Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: TUESDAY, September 6, 1994 TAG: 9409080016
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-7 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: William Raspberry
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
... So the people said something would have to be done
But their projects did not at all tally;
Some said, ``Put a fence 'round the edge of the cliff,''
Some, ``An ambulance down in the valley.''
I KEPT THINKING of that snippet from the John Malins poem I learned in grade school whenever I heard the ``midnight basketball'' debates over the recently enacted crime bill.
It seemed as obvious to me during the debates as it did during sixth grade that prevention is better -and cheaper - than cure. And yet, there were all these village elders disparaging programs aimed at tempting young people into organized, adult-supervised activity as ``pork'' - as a waste of money that might be better spent on cops and prison cells.
Part of what was happening, of course, was sheer politics: legislators wishing to sound tougher-than-thou on crime for their constituents, Republicans opposing provisions of the omnibus bill for no other reason than that Democrats had proposed them.
But part of it was at least as heartfelt as the discussion in ``A Fence or an Ambulance.'' The disparagers of midnight basketball are not opposed to prevention, or even to recreation. Their point is that when you've got both a limited budget and a crisis, it makes sense to abandon the nice-to-have in favor of the must-do.
The children playing near the edge of the cliff may be, in their view, ``at risk,'' but they are not yet a social or budgetary problem. Those who have gone over the behavioral edge clearly are. If money were not an issue, the naysayers might agree to both fences and ambulances. But given the fiscal realities, it seems clear to them that the already-fallen must be the priority.
Besides, many of the pro-ambulance people really do not see any worthwhile connection between recreation and crime prevention. They believe that crime is the product of permissiveness, willful wickedness and warped values. But where do they imagine these values are formed? Do they really believe that they can be modified through sterner law enforcement alone?
Law-enforcement people know better, which is why police departments across America are involved in athletic leagues and youth clubs. These activities - and recreation centers and drama clubs and, yes, midnight basketball leagues - can remind young people that cops aren't necessarily their enemy and that there are adults who care about them even though they don't have to.
And these connections with caring adults provide the opportunity to transmit and alter values.
This isn't just theory. I've seen once-defiant youngsters learn to suppress their outrage over a referee's bad call against them. I've watched selfish kids become team players. I've observed the transformation as boys and girls learn to internalize rules that once made no sense to them. I've seen the changed behavior.
And so have you, even if it's most conspicuous in its absence. The next time you see a fight on a basketball court, ask yourself why such fights are so rare. Ask yourself why the youngster whose peer-group ethic is to go to war over an unintended slight does not throw a punch at the kid who has ``dissed'' him by putting on a spin move and dunking over him.
No, it's not about protecting athletic eligibility at school, or perhaps landing a college scholarship. A lot of these youngsters can't even make their high school teams. Still their coaches manage to teach them such important lessons as winning without gloating, losing with grace and playing by the rules.
Can I prove that any of this prevents crime? No. Do I doubt that it does? Not for a minute. John Malins had it right years before the crime-bill debate:
... Better guide well the young than reclaim them when old,
For the voice of true wisdom is calling,
``To rescue the fallen is good, but 'tis best
To prevent other people from falling.
Better close up the source of temptation and crime
Than deliver from dungeon or galley;
Better put a strong fence 'round the top of the cliff
Than an ambulance down in the valley.
Washington Post Writers Group
by CNB