With news of youth rage springing up too frequently, Bill Whittle and Zo Rachel explore an ancient method to conquer a kid’s emotional explosions — sports.
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Video below hosted at Rumble.
14 replies on “Remedy to Rage: Ancient Method Conquers Kid’s Emotional Explosions”
Me and my one girlfriend grew up in a neighborhood full of boys. So we played sports, rode bikes and played in the drainage ditch catching pollywogs and other slimy things. Heaven forbid if any of us showed up wearing a bicycle helmet – we’d have been kicked out of the club for sure! Not to mention being called a sissy. But back to sports…
I played in a girls softball league starting at 8 yrs old and played until I reached the age limit of 18. What team sports teaches you is how to work with others, what good sportsmanship is all about, but most importantly, camaraderie. Coach Joe did not treat us as ‘girls’, he treated us as ballplayers. Period, no excuses. Mouthing back, pouting or temper tantrums got you benched. Kids of all races and backgrounds were on the team. Heck, we even had a one-armed girl in centerfield that I’d pit against most boys.
I currently have a girlfriend with a 16 yr old daughter [only child] that has been to the ER twice for suicidal thoughts and is undergoing therapy. She’s your typical teenager that always has a phone, tablet or some other screen in her face. There are no other kids her age in the neighborhood and she has no interest in doing anything outside – at least as far as I can tell. She’s inundated with wokism in school – what pronouns to use or not use, America is an evil place, where she ranks on the intersectionality scale, LBGTQ+ concerns (have you ever thought of kissing a girl? Then you might be a lesbian). Kids are confused enough at that age without the school inserting their various agendas to add to that confusion.
Bottom line, the kids are being inundated with a ton garbage like we’re being inundated with ton of garbage every day. The difference is, they’re not fully equipped to handle it, even if they have the best parents on the planet.
P.S. ATM’s post made me laugh. I remember all of that playground equipment, but especially the steel slides. If you wore shorts in the summertime, you’d lose skin on the way down!
ADHD kids have to have sports, period. ADHD meds actually make these children’s sports performance worse. I’ll never forget the star teenage soccer player who had just been placed on Ritalin and who seemed to merely watch the ball go by with no investment in getting involved in the action as a result.
I used to have to walk my four-year old two miles in order to have him even be able to sit still a few minutes at dinner.
Great episode. This past weekend 3 grand boys (3, 6,9) stayed with us and at the Friday evening meal the two oldest were lamenting how some game they played was having some big thing on Saturday and they would miss it. (No zombie pads at Poppop’s house) The oldest said “it’s going to be completely different next week. We’re missing it all.”
Of course, with acres and acres to explore and cool things to do with Nini(decorating, baking, wrapping and making gingerbread houses), they didn’t say another word about it. And they lived!
I think it is less what is done and more interpersonal connections and developing relationships which results in better people. We even had a bit of drama with the oldest and the cute 9 yr old neighbor girl falling out (both oldest sibling and hard headed). But by the end of the weekend they had worked out their differences and became friends again.
I used to love playing sports when I was a kid. We had some serious “sand lot” action going on, both baseball and football. None of this “flag” or “touch” football stuff, tackle football with no pads, helmets or protection of any kind. Same with baseball, a softball of any type was “for the girls”, we played hardball for keeps.
One of my fondest memories is my dad coming home with a brand new Rawlings baseball glove for me, “just because” I needed a good glove to stop hurting my hand every time I caught a baseball. About 1/2 to 3/4 of the kids didn’t have any glove at all, so this made me “one of the pros”.
This went for the playground at school as much as on our own time after school. Back then the teachers didn’t much supervise the playground. There might be one of them out there reading a book with a whistle around her neck. She wasn’t there to do anything but decide how bad an injury was and what was the appropriate medical response. And break up the occasional fight, which seldom happened because we knew if we were going to have a fight to get our of her line of sight.
That was when and where I learned how to deal with bullies too. I learned that it didn’t matter as much if you “won” the fight with a bully, the point was to make sure he knew he was going to get a fight for his bullying efforts no matter what.
