Le Sequoit

Unfit for the Masses

WPR's modus operandi is to bring on a guest for an entire hour, or perhaps two guests of opposing views, and devote as much time as possible to listeners' questions. This does necessitate a lot of listening to a lot of poorly thought out and ill-prepared comments and questions, but by the end of the hour a good collection of popular opinion is married to professional opinion and this turns out to be a decent reflection of what people are thinking.

Today one hour was devoted to sports and children, opportune after that last post.

Everyone weighed in, except the kids. First came the old grumps like me extolling the virtues of the bucolic 50's, when we made our own fun. The "expert" responded with that concept that creeps steadily into our collective consciousness―that pernicious, petrifying piece of pragmatism that feeds the darkness settling around us―that it's a new world somehow, and that we are suddenly not safe―our children are not safe. Children were never safe, but now the interviewee's child plays "on his own" and so develops ability to construct socially "on his own" in free play portions of practice, but for safety's sake within eyesight and earshot of five or six adults. Right.

And then came the "Why does everything have to be so competitive?" crowd, the extreme exercise in missing the point. "My son is eleven and says this is his last year," and "My daughter just doesn't seem to be enjoying herself, she spends most of her time on the bench because the coach is so intent on winning." Winning isn't everything, but doing something well is. Doing something well generally translates into winning. Isn't that a tough bit of logic? In a backhanded way, this is one of the things youth sports does well. "You suck, kid, don't waste any time looking for something you do do well!"

That's a lot of welling in do do.

Somewhere a high school school coach had the time in his bleak, underpaid and overworked existence to listen to the radio and chime in with the inevitable, "Sports build's character." There's no denying this. Leaders learn to shine, and followers learn to subordinate their ego for the common cause. This is fantastic experience to prepare one for organizational cooperation that will be expected in later life, and quite a learning one for those on the receiving end of such character―for those subject to its humiliating and sometimes violent ends. But very, very few will participate in these roles into their teens, these players at varsity levels will be populated heavily by fortunate children, for whom the transportation, equipment and interest needs for the extreme schedule they will be expected to maintain can only be met by a more leisurely parental lifestyle than most enjoy. Thus this character building, though heavily funded by everyone, is quite undemocratic..

And then, "They need the exercise." Youth sports isn't about exercise, certainly not as a mass movement (sorry). Sure, the swimming and cross country teams are in shape, all twenty of them. Exercise isn't about winning, exercise is just about exercise. You don't need a 4 million dollar sports center to get some some exercise. and you don't need four assistant coaches. You need self-awareness. You need encouragement. You need philosophy.

Fitness is an expression of the self, and will never be a widely successful result of a system that is designed to subjugate that awareness. The strong-bonding elitism inherent in organized sports serves to clear the gridiron of the masses and has nothing to do with the overall fitness of our youth.

For some, the local soccer field is best to be a competitive training ground, for others a serene playing field of socialization―so goes most of the argument.

What it will never be is about health.

posted by sequoit @ 10:16 AM