And it continues!!

[Blackwater 53393]

Watching TV this morning, I saw this Mass Mutual commercial that should be “required viewing” for anyone who has children, with a critical and powerful explanation as to why this is SO WRONG!!

 

This self important, politically correct fungus is sitting in the stands at a youth baseball game. There’s a kid at the plate, swinging a bat and what we’re going to assume is a mom standing, shouting encouragement to the child.

 

This, (I can’t use terminology to describe him with any hope of remaining here in the future) is responding with comments to the effect that the child has no hope of hitting the ball, because the odds of him becoming a professional athlete are daunting and that any other endeavor would be more productive and that the kid could never be the best and on and on!

 

Mr. bigmouth has no way of knowing WHAT this young man might become!!  What if this was the next Mantle or Ryan or Aaron??

 

We SHOULD be cheering and encouraging our children to do their very best and to be their very best in EVERYTHING THEY DO!! 
 

What this fungus, (and YES!! he is a fungus) is doing is undermining the child’s self esteem and his willingness to do his best!  
 

This sort of thing should never reach the public!!  This man’s behavior should never be acceptable!!

[Singin' Sue 71615]

Mass Mutual??

 

This 'battle' has gone on for ages...

The extreme of parents pushing children/belittling/punishing if that child did not meet their(the parents) goal.

The ones who say 'poor baby'...giving the child an excuse to blame something else for not achieving the goal, instead of letting the child know that even when trying your best can still end in 'dissapointment'.

And those that say 'everyone is a winner' even those who never put an effort into play.

 

I don't agree with the 'no one loses' ' everyone gets a medal' attitude being pushed today...

But where does your post speak to the 'participation trophy syndrome'?

[Singin' Sue 71615]

PS...

I hate that term being used and thrown around in our CAS family.

A match has their choice how to give awards.

Top ten

Top five

Top three

A sliding scale on amount of folks in the catagory.

(Yes, there are a lot of catagories)

I load, I shoot, I clean my guns, I dress up (sometimes sew my own clothes) I work in the posse...

If I earn a medal, I earned it. Even if there are only 3 in my catagory...I earned 3rd.

Just my honest opinion.

[Sedalia Dave]

 

[Wallaby Jack, SASS #44062]

I'm glad that doesn't appear on my tv; for all, and more, of the reasons stated above.

 How could the advertiser expect to gain,in any way, from this message ???

[Singin' Sue 71615]

49 minutes ago, Sedalia Dave said:

 

Thanks.

A supportive parent and a 'why try, you're screwed parent'...geeze.

2 minutes ago, Wallaby Jack, SASS #44062 said:

I'm glad that doesn't appear on my tv; for all, and more, of the reasons stated above.

 How could the advertiser expect to gain,in any way, from this message ???

Exactly!!!

[Derringer Dan]

Commercials these days are horrible. Can’t count the amount of them that simply make me shake my head and say  “Really”

[Waxahachie Kid #17017 L]

Growing up, for me, it was: first place, second place, third place. That was it. No "participation" award. It made us want to try harder next season. 

We did not get a participation award, we did not expect one. It means more if one competes, and earns it.

Also, as was stated, you can try as hard as you can, and try the best you can, and you can still not win. That's life.  

It takes incentive to do better. If everyone wins something, where is the incentive??? Also...real life, the life that goes on outside of school, and childhood, won't give you anything, but perhaps a meal, and a sermon, at the local mission.

In our 9th grade football changing room, the coach had a sign put up. It said: "The difference between good, and great, is effort".  

Many, if not most, life lessons are hard learned, and can be learned no other way than to experience them first hand.  

 

[Blackwater 53393]

4 hours ago, Singin' Sue 71615 said:

 

 

I don't agree with the 'no one loses' ' everyone gets a medal' attitude being pushed today...

But where does your post speak to the 'participation trophy syndrome'?

This whole commercial illustrates that participation trophy attitude!!  The jerk sits there and tells the child that he needn’t really try to compete, that it will do no good and that he will never excell!!

 

I coached, refereed, and umpired for years when my son and his friends played sports!! My son is now forty years old. It had already begun, (the participation trophy thing) and some parents, like the fungus, had already begun to demean young athletes who actually tried to do their best!  Moms and Dads like myself and Schoolmarm were sometimes taken to task by these “people” who felt like parents and coaches shouldn’t encourage the effort for excellence!!

 

The participation trophy syndrome has taken the desire to excell and to do ones best and made them less than acceptable, particularly among those who don’t see any reason to excell, or who are too lazy or shiftless to put forth the effort.

[Singin' Sue 71615]

16 minutes ago, Blackwater 53393 said:

This whole commercial illustrates that participation trophy attitude!!  The jerk sits there and tells the child that he needn’t really try to compete, that it will do no good and that he will never excell!!

