Marching season and parental rivalries

Even with four kids of my own, I don’t like to offer parenting advice. My later-in-life law studies support this decision. People have a Constitutional right to parent how they see fit. The Supreme Court says so!

Now, do other parents annoy me? Absolutely. It happens most often when other parents seem to be a little, umm, too involved in their children’s achievements.

I feel like I’m proud of my kids at the appropriate level. Their successes make me happy, sure, but I don’t define my happiness by their happiness. I don’t want their happiness to be conditioned on mine either. I let them be their own people, and I celebrate them in a measured enough way that it doesn’t become about me.

My oldest daughter just finished her second season in competitive marching band at her high school. The program is impressive and I marvel at how many hours and how much effort the coaches and students put into their show. I honestly think I’d feel the same about them regardless of the outcome of competitions.

Their success, in fact, makes me uncomfortable. I’m not used to seeing it. I don’t invest emotionally in historically successful enterprises. I’m a Minnesota Twins fan!

Across two seasons, the band had a consecutive run of first place finishes. To the coaching team’s credit, they’ve been gracious winners, cheering equally for other schools, sharing praise and connecting with other students all over the region. The bands’ other parents seem respectful as well, at least from my vantage point. Claps and cheers at all the appropriate moments. A few pompoms scattered about the crowd. Nobody making a show of themselves and pushing for their own attention.

Perhaps many of the other parents share the same attitude as I do. “Yay, they won… now let’s go figure out what to eat for dinner.”

Well, apparently, a few parents at a couple “rival” schools feel differently about competitive band.

Throughout the season, I learned that my daughter’s band was frequently getting “attacked” by students and other parents online. Instagram and TikTok apparently house the majority of the hate — two platforms I don’t really use.

A sampling of the accusations:

“They pay the judges for high scores.”

“They stole the choreography from another school.”

“They used A.I. to design their show.”

“Their music is synched and not live.”

Well, as far as I know, none of those things are true, but I do love the conspiratorial tone and apparent extreme nefariousness happening at my daughter’s school.

None of the “hate” seemed real until the last couple events of the season, when a crowd of a few parents (from two other schools in particular) started being openly hostile in the stands. Snickers and scuffs when our daughter’s band took the field. A few stray remarks. Even a couple instances of booing!

I found this baffling. Is this what Yankees and Dodgers fans feel like when they visit rival stadiums?*

*Answer: No. Yankees and Dodgers fans figure out how to be obnoxious anywhere they go.

These same parents also started treating their school’s performances like a Monster Truck rally. Ear-piercingly loud screeches. Strange remarks (in jokes?) bellowed at individual performers. Horns, noise clackers and near constant applause throughout their kids’ 15-minute program. I couldn’t tell you how the music sounded because all I could hear were their rowdy, sometimes nonsensical exclamations.

At the last performance, there was even a heated confrontation between one of the rowdy parents and a woman from an entirely different school. The woman politely asked one of these bozos to sit down so she could take a picture of her daughter getting ready for her solo. He refused to sit down and well… words were exchanged. These are still mostly civilized people, after all.

Anyway, my daughter’s band took second place at this last competition, though they hit one of their highest ever point totals. My daughter reported that she felt great afterward because it was a “locked in, consistent run.” It felt like one of her best performances. She was devastated, however, that the season was over and that the seniors wouldn’t be back in the fall.

One of the two “underdog” schools scored just a bit higher and took first place. The kids deserved the win! They performed their best run of the season… despite it probably being difficult for the judges to hear their music over the parents screaming.*

*I don’t understand the scoring at these competitions. I do not know how you “win.”

The “underdog” parents went into overdrive. They not only acted like their favorite team won the Super Bowl; they acted as if they caught the winning touchdown.

The whole experience reminded me of watching “Friday Night Lights,” a legitimately great show about how parents and townsfolk care a little too much about the physical exertions of 16-year-olds. Fandom can be insane, I guess. At least DraftKings isn’t involved yet.

I suppose some might think I’m complaining because the band we support had such a run of success that we became “detached” or “ungrateful.” If I knew how to check the “chatter” online, I might expect to see comments like, “Look at those snob’s faces when they expected to win but realized they didn’t.”

I will say that while my daughter is a good student, she has never been athletically gifted or participating in any real “good” team. None of my kids have. Wilsons don’t win.

So, my only response to the negativity would be the words uttered by my daughter when discussing their loss.

“Eh, it’s not that deep.”

Second place still seems impressive to me. So would 7th or 10th place, because, honestly, every one of the bands play complicated music and execute choreography I never thought possible while holding a tuba. Before all this, I thought marching bands, well, marched, and played a constant loop of “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

While I don’t like to give parenting advice, I will offer some spectator advice to the newly minted champs: Leave the bull horns at home next season and cheer (reasonably) for the effort rather than the achievement. It’s your kids’ accomplishment, not yours.

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Tyler Wilson is an attorney, freelance writer and parent to four kids, ages 9-15. He is tired.