included at the end of the document.
Having attended thousands of prep sporting events - first as a student, then an event worker and now a member of the press - the list Clark provided is pretty mundane. You can expect to hear those chants at any sporting event on any night in Wisconsin or any other state - and it's not a new phenomenon.
Banter between opposing student sections can help to set the ambience of great high school sporting events. It doesn't matter how great the game is, if spectators are sitting on their hands (or, worse yet, don't even show up), it lacks something without that emotional element. The "What's a Hodag?" chant - as annoying as it can be for Rhinelander fans to hear from every opposing student section - is well within the bounds of decency, in my opinion.
I have seen cases, however, where fans have crossed the line. Generally speaking, that occurs when fans single out a specific player or the officials with personal catcalls. "Jersey, name and appearance," were the three taboo subjects when I spoke with Rhinelander AD Brian Paulson about the topic last week. Those chants typically focus on a specific player and extend well beyond the bounds of the game in question.
I see both sides of the coin on this one. On the one hand we, as a society, need to grow a thicker skin. Sometimes, we just need to brush off the naysayers and go about our business instead of immediately becoming ghastly offended.
"Season's over!" Yeah, guess what? It is and, unless you are the state champ, odds are it ended in a loss. That doesn't mean the season was an automatic failure or that it didn't hold valuable successes and lessons for life - which, by the way, is supposed to be the all-encompassing goal of student athletics, right?
"You can't do that!" No, you can't. Shake it off and do better the next play.
On the other side of the coin, buying a ticket does not automatically make fans honorary coaches, referees or sports commentators. There should be a certain amount of decorum fans display when it comes to their treatment of players, coaches and officials. The big difference between youth games and the pros is that there are far more people at a pro game and no one can hear, or really cares about, someone's overly fanatical yelling and screaming.
It all comes down to what I said above. Have fun, get loud, be proud, but don't be a jerk. If we could all do that, the WIAA would not have needed to send its memo and I wouldn't have had to all of this perfectly good bandwidth telling you what we should already know.
Jeremy Mayo may be reached at [email protected].
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