Posted on 11/14/2008 7:08:39 PM PST by ebbscomic
Incredibly scary, Soviet-style stuff going on in the People's Republic Of California. Below is the text of the decree from a youth soccer league, stating that parents are not permited to cheer for THEIR OWN KIDS, or they will be THROWN OUT. Below that is an excellent freelance article penned by one of the parents. PLEASE EMAIL THIS ROGUE SOCIALIST LEAGUE AT reg46rc@ca.rr.com and let them know what you think. FLOOD THEM. -----------------------
Region 46 will be holding a Sunday edition of Silent Saturday on November 16th, 2008, during the make up games. The AYSO Board requests that there be no comments from the sidelines audible to players or the referee during games.
We are sponsoring this program to allow our players to better develop their game skills by communicating with each other without interference from coaches, parents or other spectators and to learn to make their own decisions in games.
* * * * *
Players: Have fun and enjoy the opportunity to communicate with your teammates. Play fairly and show your best sportsmanship. While on the field talk to your teammates in a positive supporting manner and while on the sideline as a substitute please follow the same rules as your coaches and parents and only clap for your teammates. After the game, let your coach and parents know how you felt about playing on Silent Saturday, or send email to reg46rc@ca.rr.com.
Coaches: You may not provide any direction, verbal or non-verbal, to players who are on the field. You may speak quietly to any players who are on the bench. You may address the players before the game, at halftime, and during water breaks. Remember as the coach you are responsible for the behavior of your sideline. Please help make sure everyone follows the rules for this day.
Parents: Speak only quietly, if at all, to others on the sidelines. Avoid any comments that could be heard by players for either team or the referee. We ask for your respect for our efforts. When a goal is scored, please restrain your reaction to low-key applause. Please do follow the game closely, think about the effects of what is going on and let us know your thoughts by email to reg46rc@ca.rr.com. We need your help to make your child’s soccer experience the best it can be.
The referee will halt the match and issue a warning to the offending sideline the first time any person from the sideline breaks the rules. The warning will apply to every person on that sideline. If any person from that sideline breaks the Silent Saturday rules following a warning that person, or persons, will be asked to leave. The game will be suspended until the person has left the field.
There will be board members and field monitors at the fields helping to monitor this program.
* * * * *
We appreciate your giving us the opportunity for a single day to get a new perspective. All feedback will be used to evaluate the possibility of having a Silent Saturday again in the future.
ARTICLE WRITTEN BY ONE OF THE PARENTS IN THIS LEAGUE
California Sinks To A New Low
PARENTS NOT ALLOWED TO CHEER AT YOUTH SOCCER GAMES ON "SILENT SUNDAY"
Stephen Thomas
Valencia, CA Nov 14, 2008
California has sunk to a new low. A mind-boggling level of psuedo-intellectual social engineering is underway at a youth soccer league, of all places. AYSO Region 46, in Santa Clarita CA, is holding what it terms "Silent Sunday" this weekend - a Sunday where coaches are not permitted to direct their team from the sideline, and parents are not permitted to cheer for their own children.
I'll repeat that so there no confusion: Coaches are not permitted to direct their team from the sideline, and parents are not permitted to cheer for their own children. Direct quotes from this Pravda press release follow.
By decree from on high by the Region 46 Board, coaches "may not privde any direction, verbal or non-verbal, to players who are on the field." That is a direct quote. If that is not galling enough, parents - PARENTS - are the told to "speak only quietly, if at all, to others on the sidelines." In other words, children as young as 5 will be rewarded for their effort and athletic achievments by "low-key applause," and nothing more. The insidiousness of this idea is abhorrent and terrifying. Any child who scores a goal or makes a good play will now wonder why no one is cheering or encouraging them. The younger ones -again, some as young as 5 - will be confused and likely scared, thinking they've done something wrong. They will wonder why Mommy and Daddy, who have always told them that they will be rewarded if they try their best in any endeavor, have now abandoned them just at the moment when they have achieved something wonderful. The detrimental effect that this incredibly confusing message will have on these children is immeasurable, and the social-controlling aspect of this is frightening on a "big brother" level that is quite real.
The supposed goal of "Silent Sunday" is to allow the children to make their own decisions on the field, while keeping any bad parents from yelling at the kids or referees in an abusive or harmful manner. A fine goal indeed, and had this decree said anything even approachnig that, I would be its biggest supporter. However, like most social engineering experiments, this is directed at the wrong people. Why not simply address this problem with the individuals responsible for the offensive behavior? Why not approach the problem directly with the parents who have committed these acts, rather than punishing everyone in the league - most of whom are positive, supportive parents who have never done anything wrong on the sideline - by banning the cheering or encouragement of their own children? When it can be explained how "banning" emotions and actions results in "open mindedness" and "tolerance," perhaps I'll listen; until that happens, this horrific encroachment of freedom and liberties needs to be exposed as the repugnant, Soviet-style thought control that it is.
