Submitted by: Michael Spindell, guest blogger
“For when the One Great Scorer comes
To mark against your name,
He writes – not that you won or lost –
But how you played the Game.”
by Grantland Rice
How many of us grew up with the paraphrase of these words ringing in our ears as we participated in all of the competitions that humans partake in. These sentiments represented the epitome of humans engaging in fair contests, the object of which was defining dominance in a particular field and/or activity. We were all supposed to be “fair”, “play by the rules”, honor our opponents and most of all treat them with respect. Much of this was first defined in Western Culture by the Code of Chivalry which not only defined how men hacked each other to death on the battlefield, but also how they were to treat the “fairer” (weaker) sex. As the merchant class rose and nobility declined, Chivalry was subsumed in Western Culture by the notion of “fair play”. That all of these concepts have been but hypocritical touchstones meant to add the veneer of human nobility, to human competition, is rarely admitted by those who promote competition for financial and/or political gain.
Thoughts of this came to me as I watched the Olympics this year, listening to the portentous palaver of the announcers, discussing the contests and the purported values behind them. Yes I felt tears of patriotic pride as Gabby Douglas won the gymnastics Gold Medal, but I also saw the pain on the face of Viktoria Komova, who “only” won the Silver Medal. Implicit was that the Russian gymnast had failed in her quest and that she would forever be marked by this failure. This is the hypocritical dichotomy that is pursued in all avenues of competitive human endeavor when reported upon by the media.
Humanity reached the top of the “food chain” by defeating the competition over eons of strife with other fierce predators. While there are still valid arguments on each side of the question as to how human society developed, whether in a spirit of cooperation, or as a rigid imposition of the will of the “leader”, we cannot question that we attained our status because of our predatory talents. Once the “order” of society was imposed humanity began to learn to sublimate battles to the death for proof of supremacy, into “contests” of talent. We learned to sort out our “hierarchy” through these contests and indeed they have developed into a wide range of competitions that most of us use to determine our places in the world. This is not a controversial idea, but even so I would like to take a step back from it and look at the obvious background of human competition that is missed as we “crown” our champions and pity those who could not measure up. The Olympic Movement is a very problematic one. I could go into its mixed history of bigotry, commercialism, deception and tragedy, but that is perhaps for another time.
What I want to explore is the short shrift given by the media to the incredible individual efforts made by so many people who have dedicated their lives to attaining the worldwide stage that the Olympics represent and yet have fallen short of being able to participate, much less attain medals. Since attaining its worldwide popularity the Olympics has bred the spirit of competition in various fields in all corners of the world. For events like gymnastics, or swimming, to even begin to think of getting to the Olympics requires a dedication in early childhood to endless hours of practice and competition on all levels. This is actually true of success in all sports and as the dedicated child grows the competition begins to “weed” out those who lack the talents and/or dedication to their chosen competitive field.
An eight year old that has beaten all those in her county at swim meets finds herself finishing last in a Statewide competition. She might shrug off that defeat and redouble her training efforts, possibly increasing her talents to the point that by High School she has become competitive Statewide, or she may simply adjust to the possibility that the “Olympic Dream” is not possible for her and go on to pursue other avenues towards her personal vision of success. Is only being the best swimmer in ones’ county a failure?
No one would have ever, at any stage of my life, have confused me with being an athlete. Yet I spent much of my childhood participating in all kinds of sports, though never on an organized basis. I have my memories of triumphs and my memories of defeats. I spent hours in solitary practice sessions learning to throw and field a ball off a brick wall. My place in the pecking order was determined in “pick-up” ball games, since I was always chosen near to last. As much as I desired to be considered “good” among my peers, I came to realize that for me being considered “fair” was a triumph. What of those I played with who were the “Captains” choosing, or the first choices? Some went on I suppose to play organized baseball in High School but none ever made it in college sports, or went on to play professionally. This is as it is for most people who engage in competition on all levels. It is but a special few that rise to the point where they can represent their nation on the world stage.
