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Hitting Students Builds Their Self-Confidence
I'm really digressing here. But it's...um...odd...strange...quirky...the scene that unfolded around Coach Bobby Knight's recent 'teaching' episode at the expense of one his team charges. You can read about it and see it here. Coach Knight claims he's an educator. Ok. And when he smacked his player last night hard enough to see his head snap back, the player's and not Knight's, he claimed he was trying to help his self-confidence. Sure, right. Smacking students who are smaller than you, and whose college scholarship you control, and doing it in public view is just a guaranteed tactic to improve a student's self-esteem, self-confidence. It's so great I'm wondering why more college educators don't use it in their class? Or why NO other college educator uses such a tactic. Can you imagine your chemistry professor smacking a kid in front of the entire class and remaining tenured to brag about it at a later date? Knight's rationale was as bizarre and self-serving as it was pathetic: I'm sure there were some cases where I have been wrong but [Monday night] wasn't one of them.So, let's check the logic of the Great Educator's statement. I've done far worse (And he has and he's never admitted it much less taking responsibility for the other events.). And so that makes this escapade excusable by comparison. Compared to when I choked a player...this is nothing. So, by comparison, this is nothing to complain about. By comparison. Set a standard low enough and anything is seen as an improvement. And when you've never accepted responsibility for those previous egregious acts of 'education' then it's really easy to use them as a reference point to show smacking a student in public view, on TV, knowing he can't hit you back...isn't so bad now...by comparison. Imagine the student in this case following Knight's situational model behavior: Hey, Coach Knight. I'm sure there were some decisions I made out on the court where I may have been wrong but [tonight] wasn't one of them....Imagine the response of this educator to this student's following his example. John Mitchell, former Attorney General for Pres. Nixon, once advised his audience to watch what we say, not what we do. I guess that's the premise under which Knight expects us to view his behavior. And the response of the sports media is...sycophantic at best. Finding all the excuses from "Coach Knight's a complicated man..." to all the work he's done to players from his previous teams attending his practices...is a weak and shallow response that only communicates how intimidated they are by Knight and his cadre of excusers. It's funny. Funny in a dark chuckle sort of way. There was recently a summit on violence at schools...and teeth were gnashed from coast-to-coast as leaders struggled to identify the source of violent behavior in children. Kids always learn their behavior from their adult leaders and those around them who excuse and justify them.