Bill Belichick, Cheating, Heroes, Role Models, and Teaching Children

What a Wonderful Opportunity to Teach!

Bill Belichick was caught red handed, cheating! There is no doubt about it. He was caught, has been fined and he even admitted it. The camera that was used illegally, was confiscated; along with the tape of what was being shot. Coach Belichick can stonewall questions all he wants, but he did what he was accused of.

The man knowingly broke the rules. Publicly he has tried to explain it away by saying that he did it under a "difference in interpretation" of the rules. That is even more despicable. Lying to cover cheating gives us all a double dose. Bill had even been warned about this very behavior last year and then, every team was informed of the rule gainst using video on the field in a memo from the commissioner again before the start of the season.

What Would Any Parent Do?

What would almost any self-respecting parent do if their child was caught breaking a rule after being warned TWICE to cease the rule-breaking activity? There would definitely need to be some moral and ethical teaching taking place. Some parents might resort to punishment. (But, to show how ineffective punishment is, just take a look at how the coach is reacting; the $500,000.00 fine has not changed his actions one bit, he still seems to indicate thathe was justified in cheating!) The important thing that any parent, wishing to make meaningful changes in the rule-breaking behavior, would need to do, is to do some serious teaching of morals, values, and ethics that should be used in making future decisions!

Role Model?

Right now I read so many writers and TV and radio commentators screaming about how terrible this is because Bill Belichick let so many people down who looked up to him as a role model. Well, therein lies the folly that I mentioned in a couple of recent articles on Heroes and Role Models a couple of weeks ago; parents must be very careful in guiding children how to select heroes and role models. Simple fame or success in some level of competition should never be allowed to be the sole criteria for picking role models! Bill is, without a doubt, a winning coach; but that does not make him a worthy role model for children.

Nobody is Worthless!

My grandfather was commonly repeating sayings that he felt expressed some truth about life. One that he repeated often was, “Nobody is worthless; anyone can serve as a bad example to someone!” Now, I believe that he often repeated that saying in a humorous manner but there is still some great truth in his saying. I believe that this saying applies in the case of Bill Belichick knowingly breaking NFL rules. While it is disappointing to see a grown man, who is held up by many as a great coach and role model; it is not necessarily a bad thing for parents whose children see his failure to live up to his lofty position or obligations. He can serve as an example of how much one risks when they betray trust and forfeit character.

What a Great Opportunity to Teach!

Bill Belichick’s terrible action should give any parent a great opportunity to teach their children a wonderful lesson in moral and ethical decision-making! Any parent who is attempting to teach their children to live in an orderly society of rules and laws and who is attempting to teach their children how to make decisions about right and wrong, now has a great example of what can happen when rules are broken to use in that teaching process.

Thanks to Bill Belichick, We Have a Great "Teaching Moment"

Thanks to Bill for giving parents a chance to graphically demonstrate to their children that all of the championships in this world really mean nothing if you compromise your character and forfeit trust in order to get them. Here is a man who might have gone down in history as one of the greatest coaching minds in the history of team sports. But, his terrible decision to break the rules and cheat will forever be his legacy. He compromised his character to attempt to gain a competitive advantage and now he will be forever known as a cheat.

LOSS OF TRUST is the Biggest Penalty!

"Of course," Bill said firmly when asked about the request from the Commissioner to turn over any additional notes, tapes, or materials that might have been used in a similar manner. What Bill may soon learn, and most importantly, what parents can teach their children is that once you are caught lying, few people will ever believe you again.

Trust is So Difficult to Earn and so Easy to Lose!

I will bet that when NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell heard Belichick's reply, he heard what the man said, but because of the recent betrayal of trust, he probably will do some intense research to confirm the truth of the coach's statement. I doubt that Goodell will no longer be willing to take Bill Belichick’s word on much of anything anymore.

Teach !

Parents, teach your children that the consequences of lying, cheating, and breaking the rules is not the punishment that society meets out; the punishment for lying, cheating, and breaking the rules is the loss of the trust of others!

Mike Vick, Dog-Fighting, and Parenting Part 2

An Excerpt from "Parenting with Dignity" Book

Here is an excerpt from my book "Parenting with Dignity" that kind of puts in a nutshell how effective parenting skills can arm children against making the kind of terrible decisions that Mike has allegedly made.