The question remaining in my mind, as these games draw to their conclusion, is whether those “losers” feel satisfaction in the fact that even though they’ve achieved no medals, their lifetime of effort was worth it? Do we really live in a world where it only matters “how you played the game”, or is it that only “winning” that counts? When you start so young to dedicate yourself to the achievement of success in sport does “failing” leave you with emptiness and recriminations?
Aside from sports our particular American culture is one that worships perceived “success”. This success can range from tangible achievements in given fields, the amassing of great wealth, political office, academic recognition and/or simply being born into a notable family. With the advent of the mass media we see that even appearing briefly on television can turn someone of little accomplishment into a “celebrity”. Jonathan Turley, the creator of this blog is a legitimate “celebrity”. He appears regularly on TV, is renowned for his championing of the Constitution via both the courts and in the press. To all of us who sojourn here, he is well-deservedly famous and a figure of respect for all that he has accomplished. Yet with it all, Professor Turley is nowhere near as famous a celebrity as the “Octomom”, Paris Hilton, or the Kardashian family. With respect to the Kardashian’s, remember it was their patriarch, the lawyer Robert Kardashian, who put them into a position to achieve fame by being O.J. Simpson’s original attorney in the murder case. In the Celebrity Fame Game, all that our Professor has going for him is defending a family made famous by being polygamous on a reality show. The quite tangible accomplishments of his career are well recognized by his peers, his students and his followers, yet it is doubtful that he will ever be offered his own “reality” show, or even discussed on “Entertainment Tonight”.
At my advanced age, I can truthfully say that I look back on my life so far as a successful one. In my own particular terms I’ve played the game well, despite lack of wealth, celebrity and/or outside recognition of achievement. Perhaps though I was never driven, or drove myself to achieve anything more than a woman to love and the fulfillment of children resulting from that love. To be perfectly honest I’ve always had an arrogance about myself to the extent that I’ve always liked and believed in me, so I’ve never really cared what other people thought of me. I would hope that most people would feel that way about themselves, but my training and my career have shown that not to be the case. When I see a sixteen year old singer in front of millions of people on “American Idol” saying that winning that contest is the most important thing in their life, I believe that singer and I grieve for that singer. I understand now that outward trappings of success often mask inner pangs of longing that will never find solace, or peace.
This is then my tribute to all of those whose losses the mass media culture decries as failure. In my opinion it is “how you play the game”, since in the end as mortal beings there is little comfort in the immortality of records, money or other achievements. Perhaps it is that belief though that has ensured my lack of outward fame, wealth and celebrity. If only I tried harder, dedicated myself more and refused to accept losing I could have been a contender. Since I’ve already admitted my arrogance in not caring about your judgment of me, perhaps you might give your own judgment of yourself, or whether you think playing the game well, is just as good as winning.
Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger
Blouise, I was thinking, myself, “I wonder if I could find that book.” It was written 25 years ago in another state, and it was about ten pages of 8-1/2″ X 11″ paper folded over and stapled, and it is possible that it still exists. But my papers (not just those, which I call “primary documents,” but all my papers including a current lawsuit I brought to sue lawyers who actually entered into agreements with my adversaries behind my back) are in quite a terrible mess. I just returned from the West Coast (to the East) where I went to visit my friend and get her settled into a hospice; she died before that could happen, though. Then I quickly and obsessively (had to finish fast, had to provide papers to executrix of her estate, etc.) ran through all her papers, and met my deadlines, and my hands were all cracked from handling paper all day (the acid? the dust?) and on the plane flying home, I had the sudden realization that I need to go through all my papers so nobody needs to do this if I get hit by a truck (or god strikes me with lightening for being bad).
I’m going to start on the paperwork project this weekend. I’m blogging now to keep myself from going there; how I dread most of it. Finding my son’s book would be a bright spot, though. I will try.
It is gratifying that you are interested in it, thank you. I’m going to ask him if he remembers it well. The plot was simply that a boy his age (with some made up name) wanted the prize, competed for it, didn’t win it, and then had to settle himself down and not get overly upset because of the “loss” — and he managed to do it by agreeing with himself that he had not LOST anything because he didn’t HAVE the prize to start with and all that happened was that he didn’t get what he wanted. He adjusted by arguing with himself, CBT-style, that he DID like the contest itself, and that he DID like doing whatever it was the contest involved (racing or jumping or something else, who knows?) and that he DID like himself for doing it, so the value of the prize became less and less as he assigned more value to other things.