As a parent in Region 46, I am livid at the presumptiousness of the board members, in their thinking that they have a say in the raising of my child. AYSO exists for one reason, to provide the infrastructure of a sports league. That is all. AYSO is not a parent or a moral educator, it is a sports league. As such, board members telling me what to think, how to act, and what to teach my daughter is an offensively egotistical act, and needless to say far outside the realm of their responsibility. As parents we need to stand up and resist this type of action, and I will be the first to do so. I will teach my child that effort and hard work are rewarded, both on and off the sports field. I will teach her right from wrong as I see fit, as is my right as a law-abiding American citizen and a responsible adult. When she scores a goal or makes a good defensive play, I will cheer for her accordingly, and for AYSO or anyone else to attempt to stop me is disgusting, intrusive, and rabidly un-American.
Being a parent is a tough job, but despite the self-important and pseudo-intellectual opinions of a few small-minded individuals with Napoleonic complexes, raising a child does not "take a village." It takes two involved, caring parents. Keep the village out of my family room.
Score that goal, win that game, and cheer for your kids, America.
I’m ebbscomic’s wife.
If we had known they were going to pull garbage like this we would not have joined. We are not allowing our daughter to play on “Silent Sunday” and have explained to her coach and the league why.
In addition to what they are doing, what is scaring me is the complacency of the population. My daughter’s team had her soccer practice this evening. While the other parents agreed that the “Silent Sunday” was a crazy idea, none of them are willing to stand up to it. They are acting like sheep and going along.
In case you are wondering if this is for real. Here is the link to the AYSO Region website.
Yeah, hear an earthquakes coming.
It got so bad, we were going to call the police when my daughter's coach simply walked over and turned on the sprinklers. Cooled things off quick and in a hurry. Parents get nuts.
When you want to razz the referee, hold up an appropriate sign. Use sign language to cheer your team.........Oh, I forgot that this was Soviet Socialist California! GGGRRRR!!
Time for all the parents to remove their children and let this group realize that without the kids...no team. Can it be that simple?
I should have known that somebody here would have stepped-up in support of this garbage.
First a day, then a week, next a month. These control freaks just need a toe in the door.
They represent that this is all about letting the children make their own decisions. Decisions heavily prejudiced by the indoctrination of children by these socialist idiots.
I wonder if Rove has an earthquake machine that he no longer needs. California is long past due for a dip in the Pacific.
LOL - then sing wildly my friends, Sing!!!
Fight fiercely, Harvard, fight, fight, fight!
Demonstrate to them our skill.
Albeit they possess the might,
Nonetheless we have the will.
How we shall celebrate our victory,
We shall invite the whole team up for tea, how jolly.
Hurl that spheroid down the field
And fight, fight, fight!
—Tom Lehrer, 1945
Sounds like the scumbag liberals are even using kids' sports leagues as social engineering laboratories.
Like the military isn't enough for them....
After the game, let your coach and parents know how you felt about playing on Silent Saturday, or send email to reg46rc@ca.rr.com.
....think about the effects of what is going on and let us know your thoughts by email to reg46rc@ca.rr.com. We need your help to make your child’s soccer experience the best it can be.
The reason they are asking for feedback is so that when they make 'Silent Saturday' an everyday way of playing the sport, they can say that the "feedback" was "positive". I also strongly suspect that the scumbags running this league don't allow scorekeeping or standings, either.
You've obviously never heard 100,000 people belting out the words to "Land of Hope and Glory " at Wembley Stadium, It's so loud the stadium vibrates and you can't hear yourself sing, or the non stop cacophony at Galatasaray, or Liverpool's Kop in full song.
American sports crowds are wimps by copmparison, Soccer crowds don't need organs, Marching Bands or Cheerleaders to bring tell them when to make a pathetic little whimper of "Charge". They sing in massed choirs with a varied repertoire and a a lot of wit.
Watching soccer will turn you gay...
If you’re pink enough that your kids play soccer, then don’t cheer. You might harm the self esteem of the opposing team.
We should stop keeping score too.
And “opponents” is so confrontational, we should call them “my friends.”
And kicking! The horror, taking out agression on an inanimate object like that just whets the appetite and should be banned.
If we all just had a group hug, that would be nice, but NO TOUCHING! So let’s all just smile at each other and have a nice tofu dog.
You have never 75,000 people calling the Hogs, or 100,000 singing “Rockytop” or 92,000 Cajuns just screaming for two solid hours.
I coached soccer here for 7 years when my son was growing up in the local parks league.
During the spring I would have as many a 150 kids and I was the only coach.
I can honestly say I never had a bad kid. Every one was a pleasure. Parents however were a royal pain in the rear.
I got to where I wouldn’t even talk to adults. You got a problem? Your kid can let me know,
Now get off my pitch.