We had tetherball, monkey bars, a really big slide, lots of swing sets with really long chains hanging from really high (like 15’+) bars where you could get some serious airborne action going, a trapeze bar and a set of hand rings. That part of the playground was sand, but the rest was turf.
I lived in the country and rode a bus for 45 minutes each way. Busses were pretty rowdy back then too. I got home and had to do my homework, which my Mom looked at and made me do over the parts I got wrong. Then it was time for “chores” and once the animals were done we would have supper. Not dinner, supper. Everyone sat at the supper table, if you didn’t you didn’t get anything to eat. During supper I would be asked “What did you learn in school today?” I’d better be able to answer that question too. Then we could play outside until dark or watch TV inside with the family.
Kids got hurt all the time, both at school and at home. Occasionally someone lost a tooth, it was rare but it happened. Broken bones were rare too, but not impossible. I signed more than a couple casts back then.
I visited my nephew’s school in the Los Angeles suburb of Torrance and San Pedro several times. The playground was covered in foam rubber, the bars holding swings were no more than 8′ off the ground, there were no monkey bars at all and the slide was about 6′ long.
Every day my nephew would get picked up from school, go home to blast through his homework as quick as possible and jump on his computer to play games. Alone.
I can’t help but think this has a lot to do with the generation(s) of wimps and whiners we’ve raised in this nation.
It’s no wonder that things like BLM and ANTIFA have become an issue. The delicate snowflakes and precious little buttercups being raised today have no idea what an actual cause is and no empathy for the pain they inflict on others, never having suffered any significant pain themselve.
I remember in 2nd grade playing Kill The Carrier where it was basically everyone else tackle the guy with the ball. In 5th grade we were playing “touch” football on the blacktop when I tried to run through a kid much bigger than I was. I hit my head on the pavement and got my bell rung pretty good. That was when the teacher intervened. Only to look in my eyes and say you might want to go see the nurse, and Johnny why don’t you walk with him (just in case I fell).
When I told the nurse what happened, which she asked my to do several times, seeing as she was really checking for a concussion and might have to contact my folks, her only response to tackling on the blacktop was to call me a dumbass. Which was my right, nay obligation, as a 10 year old.
Played football/baseball/basketball until such time as I stopped growing and baseball was the only one through HS. We were outside and active 12 months of the year. Did we sometimes get hurt, yep. Did we make memories and “channel our aggression” you betcha. And there was lots of aggression because we were hormonal teenagers. Good times.
Yah, exactly, and the thing about that is, you grew up about 1,500 miles from where I grew up. It wasn’t just a Midwest thing, or an East or West Coast thing, or a Southern thing or a Desert thing or a Mountain thing.. We all had somewhat the same experiences growing up.
That’s just the way kids were raised when we were that age. I wrote the above knowing that most guys reading it (on this site) would be familiar with the story. We, at least those of us that had a decent, what I’d consider “normal” childhoods, are familiar and comfortable with that sort of thing.
Most of us raised our own kids the same way too.
There’s a definite social divide between us and the people who don’t see things like we do.
I agree about “hormonal teenagers” too. We played hard. We climbed trees and rocks, braved the dark of culverts full of unknown hideous monsters under roads, rode our bikes like Evel Knievel, ran from our enemies in order to lure them into ambushes, etc. “Sissy” was about the worst thing a friend could call you. And all the while figuring out and problem solving to get to where we wanted to be.
We grew up with scars, mended bones and memories. I have a steel BB gun BB in my left arm and left leg to this day. I remember the day I got them like it was yesterday. One time I was shot by another kid (Daisy pump-up long gun), one time I accidentally shot myself (Daisy CO2 pistol). I didn’t dare tell my mom (the self inflicted one was at my grandparent’s farm where I spent the summers working, so my grandma) or I’d lose the BB gun(s). So I dressed the “war wounds” myself and didn’t say a word to any adults about it. I even knew how to dress wounds because I got so many of them from sticks, rocks, farm equipment and sometimes even pencils. Jeanette Rimrod stabbed me in the thigh with a No. 2 pencil, I think she liked me …
The thing is, we grew up. I don’t think these people who look like adults but act like spoiled children ever did.