Mike S.,
I enjoyed your discussion concerning organized baseball growing up. Even back in my day, some of the parents pushed the kids too hard. I enjoyed the sports that I played in grade school and high school and beyond and I learned some lessons along the way. I was also into softball, but my game in the Chicago area was 16 inch softball! I still miss it. However, even though I love getting after the refs and umpires, I tried not to push my kids too hard.
All sports, I feel, are modelled after A) the chase for food, B) the need to battle to protect your “own”.
Thus we recognize and value instinctively the “good” resultes. Football/soccer recognizes agility and sense for where the game will run to get away.
Similar analogies will apply to other sports. That the sport becmes modified far from its original purpose of chase is of course a result of our social evolutional height over the millenia.
Out at the radio control flying field the other day, some of the folks were talking about the kid who has won national and international championships in his age group several years in a row. He is now a teenager. He flies radio controlled precision aerobatics. His father makes him practice on the R/C computer simulator up to five hours a day. One of the guys observed that he bet the kid never flies again after he leaves home to be on his own.
That is probably going to be exactly what happens. I have seen that phenomenon before.
I skippd the comments to come here. Is that arrogance? Perhaps.
What to do? To praise? The blog speaks so well for itself that my words could add little. Those who know me or think they do are not interested in another story.
So, it will be a “We do it differently in Sweden” story.
It is a sport growing slowly internationally. The Brits have a variant which can be play ïn the deserts of Saudi (as I did with them) where there are no forests.
It is “orientering”.
The competition requires from a given start point to find your way through a forest to certain waystations and then to goal, with the help of a compass and a detailed topograöhic map.
The value, other than the exercise is the social atmosphere. It can be done from 5 years of age to whatever age, all in age graded groups and by sexes of course. It is thus a family sport, giving the chance of those enhancements to competition within and between families, etc.
There is even a world championship for the best.
Is becoming a world champ the purpose? No, not even in dreams of much money, career, etc. Is it becoming a rich athlete? No. Is it beconing a celebrity. Of course not.
Companionship and love are the rewards.
Which I think answers one of MikeS’ questions.
Malisha,
If you can find the book, I’d enjoy reading it.
Blouise, thanks. Every time somebody realizes how cool my kid is, I get this rush like I won a gold medal.
My kid has a great way with turning a phrase. Two of his standards now are:
“Worse things have happened to better people” [when disappointed]
and
“Shoulda woulda coulda” [whenever]
“What happens when you like a prize better than you like yourself?” (Malisha’s son) … fantastic!!!
Malisha 1, August 11, 2012 at 11:39 am
…
Of course, if the original purpose for men to compete (so much, so constantly, so passionately) was for women …
=========================================
I was taught that too.
When the women began competing for my attention and affection I became confused.
It caused me to read.
I found even more perplexing ideologies:
(Mammals Made By Viruses). A virus that allows your placenta to function properly, or else, is more important to your having children than submitting to a male who won the gold medal in your heart.
Nick, we used to have a guy on some of these threads who would educate me on the male/female thing by calling me a Feminazi and a “silly c*nt” and sh*t like that, and I still believed that I had understood the basics better than he had. (He’s either not on the current threads or changed his name or something but nowadays I can say something about men or women without calling forth a firestorm of protest.) The only reason I can see for testosterone to correlate with competitiveness is that, biologically, men are designed to want to compete with other men in order to attract someone (a woman of child-bearing years) to carry their genes into the next generation for them. By showing the women that they are the physically fittest of their male group, they have a chance of getting the cooperation (in that endeavor) of the women who will be most likely to help them succeed at that goal.
