Posted on 05/11/2010 8:50:13 PM PDT by Roberts
Remember the story of the college softball player who hit the game-winning homer and blew out her knee as she trotted around first base, but was carried to second, third and home by opposing players -- even though she represented the decisive run in a game that determined the championship?
This is not that story.
This is the story of a high school pole vaulter whose successful leap in the last event won the meet and the league championship for her team -- until an opposing coach pointed out she should be disqualified for breaking a rule, reversing the outcome so that his team captured victory and the league title.
The girl's infraction? Wearing a friendship bracelet.
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"This is my 30th year coaching track," Knowles said a few days later. "I know a lot of rules and regulations."
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South Pasadena coach P.J. Hernandez was dumbfounded.
"I said, 'Coach [Knowles], you really want it to come down to this?' " Hernandez recalled.
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"It's unfortunate, that's all I can say," Knowles said. "It's unfortunate for the young lady. But you've got to teach the kids that rules are rules."
(Excerpt) Read more at sportsillustrated.cnn.com ...
I trust all the competing players refused the medal?
If the rules state that no friendship bracelets are allowed and the penalty is indeed forfeiture of victory... then what’s the problem?
“But you’ve got to teach the kids that rules are rules.”
Especially when enforcing them will help ME, ME, ME!!!
“...rules are rules.”
Especially when the rule conveniently disqualifies the other team, and allows you the win.
I would agree that you must abide by the rules, but if I were the coach, I would give this violation a pass (if this is, in fact, a rule).
So a loop of string is jewelry?
What a jerk of a coach.
The coach in question is a giant bag of douche. That’s the problem. Probably works at the DMV in his spare time or is a spleling nazi on boards.
It just seems petty. She didn’t break the spirit of the rule and it certainly would not have given her an advantage.
On the other hand, violating the spirit of the rule and persecuting another for your own avarice of sorts, seems petty, venal, and small.
You won because your coach had another disqualified for wearing a friendship bracelet? That must be some real victory, pyrrhic, but a victory.
Rules are rules;
Can’t actually say you beat anyone, by besting them.
Anybody who says “rules are rules” is full of it - and I’ll prove it.
Let’s imagine the girl’s bracelet got stuck on the pole and she broke her wrist.
Lawsuit. And would the girl be responsible for her broken wrist, because she broke the rules? Nope. Her lawyer would argue that the coaches had the responsibilit for checking for obvious violations such as jewelry before the match - both coaches. Reason? Students have to be pre-judged as non-competent, otherwise the school can’t limit their rights. So this this is EXACTLY how she would win a lawsuit (or her parents would).
But she didn’t break her wrist, and so the coach who otherwise would be held responsible if she got hurt and the kid had lawyers gets to invoke a rule that actually, legally applies to him more than her - and then he shakes his finger at her and cites rules are rules and steals the championship away from her superior performance.
So don’t tell me about rules. If this girl’s family was worth millions and could afford to sic a lawyer at these rule-spouting jerks, they’f be hanged by the very rules they are smashing her down with.
And THAT’s the truth about the “rules.”
Sure, rules are rules but Knowles’ team did not win and they should be ashamed of him as their coach. He’s an embarrassment. If I were on the school board, he’d be looking for another job.
“Especially when the rule conveniently disqualifies the other team, and allows you the win.”
IIRC, this is how Obama won his first election.
He has to be.
We have similar rules in our league. The students know them, and know the consequences of violating them. Can’t tell you how many bracelets, nose rings, studs and earrings I’ve wound up with in my pockets at the request of the athletes at the meets I have attended. Fighting and changing the rules is another issue. Coaches who may try to get an unearned win by nitpicking are another matter entirely.
post of the month LA and exactly how this old boy feels about garbage like this ‘rule’. good God....
I had a similar experience with a coach twice in one year.
During the 1994 Cross Country Championships in Buffalo NY the top two teams tied their top seven, the rules stated that the next finisher broke the tie.
The guy coaching the other team was on the rules committee, and changed the rules after the fact for the next three in giving his team the win..
Then during track season my 4*4 team set the City record, the same coach now pressed that my T-Shirt on under my uniform was deep dark navy and not black like one of my teammates so we were dq’d..
One of the most fundamental responsibilities of a jury is to judge the law itself.
Not whether the law was broken, but whether it should be applied even if it was broken. In other words, whether the law is an ass in any particular situation.
Judges generally block the jury’s knowledge of this, but they can’t stop it’s existence The Fully Informed Jury Association (FIJA) has been fighting for years to educate people about this fundamental right.
Teaching kids to simply obey stupid rules, and accept stupid punishments, simply because they exist - without teaching them about their equal American responsibility to judge rules, or the fact that they are denied full rights in school because the teachers have a responsibility to do what the law presumes they can’t, is sheer hypocrisy.
The fact that millions of people are outraged by this particular story isn’t just popular sentiment - the legal fact is that the the very rules the school is citing were broken by the coaches, would never stand up in court, and violate the equally important rule that coaches must teach sportsmanship.
In other words, the coaches broke the rules by applying this rule in this way at this time. THERE ARE RULES ABOUT APPLYING RULES.
That such gross violation of the rules is being conducted in the name of the rules itself is utterly disgusting - and only serves to shatter the spirit of students. What’s really being taught here is that effort and achievement don’t matter - bureaucracy is the only thing that matters - so let your human spirit be crushed and serve the rules. It is the true Lefitst vision of the purpose of the “rules.”
Then Jesus said to them, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for the Sabbath.
- Mark 2:27
What people are failing to recognize is that coach Knowles protested AFTER his team lost. Why didn’t he protest during the qualifying heats?
The coach should be ashamed.
Is she legal?
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