Letter to the editor

Dear Editor:

In the past several weeks our son has given up his Sunday afternoons to help referee basketball games for 5th and 6th grade area youth. During the weekend of February 19th and 20th he and other members of the Postville girls and boys basketball teams gave up their weekend to assist at a tournament sponsored by the Postville Booster Club. These young people volunteered their time. They received no compensation but did receive plenty of abuse.

The coaches and fans are both guilty of abusing these young people. They certainly did not call every violation. I’m afraid that if they did, the games would still be going on today. Knowing all of these young people, I believe they did the best they could and as fair as they could.

Sadly, adults see these games as more than games for the children to learn and have opportunity to play. It was win at all costs and winning was more important than anything else. From grandmothers to coaches they yelled and told these young people how poorly they were doing and why did they not make a call for their team. One coach yelled at my son while he was keeping statistics. Another coach should be proud that he caused one young lady to leave in tears because of his verbal abuse.

What are we teaching our kids? Are we teaching intimidation to get your own way? Are we teaching sportsmanship includes yelling from the stands about how bad the officials are? Are we teaching only winning counts and if you lose, it is the officials fault?

If as adults we must live through our children we are making a big mistake. Instead of yelling and complaining about the high school students giving of their time, why not encourage those who are playing and teach them the game? It would be better to celebrate the opportunity to play the game and learn than to complain that the other team won because the referee did not know what he/she was doing.

Eventually these high school students will have had enough and then there will be no one to take their place because in my experience those that complain the loudest are the last to give up their time to do the job.

Let’s teach the kids how to play and enjoy the game and not this terrible attitude that sours so many into not helping any longer.

Rev. Gary R. Catterson

Postville, Iowa