I remember most (didn’t have a BB gun to shoot myself) and growing up in the country with animal chores I can share that too.
Those chores and the responsibility they put on us I think was a great part of growing up. You started when young going out with supervision, holding the egg carton or putting the little scoop of food in the animal dish that someone else measured out of the bucket, to doing some of that yourself, to eventually cleaning the barn (we had cages of 25-40 rabbits, plus chickens ducks and geese, the goats and sheep were mostly outside and didn’t require much cleanup) or doing some other task by yourself and having seen it done for years, you knew WHY it had to be done right and didn’t shirk the work. Maybe you mowed the lawn for neighbors if you were a city kid, or shoveled walks for money. Picking fruit would be the best work, I think if someone nearby had a small orchard or at least a couple trees in the back yard, because then you’d probably get a pie out of it and could directly benefit from your work.
Today’s kids though, without work after school or during summer (time being taken up with sports or camps) or fear of pedophiles and child kidnapping (mostly irrational as the most likely kidnapper is a non-custodial parent) means kids are stuck at home. I think video games are only half of the reason, though boob tube nannies go back as far as the game parlors and arcades.
I think animal chores make for good life-lessons all around. We had chickens, pigs, cows (both beef and a few milk cows) and sheep.
When my boys were growing up we weren’t farming but nearby their friends were. They learned that play time stopped for chore time and resumed when the work was done. I also made sure they had their own “chores” that had to be executed faithfully around our place. We owned an old farm house (a huge old thing that I loved dearly) and six acres of lawn. There was always something that needed the attention of a boy to get done … 🙂
I have a friend today that owns an earthmoving business. They mostly prepare raw ground for development into housing lots. When he finds himself short-handed he gives me a call to run some sort of heavy equipment for a few days. Sometimes a bulldozer or an excavator but mostly a track truck. Which is a sort of dump truck on treads. It drives exactly like an M113 APC, if you know anything about those. Except the dump part of course.
He and I were talking at lunch one time about how hard it is for him to get help. Running a track truck is the simplest job on the site and not hard to teach someone to do. But it’s noisy, I wear a headset that I can jack a two-way radio into and also Bluetooth to my phone so I can get calls (I still have a few IT clients to support) and listen to audiobooks while I work. It’s also smelly because the exhaust for the Cat diesel is only about 4 feet from the cab — And it can get pretty hot even with the AC. It’s also either muddy or dusty. None of which is a problem for me, I like getting outside and running big boy toys now and then.
He pays pretty good too but he can’t get any younger people to work for him, he’s mostly stuck with old pharts like me who grew up before the “screen era”. He says “As soon as they get some dust in their eyes or detect a drop of sweat they quit. They’re used to sitting in an air conditioned room playing computer games and this is a ‘hostile’ environment for them.”
In a previous era there were always farm kids looking for work. There are still enough of us geezers around to keep him supplied with help but as we get older and less physically capable we’re thinning out pretty quick.
The reason this is a problem to him is that his youngest son (just finishing high school now) loves the work and loves working with his dad. He’s a good kid. He grew up on this equipment and is a sort of a rare bird these days. The dilemma my friend faces is that instead of going to college his son wants to work with his dad and someday take over the business. My friend is uncertain that’s a good choice for his boy, not because the boy has any problem with the work and it pays really well so the economic considerations are very good compared to years of student expense/debt for a college education. The problem is that my friend foresees a time when he won’t be able to hire good help.
By “good” I mean people that will be reliable, work steadily and not break the equipment. That kind of employee is a dying breed. Without that kind of help the business will have a hard time remaining profitable.
So sending his kid to college or keeping him in the family business presents a serious dilemma for my friend. I don’t envy him that at all.
This is a “new” unintended consequence of modern life.
I have a nephew that is got his degree in construction mgmt and would probably love to go work for your buddy when he finished grad school (he’s going to grad school just to consume all his eligibility to play college baseball and get that fully out of his system) He loves being outside and getting dirty in his work. Sounds like they make a good team.
