Professional Athletes as Role Models
The role of professional athletes as role models for the youth is a debatable topic. Should they be the people your children look up to and try to be like? Or are they just popular people who have let fame get to their head and influence them to make poor choices? While there are many people who believe that they should be responsible for setting good examples for the millions of children in the world, there are equally as many that believe they should not be put under that kind of pressure on top of their playing commitments. The media is a big influence on the opinion of people. It leads them to believe all professional athletes are bad people because of poor choices they get caught making, or it can show them that these athletes are determined, hard-working, and successful people.
Children of this generation are very technologically advanced. More often then not young children have smart phones, iPads, laptops, and other ways to access the internet at all times. It is so easy for them to come across articles, pictures, tweets, etc about their favourite athlete. Because of social media sites like twitter, children can see what their role models are doing at all times. During the 2012 Olympics starting goaltender for the US Woman’s National Team, sent out a risky tweet about former US striker Brandi Chastain and the way she commentates. Many people were against this tweet and believed her to be too opinionated and rude. Other people believed that the tweet was the only way to confront Chastain. They thought it was acceptable because it showed Solo wasn’t going to just sit back and watch Chastain make negative comments about her teammates. This is only one example of a professional athlete getting attention from the media in a negative way. The particular incident caused Solo to lose the respect of many of her younger fans because they did not fully understand the problem at hand.
Although it is unfair that professional athletes earn their reputation from the
Children of this generation are very technologically advanced. More often then not young children have smart phones, iPads, laptops, and other ways to access the internet at all times. It is so easy for them to come across articles, pictures, tweets, etc about their favourite athlete. Because of social media sites like twitter, children can see what their role models are doing at all times. During the 2012 Olympics starting goaltender for the US Woman’s National Team, sent out a risky tweet about former US striker Brandi Chastain and the way she commentates. Many people were against this tweet and believed her to be too opinionated and rude. Other people believed that the tweet was the only way to confront Chastain. They thought it was acceptable because it showed Solo wasn’t going to just sit back and watch Chastain make negative comments about her teammates. This is only one example of a professional athlete getting attention from the media in a negative way. The particular incident caused Solo to lose the respect of many of her younger fans because they did not fully understand the problem at hand.
Although it is unfair that professional athletes earn their reputation from the