I’m not here to tell you I “get it” more than you do or that you can’t instruct me in the ways of testosterone, but I raised a male child who not only knows how to compete, he knows how to lead, and he’s damn good. But not because competition was the major goal of his childhood. When he took “tumbling” (a precursor to gymnastics) he was the best in his class so the teacher used him for the demonstrator. He practiced a lot at home so he would be good enough to do the demonstrations perfectly and assist his teacher; having “won” and been the best was a responsibility for him. One time in second grade, he thought he should win a prize and he didn’t win it. We dealt with that and then I advised him to write a book about it, small book, anything he wanted to say. He wrote a book (illustrated it nicely) entitled: “What happens when you like a prize better than you like yourself?” He didn’t enter the book in any contests, but maybe he should have.
Of course, if the original purpose for men to compete (so much, so constantly, so passionately) was for women, what has happened now? Now men compete BEYOND the goal of succeeding at getting women to help them reproduce; now they compete with everyone including women; now they don’t stop competing even when the other competitors are far behind. Now they have increased the distances between the winners and the others so that there are BIG WINNERS and MILLIONS OF LOSERS. Now everything has morphed into something quite addictive about winning.
Now, also, our culture has things so turned around that “every dog [should] ha[ve] his day” and there’s more competition among women for MEN than vice versa, and that’s one of our biggest problems, in my opinion. If women were choosing mates rather than seeking to be chosen BY mates, men would be competing in all the ways that benefit the NEXT generation, which would be as it should be. Don’t get me started.
Nick,
You got what I was aiming at. The only time I ever participated i organized sport was Little League at age twelve. Growing up I had never played actual baseball, merely softball and variations like stickball. Tall for my age though, with a good arm I was selected for the LL “Majors” and put on the best team in the league. Because I’ve always been slow afoot my two best positions were First Base and Catcher. My team had both the All Star First Baseman and Catchers in the league and they were significantly better than I. I hated the experience ad the fact that I’d play perhaps a inning a game and I quit after six games. Nevertheless, my summers were spent playing baseball in daily pickup games, which I thoroughly enjoyed even with my being at best a fair player. I played softball regularly into my 40’s when a heart condition finally stopped me. Having had a heart transplant 21 months ago I am again playing
softball this summer and guess what, most of those I play with are significantly better than me. So what, it’s still fun for me.
I agree with you that there has been a significant change since the 80’s. The involvement of parents in their children’s athletic careers can be stifling, especially when those parents seem to live vicariously through their children’s accomplishments. You will note that many of the Olympians like Viktoria Komova, had parents who were also Olympians. how much of Viktoria’s distress at winning “only” Silver was related to disappointing her mother? My athletic memories are quite dear to me, even though I was never a good player. My “greatest” athletic accomplishment was hitting a grand slam home-run, in the bottom of the ninth, with two out and my team losing 6 to 3. This came in a Saturday pickup game in Prospect Park in 1980, yet the memory is dear to me. My future wife was at the game, but wasn’t watching when I did it. It was a glorious moment anyway. 🙂
“While there are still valid arguments on each side of the question as to how human society developed”
One author talks about those “valid arguments”:
(
(The Artificial Ape: How Technology Changed the Course of Human Evolution). But we still hear a lot about “natural selection” don’t we?
The book was written a couple of years ago, before the current human-microbe genetic research that has led to a revolution.
Why are we not talking about 98% of our DNA, but resting our textbooks on only 2% of our DNA?
Why do we ignore the most prolific life forms that have survived FIVE mass extinctions on the Earth?
Because we like to think we can game the system even to the point of destroying it in our glorious great game we call war.
We can’t.
You quoted sportswriter Grantland Rice at the beginning of the piece. He was a sportswriter, but I am also reminded of what UCLA Bruins football coach Henry Russell (“Red”) Sanders, said: “Winning is not the most important thing; it is the only thing.”
The Modern Olympic creed was written by its founder, Pierre de Coubertin: “The most important thing….. is not winning but taking part,” referring to the Games.
Too many spectators, players and even governments have an attitude more like Red Sanders than de Coubertin or Grantland Rice.