Well said. I hope to hear that sung in person one day.
No, but I've seen plenty of American Football games where the referee has called for the crowd to be quiet because the little darlings can't hear the plays being called.
I've also been to plenty of games where they have to prompt for noise on the Jumbotron, and then the farce is that the crowd makes exactly the same "white noise" in support of their team as they make when trying to "psyche out" the opposition...LOL.
The point I am making is that, having been to many Soccer matches and many football matches I can tell you there is no comparison in the noise level or the atmosphere created. It is partly due to the fact that American Football has long been marketed as a family event and has a much less intensive fan base.
Front page article on this in our local paper - http://www.the-signal.com/news/article/5990/
Again, they try to spin it as “keeping the bad parents from yelling all the time.” Again, WHY DON’T YOU ADDRESS IT WTH THOSE INDIVIDUALS, INSTEAD OF PUNISHING EVERYONE ELSE WHO’S DONE NOTHING WRONG?
The worst part is, my wife and I are apparently completely alone in having the gumption to stand up to these mini-dictators. I am utterly amazed at how far the American spirit of freedom has fallen in the past 20 years. I barely recognize my country anymore.
The text of the article:
Mum’s The Word, Soccer Moms
Local soccer moms and dads will observe 50 minutes of silence this weekend in the valley’s first-ever silent soccer games.
The event billed by a Santa Clarita division of the American Youth Soccer Organization as “Silent Sunday” will be the first game in which moms and dads are expected to keep quiet.
Some parents and coaches think it’s a great idea to promote better communication between young players.
Some parents think it’s ridiculous that they’ll be prohibited from cheering on their kids.
John Cox, regional commissioner of the AYSO Saugus Region 46, is the man behind the valley’s silence.
The national AYSO calls the event Silent Saturday, but Santa Clarita Valley officials scheduled the historic event for Sunday.
“It’s been tried in other regions but this is the first for Santa Clarita. Overall, I think it’ll go over quite well.
I’ve received a little bit of negativity from one parent and I was kind of anticipating your call,” Cox said.
Beginning at 9 a.m. Sunday, six AYSO games will be played out in two locations: Rio Norte Junior High School and Arroyo Seco Junior High School.
Will parents be allowed to cheer on their kids?
“They can cheer on their kids ... to an extent,” Cox said.
The point of Silent Sunday is not so much about muzzling vocal and excitable parents, but about allowing kids to play and communicate with each other.
“We’re trying to get the kids to play without people from the sidelines telling (them) what to do,” Cox said.
Stephen Thomas, a Valencia father, calls the program, “an absolutely insane event.”
“Basically, it’s a policy where no parent is allowed to cheer for their kids. I’m not kidding, it’s insane, and we’re not going to allow our daughter to participate,” he said.
Thomas is a local comedian but finds nothing funny in the AYSO policy.
“I’m also going to draft an official letter to them,” Thomas said.
Jackie Ferialdi is the Director of Sportsmanship for Region 46 which is initiating the “Silent Sunday” in Santa Clarita Valley.
As a mother of five young soccer players, she is the quintessential Santa Clarita Valley soccer mom.
She and her husband, Mike, are both coaches for a sport and try to promote good sportsmanship - whether the game is competitive or not.
Some of the games slated for Silent Sunday are competitive, others are not.
“A ‘woo-hoo’ is OK,” she said about parents cheering when their child scores. “I can’t imagine a place where a ‘woo-hoo’ wouldn’t be OK.”
Ferialdi was asked if the Silent Sunday rules were meant to muzzle parents yelling constantly on the sidelines.
“Bingo,” she said.
The AYSO rules for Silent Sunday are spelled out on the group’s Web site and are simple: parents may speak quietly among themselves on the sidelines and make no comment that could be heard by the players or the referee; coaches may not provide any direction verbal or non-verbal and players may “have fun and enjoy the opportunity to communicate with your teammates.”
Carlos Vasquez, a Valencia father of three, just wrapped up his first season as coach of his son, Mateo’s, team of five-year-olds called The Cheetah Cats.
“I think it’s a great idea,” Vasquez said. “The biggest rule-breakers are the parents. They forget that they sign a contract for their kids to have fun.”
Simon Howell, a Valencia father of two, whose daughter Rachel is a long-standing player, is a former AYSO referee.
“I can see the justification for this from one side of the fence,” he said. “But I think to expect the parents to be quiet completely is wrong. I’ve heard of one alternative that moves the parents farther back from the play and I think that’s a much better idea.”
Parents should be encouraged to support their children, accompany them to games and relive the experience with their children after the contest is over but parents should observe the proceedings from afar while maintaining a reasoned silence.
There is no bigger fool, no more obnoxious individual, than a parent at an under 8 soccer match giving detailed instructions to their child, their child's coach and the youth referees.
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