by Roy Exum
posted November 8, 2009
As I read a letter from a well-meaning lady about a couple of nude statues that have just been placed somewhere downtown as part of the public-art effort, my thoughts were drawn to what I have seen this week and how it too might affect a child. You see, sometimes I can hardly believe my eyes.
As the week began, there was a chilling story about a convicted sex offender in Cleveland, Ohio, that stayed in the news because more and more bodies kept being discovered in his house. Right now he's being denied bail because of five murder charges, but by Thursday the body count had risen to 11 and police were struggling to find out who they were.
Then there popped up a YouTube video of Florida linebacker Brandon Spikes trying to gouge the eyes of a Georgia running back in last Saturday's game. They showed it on TV a lot, especially when things escalated to the point the Southeastern Conference had to finally fine Florida coach Urban Meyer $30,000 to get him to quit publicly complaining about the officials.
Then the entire nation was virtually shocked when an Army psychiatrist opened fire at Fort Hood, killing 13 people and wounding 38 others in a Texas-sized massacre that made us realize we hardly need to send our troops overseas to get killed. The deranged gunman obviously has mental problems, but, in figures collected since just 2003, we were reminded that so do 34,000 veterans with post-traumatic syndrome.
The television people interrupted one report of the Fort Hood melee to tell us the top player for the Ooltewah High School football team had just been tossed off the team for apparently slugging a teammate at practice. The kid, headed for the University of Tennessee on scholarship, was not with the team when Ooltewah promptly lost in the first round of the high school playoffs Friday night.
Hardly was the Fort Hood tragedy taken off the air before the camera lights went on in Orlando, where an unemployed man known for his "vacant stare" shot six people, killing one, before he was led away in handcuffs. He'd been fired two years before and, when he was led to the police cruiser, you could hear him yell, "They left me to rot!"
But - once again - that news clip also lasted only briefly because a University of New Mexico soccer player, Elizabeth Lambert, became an Internet sensation when she committed one heinous act of violence after another in a women's soccer game against Brigham Young. Soccer is a game kids everywhere play and Lambert's highlight clip was shown repeatedly by ESPN and every national network on Friday.
What was especially maddening is that this was a girls' game, that none of her teammates urged her to calm down, and that it went on for 77 minutes before the first penalty card was issued. Soccer isn't about brawling, but the semifinals game in the WAC was exactly that.
Are you beginning to see what I saw this week, just in the span of a few days? So no wonder it's hard for me to get all jazzed up on some artist's depiction of public art when the "real stuff" leaves little doubt in my mind why "school resource officers" are the norm at our schools.
I got an email this week that compared how far we have fallen by pointing out that it hasn't been that long ago since we'd go to high school after dove hunting the day before and the principal would look at the shotgun in the back seat with admiration. If you take a gun to school today, not only are you arrested, you'll be investigated as a terrorist.
I'm a firm believer in the "GIGO" theory - garbage in, garbage out. What young people see is what young people do. But after one dizzying display of anger after another - it is literally something new every day - there is no way you are going to shield kids from seeing the senseless violence that is actually applauded in some sectors.
This week Hines Ward, the former University of Georgia player who has become such a star for the Pittsburgh Steelers, was voted as "The Dirtiest Player in Pro Football" by the other players in the league. Hinds didn't dispute it at all, saying instead football is a hard game played by hard men. During one play last year against Cincinnati's Keith Rivers, Hines broke the linebacker's jaw with a particularly unsportsmanlike block, and he has repeatedly paid fines to the NFL for vicious hits.
"When I go across the middle," Ward explained, "those guys aren't going to tackle me softly and lay me down to the ground. That's not football. I find it ironic that now you see a receiver delivering blows, and it's an issue. But I haven't changed. I've been doing it this way for 11 years."
What will happen this week? What will the nation's children see? Whatever it is you can be certain of one thing -- nude statues don't draw their attention like they once did. Things have changed. Now they just want to hit somebody.
royexum@aol.com
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