If you haven't heard lately, there has been a news story about a kid that made a crazy hockey shot to win $50,000. If you already know the story feel free to jump to the next paragraph right now. If you don't what happened is this. This insurance company has a contest/raffle at a charity hockey game that they offer $50,000 to a kid if they can shoot a hockey puck from center ice and put it through a hole that is literally only 1/2 inch larger than the puck. They draw this kid's name (Nick Smith). He makes it and wins the money! Only it wasn't him. It was his twin brother. Nick went home so Nate took the shot. The next day the dad comes clean that he sent the twin up there and he returns the money. There is a debate on if he did this of his own free will or if he came clean because some people in this town knew it was the wrong kid and were going to spill the beans anyways if he didn't.
The thing is that now there is controversy that the insurance company should?/will?/might need to?/might want to? pay the kid anyways for making the shot.
While I am not denying the shot was fantastic (you can find it by googling it if you haven't seen it) I don't like where this is going. I don't mind if the kid gets some kudos for the shot; it was fun and he did a good job.
But are we teaching everyone that if you cheat and win money that you should be able to keep the money?
What are we teaching our kids? If the dad truly did return the money on his own you could say good job to him but what in the world was he cheating for in the first place? Didn't he just show his kid that if you find a chance to win money you should go for it even if you aren't being honest? And if you win that money you should take it and run and hopefully you return it later because your conscience is bothering you? And then since you were so "honest" by returning it that it is right that the money should be given to you anyways?
How in the world did this ever become a debate? Why are we teaching our kids that this is in any way ok?
Do we really want to go down this road? Have we already gone down this road by doing this?
I am disturbed that our society holds honesty and integrity in such low esteem that this has ever become an issue. We should be teaching our children and neighbors to do what is right and what is honest the first time, not as a secondary consideration.
Perhaps this is a big reason why the world is in the shape it is today; perhaps this is what has driven the world to be in the shape it is today. While there are good people out there, we have a few too many of this type of thing going on. We should really get back to honor and integrity and honesty before we are the end of ourselves as people.
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