Sentence Dad to the ducking stool?

When the guys in the zebra shirts need backup from the guys in the black robes, we’ve got a problem.

There’s a bill before the Minnesota legislature that would slap a $1,000 fine on grownups who raise holy hell at kids’ games by charging the field, pelting players with popcorn, f-bombing officials and otherwise acting like overwrought toddlers long overdue for a serious timeout.

All right, “Kill the ump!” has been part of baseball longer than hotdogs, and back at the turn of the last century a couple of journeyman minor leaguers actually turned their bats on umps intent on sending them back to the dugout, sending the umps, instead, to early graves. Yeah, those legendary British soccer hooligans have nothing on old time-American townball fans  --remember, “fan” is short for “fanatic” – but the bill pending in St. Paul isn’t aimed at drunken ruffians riled up by a call that lost ‘em the bet that cost ‘em Friday’s paycheck. Nah, these are suburban mommies and daddies throwing public tantrums because things weren’t going junior’s way.

Bill sponsor Rosemount Representative John Huot presented a legislative committee with example after example of juvenile antics by erstwhile adults. There was the Detroit Lakes gentleman, 45-year-old Phillip Lokken, who is facing charges of assault and disorderly conduct for charging onto the court during a boys’ basketball game, getting in the ref’s face, then ripping the whistle off the lanyard around his neck before retreating to the stands, whistle in hand, only to be hustled out of the grade school gym shortly thereafter. Then there are the mature adults who engage in intermural fisticuffs on the sidelines when they perceive their youngster’s team colors to have been offended. People old enough to vote and hold public office pursue team buses out of town intent on intimidating teenage players and underpaid coaches, and the same folks who piously protest unseeming language in school library books lay into high school league officials with language that would make Dave Chappelle and Sarah Silverman wince.

Huot figures that maybe, just maybe, slapping these grownups with a grownup-sized fine might get them to act their age rather than their IQ – as my classmates so delicately put it back in sixth grade.

The bill passed out of committee on a unanimous vote – of course what legislator wants to stand up for somebody’s right to hawk a loogie at the linesman at a girls’ tennis match?

Then again, perhaps the better question to ask is, why would anyone feel compelled to hawk a loogie at a linesman at a girls’ tennis match? Seriously, what is wrong with these people?

Even more seriously, what is wrong with us?

Let’s face it, the bird flipping, popcorn pelting, whistle grabbing goombahs are really just the fringe edge of a phenomena that’s been steadily intensifying year after year, decade after decade. Once upon a time kid’s games were just that, games kids played while their parents and the rest of the adult community got on with growing crops, selling shoes, having sex, fighting wars … all those things grownups did after they’d outgrown kid’s games. Back then kids played games after school for fun. As of late the play and the fun surely seem to have gone out of a lot of those afterschool games. Instead of getting together to shoot some hoops or slap the puck around, we have tournaments and trophies, coaches, camps, and college scouts. When parents are expected to drop better than a hundred bucks on a hockey stick and spend weekend after weekend carting their nine-year-old Gretsky-never-will-be from state to state for high pressure league play, should we be entirely surprised when Dad gets bent out of shape when a near-sighted accountant in a striped shirt makes a call that threatens the future of his investment?

A thousand buck fine for being a jerk. The only real question is, is it enough?

Perhaps we should bring back the stocks, pillory, and ducking stool instead.

Or just let the kids go out and play.