Two youth baseball coaches in Indiana, Scott Kaletha and Mike Schwanke, who allegedly engaged in the homophobic taunting of one of his 12-year-old players were suspended for a year after an investigation earlier this summer. But that suspension has been overturned by local Park and Recreation Board on a 3-2 vote after nine hours of hearings and testimony. What’s gross is that the coaches acknowledge they often call their players names like “homo and fag.”
Garbacik’s [the superintendent who originally suspended the coaches] decision came after a two-month investigation that started with complaints a 12-year-old baseball player was being harassed. The boy’s parents contacted Garbacik in June after finding out their son was being called names such as “gay, fag, homo and queer” by other players.
Kaletha told Garbacik he was aware of the comments, but called it “joking and humor” and “just boys being boys.”
Both coaches said the comments had been made for some time, but they denied participating in the harassment. However, Kaletha said he often engages in name-calling with players and said it was a common practice among coaches when he was a young player to use words such as “homo and fag.”
Hat tip to Pat Griffin, who has contact info for the people who overturned the suspension.
on Oct 30th, 2008 at 12:20 am
To make sure I’m keeping things “fair and balanced,” I always insert the N- word where the F- word is being used and see if the reaction–official or societally–would be the same.
Clearly, if Cromagnon coach had used the N- word, he’d be long, long, long gone.
on Oct 30th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
People should start using nigger and cracker to describe them, and maybe they’ll stop using fag.
on Oct 31st, 2008 at 9:06 am
I receive the Michigan City paper and if the they would have called them “N”worders they would have been ran out of town. Mich. City has a huge balck population. Being so close to Chicago and a huge lake front. A lot gays live here. La Porte County is a good area for gays to live.