Disorderly Conduct as a Spectator Sport

I’m only 25, much too young to start sounding like someone old, like a parent or grumpy uncle--I thought.

But when I walked away from Quartz Hill High School in the Antelope Valley on a recent Friday evening after failing to enjoy a football game between Quartz Hill and Encino’s Crespi High, I could only shake my head and wonder: “Kids today.”

Actually, that’s not all of what I said, but that’s all I’m allowed to print.

The teenagers I ran into seemed far ruder, cruder and obnoxious than kids were back in the good ol’ days when I was in high school--way back in 1988.

As we strolled over to the game from my friend’s house near the stadium, a soft wind cooled the desert evening. The setting sun cast a golden shade on the Joshua trees at the outskirts of town and over the distant hills--the type of evening that sweetens the thoughts of poets.

But the night began to turn sour when we picked seats high on the north end of the stadium, in a spot I soon found out was reserved for freshmen, who probably aren’t allowed anywhere near the seniors and parents.

An irritating group of 14-year-olds would grow to an oppressive swarm of 15 or so by the kickoff.

Before the game began, the rowdy conduct, the running up and down the shaky bleachers and the shouted four-letter words weren’t so bad. The players were just running warmup patterns and the cheerleaders’ pompoms rested on the track.

When someone knocked my soda over, I walked back down the steps to get another.

But when the announcer urged the crowd to stand and gave the band the go-ahead for the national anthem, the horseplay became raw incivility.

Unlike the crowds at other sporting events--professional and amateur--where players respectfully put their helmets or hats over their chests, spectators by the thousands stand in silence with hands over their hearts, some whispering the words that occasionally draw tears from veterans, the noise in this corner of the stadium was relentless.

Some of the kids remained seated, laughing during the song. Others stood but yelled at friends.

And a couple of girls, standing three rows below me, mockingly yelled the anthem’s words so loudly that the visiting fans across the field must have heard their shouts.

My instinctive reaction to the clear disrespect for flag and country was anger and puzzlement: What are these kids learning in history class? Does the flag mean anything to them? Do they have friends or relatives--maybe parents--serving in the desert’s military installations? This is the Antelope Valley, with its reputation as a stronghold of middle-America patriotism, home of Edwards Air Force Base and the “right stuff”?

Where in the world are school officials--or parents?

And who the hell knocked over my soda again? Those things cost a buck apiece.

The game began. Not that I got much of a chance to watch it.

The mass of gremlins jumped on the bleachers. Out of the bleachers. Into the bleachers. They blocked my view when I was trying to watch that fourth-down-and-inches.

A girl behind me kept calling to a girl in front of me. The angelic-looking young lady in front shouted back: “What the . . . do you want?”

Later, two girls sitting to my right were talking while a third friend stood to my left with her knees next to my ear.

Girl 1 to Girl 2: “I kissed him.”

Girl 2 to 1: “Shhhh.”

Girl 3 hears something and says: “What?”

Girl 1 to Girl 3: “I kissed him. I couldn’t help it.”

Girl 3 to Girl 1: “Bi---!”

An insult, female to female. Seems Girl 3 had her eye on that guy.

Still later, two quieter girls en route to the also quieter south side of the stadium were walking behind me.

“Hoochies . . . ho’s,” yelled a boy in front of me, lucky that I wasn’t their brother.

Although bodies often blocked my vision and shouts drowned out the play-by-play, I did manage to see much of the game, which was close at the end. Quartz Hill fielded a good team, which, despite their eventual loss, executed a couple of big plays toward the end to nearly get back into the game.

The cheerleading squad was spirited. Parents worked hard in the concession stands to raise money for the kids. And the one time I walked to the south end of the stadium, the parents were having a good time. The kids there were civil. A sleepy teenage girl rested her head on a boy’s shoulder.

Driving up the hill that leads out of the Antelope Valley later that night, I looked forward to the college games I could watch peacefully in my living room on Saturday.

I was doing just that the next day, while also writing a letter to the principal of Quartz Hill High. I asked him this:

While allowing kids to be kids, isn’t there a way to instill in them a more civilized code of conduct?

Basic respect for the flag would be a good start.