By Renée Brack
With cricket on and kids back in school, will sledging they learn from their sporting heroes spill into the playground?
Sledging is specific to sport, rife in cricket and is an adult form of public bullying with paltry reprimands that don’t discourage it.
Ross Bark of Best Enemies takes anti-intimidation campaigns into schools and sees the direct correlation between sledging and bullying.
“It’s tough for an anti-bullying message to get through to kids when the people they admire are behaving badly. You couldn’t get away with it in the workplace now so why is it still acceptable on the sports field?” he says.