Being young is no excuse for being stupid

Here in our little midwest corner of the world we have a raging controversy going on over internet photos. No, not the latest ones from Britney Spears. These have to do with a local high school that recently gave 13 students a two-week vacation from extracurricular activities. Their crime was appearing in photos on a Facebook site with alcohol in their hand. Several of the miscreants, their parents and their lawyers screamed loud and long about invasion of privacy issues, etc.

The administrators at the high school basically snickered and reminded the youth they had signed a sheet of paper saying they would not engage in such behavior. Under the rules, if they smoke or drink alcohol, they get a two-week suspension for the first offense. Repeat offenders get more. And, in this case, possession is the law.

I write a twice-a-month column for a neighborhood paper. For the current column, I talked to a series of local high school athletic directors on this subject. All (except one who didn't want to talk about it) were shaking their heads at the stupidity of kids who thought nobody would ever notice their pictures on the internet. The youth seemed blissfully unaware that if a presidential candidate sneezes, it's on You Tube five minutes later.

"I can't tell you how many dumb things I did as a kid," one told me. "But do you think I went home and advertised it?" Just because we didn't get caught didn't mean we weren't stupid.

In this case, the athletes complained they were being treated unfairly and singled out. The school noted they didn't have as good a hammer to use over the non-athletes. The best they could do was let the parents know via a letter and hope mumsy and daddy will handle it properly.

All of which reminded me of a story Red Jones, an old American League umpire, once told at a banquet I attended. Seems Mr. Jones was getting heat from a bench during a game. Eventually, he heard enough and sent the entire bench to the showers. The last guy out was Wally Moses, a quiet fellow. "Red, honest, I never said a word to you," Moses said. Jones didn't doubt this for a second but said, "Wally, it's like a raid on a cathouse. The good go with the bad. So off you go."