Complaining parents - When did this trend start?

I wouldn't mind covering the sheep tossing, actually.

 

It's a boomer thing.

To put it into perspective, I'm the classic boomer--born in '49.

When I was a kid, my dad would occasionally come to my games--my mother never did.

We never thought ONE thing about it. It was a treat when my dad came but if he didn't, so what? (He also worked shifts)

Not attending your kids hockey/football/baseball/soccer games now is probably grounds for child abuse.

Oh, and two of my boys are playing university football and I've got the phone number of the SE of the Halifax newspaper. I'm gonna phone him every week to make sure he publishes the story idea I pitched him.

I think a lot of it started when players salaries started rising and parents thought they could cash in on their kids. Delusional as hell, but trust me, I saw it for over 10 years at hockey arenas.

Dumbasses

 

I know it was different in 1981 than it is now.

That's when I started in the business.

Sure, there were folks even back then who called and demanded coverage, but I agree with the Baby Boomer comment. I think it's grown dramatically in the last 25 or so years.

I think part of it is the growth in scholarship sports (including women), and the sense of entitlement the last couple of generations has developed and/or had installed in them.

I am technically one of the last of the Baby Boomers -- 1959.

 

The first prep football game around here was 1898.

 

Can I get an AAAA-MEN?

 

Started in 1981? I started in 1983. Clerk role. Only thing worse than complaining parents are golfers who call in their holes-in-one, ya ask them for witnesses and they don't have any. But they made a hole-in-one.

Oh .... OK. Thanks for calling. Go back to the beer girl and grab your 14th Budweiser or whatever.

 

So it started with the boomer parents, does that mean it'll be worse with boomers as grandparents?

 

Too self-absorbed at that point. They'll generally abandon the G-kids.

 

It was '80 for me. Back in the day, you could almost tell a parent to STFU ... not quite, but close.

Damn.

 

I also think the fact that parenting itself is now a competitive sport contributes to the problem. Parental value is tied directly to the size of Johnny or Susie's scrapbook(s).

 

I haven't been around as long as JR -- I'm in my 30s -- but I agree with the point about parents turning attendance at games into a competitive sport all its own. My high school games were in the afternoon after school. My parents worked. They were never there. Even Sunday kiddie league games, they didn't always make it. Now, the freakin' youth sports parents show up with lawn chairs to sit and watch practice. Talkin' 'bout practice, man! Seriously, drive by your football and soccer fields and you'll see them all sitting there. Never happened when I was a kid.