Respect for Authority

"Do it because it's the law." Teach your children that a civilized world will always have rules and laws. Teach them that these are not an annoyance; they are an aid to us all. Rules and laws protect our rights, privileges, property, and safety. Explain to them that chaos would result from a society without stop signs, property laws, and rights to privacy, opportunity, expression, and freedom from injury. (Note that it is almost impossible to teach respect for laws and rules if your children see you violate those same rules and laws. You can't speed and then demand that your children drive the speed limit!)

This education about rules and laws can start at a very early age. It really works to point out to kids as young as four or five that a busy intersection simply would not be negotiable without traffic lights. I watch our son teach his kids the meaning of red, yellow, and green lights and how they protect all of us, and it's easy to see why, at three and four, they're able to negotiate intersections by looking at the lights and knowing how to decide when to stop and when to go.

As I work in juvenile prisons (and adult prisons, for that matter), it never ceases to amaze me how almost every kid who is in trouble with the law has little or no knowledge of the very law that they have violated! A child who has a knowledge of laws and an ability to use that knowledge to make decisions is far better equipped for successful living than a child who doesn't!

Check back for the next article as I will highlight some other portions of Parenting with Dignity and how it will help arm your children to make great decisions for themselves.

Mike Vick, Dog-Fighting, and Parenting

Finger of Blame

It is amazing to me to read the bulk of the writing and commentary that is coming about as a result of the whole legal issue of Mike Vick, his indictment for involvement in dog fighting, and the role of the law and the NFL in controlling his behavior. “Why is it amazing?” you ask. Well to me it is amazing simply because it seems to me that few seem to grasp the whole big picture. Everyone seems to be wanting to point a finger of blame at someone.

The Issue Is Parenting

To me this is really not about Mike Vick and dog fighting. To me this is an issue of great cultural significance because this seems to be evidence of a failure of our older generation in teaching the next generation the way that our democracy works in America.

The Issue Is Teaching Children to Respect Rules and Laws

We are a society of rules and laws! Freedom does not mean fewer laws. Freedom does not mean ignoring laws. Freedom does not mean living outside of the laws. Recently someone gave me a bumper sticker as a joke... but to me it was not a joke. It reads, "It's not guns, stupid; it is a lack of parenting!"

The problem in America is not one of more cops and stiffer penalties; it is clearly a problem of doing a better job of teaching our young people about our way of life. Democracy all starts with respect for the rules and laws we create. It simply does not work if we do not show respect for the rules and laws. Our children need to know that!

What freedom means is more laws! The more laws that you can live within the bounds of, the more freedom you have.

American Parents Have Shirked Their Duty

Our older generation (commonly called the “Baby Boomers”) taught the next generation, by their actions, that if there was something that we felt was wrong with our societies laws; all we had to do was to disobey the law! That is not how it works. That is not Democracy; that is Anarchy!

What a disservice we have done to our younger generation.

The problem with Mike Vick is a lack of parenting! Someone failed to teach him to live within the law. My issue is not specifically with Mike Vick's parents... it is with American parents in general. As a society, we Americans need to do a better job of teaching our children to obey rules and laws!

The Point of This Article

Now, like I said, the purpose of this article is not to point the finger of blame at Mike Vick’s parents. The point of this article is to say to every parent, "we need to pay attention to what we teach our younger generation!"

We Americans need to teach respect for rules and laws!

We need to teach respect for our process of making laws in our great nation. We need to teach our children to respect our way of government and to respect our leaders. We need to teach our young people that if we do not like our leaders and the way that they are leading our country, we need to vote them out of office and replace them with leaders who take us in a direction we want to go.

American Democracy Is Built To Allow Change

We need to teach the next generation of Americans that if there is something that they do not like about our structure of laws they must get involved on our system of representative government and work to change that part of the law that they disagree with.

Our forefathers set up a government with a built-in process for change and improvement. Few young Americans understand how that process even works.

Mike Vick, if he indeed was raising, training, and putting dogs in fights, needed some instruction about how our system works. If it is illegal to do something… don’t do it. If you feel that the law is wrong, work to change it but do not just ignore the law.

Missing the Point

It seems that most of the people writing about this unfortunate event seem to be saying that we need stiffer penalties for violators. They say that the problem is lax penalties and weak leaders in the NFL. They say that the problem is that athletes are paid too much. I say "NO!" to all of that… I say that what we need is better parental guidance.

In my book Parenting with Dignity and in our 9-week Parenting with Dignity course we teach parents how to teach their children respect for rules and laws. What America needs is more parents teaching their children respect for rules and laws! It is that simple.