BTW – next time you drive, get a battery operated or usb plug fan that you can mount outside the cab an blow the CO away. There are some very powerful battery operated fans now.
My suggestion, not that it has all that much research behind it, is let the kid go to work. He builds experience for a resume, saves and stockpiles money, and gets some real, practical experience. If the worst happens and he has to fold the company, kid can still go to college or some other tech school for other paper and skills. He’ll also have various skills on machines that another company would be willing to pay for or they can sell off the company and some of the hardware, keeping enough to spin off a smaller, more specialized service company that doesn’t need as many people.
Yeah, that all makes sense but … I never give advice like that to anyone IRL. It’s my friend’s job to navigate that part of his life and he’ll have to work it out however seems best to him.
It’s not that I’m not willing to help, it’s that there’s no guarantee that what I do or say will actually be helpful.
It’s a fair bet that if I give that kind of advice and something goes wrong I’ll get a portion of the blame, consciously or not.
It’s not really my business how he charts the course for his family’s future, he was just talking to a willing listener and friend. I’d like to keep that friendship so I don’t provide my own “good ideas” thereby.
He’s a good man and a good father so I’m sure he’ll figure it out.
I know that feeling. You know your friend and how he takes advice.
Sometimes a person just listing out other ideas can make a person say “oh, yeah that could work” especially when it is something that is several months away. Other times, its just asking for an argument. (which makes me remember the Monty Python skit/sketch about The 30 minute or full hour Debate).
HA, after a playground altercation in 3rd grade, the other guy was still steamed at me. He stabbed me with a good ol #2 as well. Pretty deep in my thigh where it broke. My dad had to dig it out with an x-acto that he put in boiling water (we used it for model planes) and then my mom showed me how to bandage it.
They would not have known but the teacher called to ask them how my leg was. It didn’t hurt but they thought we should get the lead out. LOL
LOL … #2 lead pens are dangerous weapons!
Seems to me like kids were a lot tougher when we were growing up.
Don’t get me wrong, some of that stuff hurt. It’s just that it didn’t usually hurt bad enough to stop us from whatever it was that we were more interested in. Short of a hospital stay anyway.
It wasn’t all particularly safe either. Lack of ready-made entertainment meant we invented our own.
I remember a kid who was playing with a big ol’ machine nut off a piece of farm equipment. Like a 2″ diameter nut. He had tied a piece of twine to it and was whirling it around in circles then letting it go to see how high/far he could throw it. Somehow he managed to smack himself in the head with it. It knocked him out. His folks took him to the doctors office and he was treated for concussion and sent home.
He died that night. Unexpectedly. They didn’t have CAT scans and MRIs back then and he had an intracranial hemorrhage that didn’t show up on X-Ray.
I was helping fetch some corn from the local elevator, my neighbor drove the tractor towing the hammer mill into town and I went along. I was sitting on the frame of the hammer mill coming home. The frame is angle iron and slopes down towards the wheel, I started to slide towards the wheel so like a dumbass I put my foot down on the pavement to push myself back up. Pavement going by underneath me at “road gear” tractor speeds. As soon as weight hit my foot the pavement just grabbed me and pulled me under, giving me a nice 4 1/2 inch skull fracture for being stupid.
Funny thing is it didn’t really hurt all that bad, at least not right away. It knocked the crap out of me and I couldn’t breath. That’s all I remember until they were putting me in the ambulance. I spent 5 days in the hospital and went home feeling fine. They might have let me out sooner but they didn’t dare leave someone stupid enough to do that to himself go running around and re-injure the fracture. So I had to stay in bed until the doc said I was out of danger.
It was pure Grace-of-God and dumb luck that I didn’t Darwinize myself before I grew enough brains to know better.
I get a shudder down my spine when I recall some of the things we did with kitchen matches. They go “boom” in all sorts of neat, dangerous-as-hell configurations.
Back to the topic … By the time school, chores and some pretty aggressive playing was done, there wasn’t a lot of rage left to spend when my head hit the pillow at night. I was usually plumb tuckered out.
The old, beat up me of today is never bored, I can always find something to occupy myself. Whether that something is productive or not is a different matter entirely. 🙂