As for me, the older I get, the more I lose interest in the Olympics. I must confess that I did not watch a single minute of the Olympics. When I did watch TV, it was usually shows about actual crimes, or documentaries on science. I would rather watch Morgan Freeman narrate “Through the Wormhole” on the Science Channel than a whole afternoon of sports. The reason I have lost interest is the exact thing Raff writes about. I do enjoy NASCAR because of the different attitude about winning. The racers like to win, but just finishing in the top ten is a big deal.
Malisha, This is a male/female thing. There’s this thing called testosterone. And, when it hits boys you better have some positive activity for that hormonal energy. Competition is a great choice. Play, particularly when young is very important. However, in this world, whether you like it or not, there is competition, be it for school, jobs, careers, etc. To not train our kids[male and female] how to compete, and to compete righteously, is akin to parental malpractice. I think Title 9 has been very important in teaching young women how to compete. It sort of comes naturally for those w/ testosterone
Many, many years ago we held an “Olympics” for all the kids at a family reunion. The day before the competition we asked the children about medals and they told us that everybody should get gold but the one who won each event should stand on a stool to accept his/her medal.
Everybody went home with ten gold medals (poker chips sprayed with gold paint), one for each event, and for those who placed 1st in an event, the memory of standing a foot above the others and accepting their applause.
“Humanity reached the top of the “food chain” by defeating the competition over eons of strife with other fierce predators. While there are still valid arguments on each side of the question as to how human society developed, whether in a spirit of cooperation, or as a rigid imposition of the will of the “leader”, we cannot question that we attained our status because of our predatory talents.”
That is the doctrine of the military colleges, which “educate” youth in a nation that spends more on imperialism than all the other nations put together (MOMCOM: A Mean Welfare Queen). They got it originally from Social Darwinists and advocates of Eugenics of the type that indicated human behavior was genetically programmed.
The greatest predators the Earth has seen were destroyed 65 million years ago by an asteroid that formed the Chicxulub (pronounced chick-shoo-loob) giant crater at the tip of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula.
It had nothing whatsoever to do with natural selection, genetics, or biological competition.
The tiniest life forms, microbes, survived that, The Fifth Mass Extinction.
Now, 65 million years later, 98% of our DNA is microbial, that is, put there by microbes, which are symbiont with us, not predators.
I fail to see how “One hundred and fifty years of biological orthodoxy ” (Tim Spector, professor of genetic epidemiology at King’s College London) can be seriously considered as science anymore.
Even more significant than “the love of competition,” in my opinion, is the love of the PLAY itself. When kids play, even a “game” that has no winner, they should enjoy playing. That’s purportedly WHY they play in the first instance. Adults can play for the joy of playing. Competition itself is only a by-produce; we have become focused on it as if it’s the point.
Mike Spindell, Bravo! You said so eloquently what myself and many folks think. I coached baseball 40 years, from Little League to American Legion, inner city, to blue collar, to upper middle class. During that era, 1975-2006, I saw a paradigm shift in sports. At the beginning of my coaching career kids/parents were similar to my experience as a young athlete. Kids played all sports, stars in some, role players in others. In the 80’s it started changing. Parents became akin to stage parents, pushing their kids to play one sport so they could get a scholarship, be an Olympian, etc. It’s out of control now.
Baseball was my love as a kid and I was pretty good. I was good @ football but didn’t really like it, too much practice not enough games. But the blue collar in me kept me playing. I loved basketball almost as much as baseball, but I wasn’t very good. I got cut from the high school team which was tough. But, I sucked it up and played CYO, merely for the love of playing and not feeling inferior per se; just knowing I wasn’t good enough to play varsity.
You captured in this piece what is lost, the love of competition. Most athletes will say they learned a lot more from defeat than victory, much more from failure than success. Thanks for you well crafted opinion.
Sadly, it seems to me the want of much of the population is to be entertained rather than educated but what is worse is how programming decisions are contributing to a feedback loop in the industry.
Shock value is often the determining factor. It is more difficult to write a quality script than it is to show foolish people embarassing themselves. Plus, it is cheaper to produce. If these type of shows rate higher they are more likely to be chosen for next fall. One of the accomplishments of television these days is now we have 900 channels of “nothing on.”
Great article and timely….. One thing I’d add is athletes “Gaming the Game”……or conversely cheating to win…..