Observations From Near And Far

In response to the previous comment and after conferring with numerous officials from around the state, here are our observations of the PROFESSIONAL RANKS OF TENNIS OFFICIATING.

** There is an obvious and highly maintained pecking order among the officials. This begins at the very top and holds true through the smallest professional event. This is not necessarily bad but can be abusive.

** There is a great amount of butt-kissing to advance through the ranks mentioned above. This includes everything from doing menial tasks to sexual favors. Seems that the one who "sleeps with the right person" gets the fastest advancement.

** There is a great amount of personal abuse that goes on from the upper level officials to the lower level officials.

** There is not enough training of people enlisted to do lines at professional tournaments. Evidenced in the lack of training for the line officials in the recent Dallas Challenger.

** Even though the USTA promotes diversity and equality, it is hardly the case. On the contrary, minority officials are usually promoted purely on the color of their skin instead of qualifications and that makes a laughing stock of the call for diversity.

** There is a great deal of sexual harrassment. Seems that there are numerous militant lesbians in positions of authority and then tend to abuse their power. Instances of sexual harrassment by lesbian officials have often been ignored.

** There is a great deal of drug abuse and sexual activity in the professional ranks.

** Most professional chair officials make very poor ITA chair officials.

** Many professional officials (both chair and line) tend to be very disrespectful of people involved in grass roots and ITA officiating.

** Many professional officials tend to give little creedance to making commitments to work ITA and grassroots event. They more often than not tend to cancel these commitments to work professional events.

** Many professional chairs tend to be abusive of people who only call lines.

** There is a culture of feeling superior to anyone who does not do professional events. This culture is taught from the top to the bottom and is detrimental to the development of new officials.

** New officials tend to be quickly promoted on the basis of their physical appearance, color of their skin, and sexual orientation.

These are just a few observations--I'm sure there are many more...

The sad thing is that most of the officials that I most respect in Texas are no longer in professional levels of officiating. Wonder why????