My ParenTime | Article - Kids, Sports, and Parents - an Explosive Triangle? Increase in Parents Involved in Sports Rage

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Increase in Parents Involved in Sports Rage

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Experts say more and more parents are giving in to Little League rage --starting violent, sometimes deadly, battles over their children's sporting events. Fights over Pee Wee sports, have "been around for a long time, since Little League started," says Stanley Teitelbaum, a New York City psychologist who specializes in sports. But he says it's now "reaching epidemic proportions" as parents wrestle with their inner demons by acting like big babies while their children are at play.

Doug Abrams -- a law professor at the University of Missouri-Columbia and a youth hockey coach for more than 30 years -- estimates than in the past decade, the number of parents misbehaving while their children are on the playing fields has risen from 5 percent to 15 percent, as society grows more and more "sports crazy."

"That 15 percent can make life very miserable," says Abrams. Barry Mano -- president and founder of the National Association of Sports Officials in Racine, Wis. -- says there's no question that parental violence at sporting events has reached startling levels last few years, although he thinks the 15 percent figure is a bit high.

The organization -- which represents 19,000 referees in professional, high school and youth sports -- gets about 50 to 100 reports each year of physical assaults against officials. Mano says the number has soared in the past five to eight years. And that doesn't count the verbal assaults and parental temper tantrums.

Earlier this month, a fight between two fathers over a practice hockey match between 10-year-olds in Reading, Mass., ended in the death of one of the men.

One question at Parenting Coalition International, Inc. (PCI) is what steps can parenting professionals take to help parents in this area with anger management? Another is, what partnerships can be formed to address this issue? What is being done?

Copyright © Parenting Coalition International, Inc. Reprinted with permission.

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