 

I coached, refereed, and umpired for years when my son and his friends played sports!! My son is now forty years old. It had already begun, (the participation trophy thing) and some parents, like the fungus, had already begun to demean young athletes who actually tried to do their best!  Moms and Dads like myself and Schoolmarm were sometimes taken to task by these “people” who felt like parents and coaches shouldn’t encourage the effort for excellence!!

 

The participation trophy syndrome has taken the desire to excell and to do ones best and made them less than acceptable, particularly among those who don’t see any reason to excell, or who are too lazy or shiftless to put forth the effort.

I get it. I do.

After seeing the clip...your post made more connections.

Yes...we have 6 kids.

3 were into music, three into sports.

They all were encouraged and excelled.

 

BUT...I still see it as bad parenting...

 

When I think of the PTS (hmmmm....) I think of the daycare Tim Taylor takes his grandson to and leaves...the 'everything is acceptable, as long as we accept it' attitude. No one wins, no one loses...we are all in this together equally. (because we really aren't)

 

There is a reason Matt Black has been Champion many over...as well as Holy Terror.

(I use them, because they have the most wins in my time as a SASS shooter)

[Singin' Sue 71615]

38 minutes ago, Waxahachie Kid #17017 L said:

Growing up, for me, it was: first place, second place, third place. That was it. No "participation" award. It made us want to try harder next season. 

We did not get a participation award, we did not expect one. It means more if one competes, and earns it.

Also, as was stated, you can try as hard as you can, and try the best you can, and you can still not win. That's life.  

It takes incentive to do better. If everyone wins something, where is the incentive??? Also...real life, the life that goes on outside of school, and childhood, won't give you anything, but perhaps a meal, and a sermon, at the local mission.

In our 9th grade football changing room, the coach had a sign put up. It said: "The difference between good, and great, is effort".  

Many, if not most, life lessons are hard learned, and can be learned no other way than to experience them first hand.  

 

Listening to you...I think our daddys would have been best buddies!

[Smuteye John SASS#24774]

1 hour ago, Blackwater 53393 said:

This whole commercial illustrates that participation trophy attitude!!  The jerk sits there and tells the child that he needn’t really try to compete, that it will do no good and that he will never excell!!

 

I coached, refereed, and umpired for years when my son and his friends played sports!! My son is now forty years old. It had already begun, (the participation trophy thing) and some parents, like the fungus, had already begun to demean young athletes who actually tried to do their best!  Moms and Dads like myself and Schoolmarm were sometimes taken to task by these “people” who felt like parents and coaches shouldn’t encourage the effort for excellence!!

 

The participation trophy syndrome has taken the desire to excell and to do ones best and made them less than acceptable, particularly among those who don’t see any reason to excell, or who are too lazy or shiftless to put forth the effort.

Isn't it odd how the same folks' kids are the ones that show up with a brand new glove that never quite breaks in and don't have the first clue about how to catch, field, hit or throw?

 

But Momma and Daddy want to know why they are stuck out in right field instead of playing a base.  Putting one of those poor kids on 1st, 3rd or at shortstop should be considered child abuse and endangerment.

 

Saw it happen one time- just to shut up the Dad.  Poor girl got put on 1st, the ball was dribbled down the 3rd base line, 3rd baseman charged, fielded it and came up firing.  The 1st baseman bailed (as in ran away) and was trying to climb over the fence to get away from the ball.

 

Wanna kill a kid's self esteem?

 

It's easy and doesn't have a thing to do with some stupid trophy.

 

Stick them in a situation where they don't know what they are doing, put them in the spotlight where everyone's watching them and set them up to fail at that moment. 

 

You know, like having the ball hit right at them when they don't know what to do when it gets there.

 

Every year when my nieces were little and played softball, they went out of their way to invite teammates that didn't get the support they needed at home over to their house after school so they could actually learn how to stop the ball without getting hit by it and throw it straight.  I can't tell you how many times I came home from work and I found myself playing catch with some little girl I'd never seen before that was scared of the ball because she had no clue how to stop getting hit by it and I found myself having to teach her the bare basics of using a glove- even if it was just in self defense.

[Blackwater 53393]

Yeah! I had that a lot!  Most times, the other coaches and I got the kids through it safely.  A very few kids decided it wasn’t fun and left the program. A few of those actually came back and played a year or two later, successfully.

 

 I had one young man who started playing with us as a seven year old. Scared to death of the ball and trembled when he would come up to bat.  He really had no business being out there the first couple of years and his mom, (divorced and just wanting someone to watch the kid while she chased guys) wouldn’t work with him. His father lived in another part of the state and wasn’t around.  But the kid wanted to play and was willing to ride the bench and get into the game for the minimum required time. He improved slowly and we spent extra time and effort with him.

 

He moved away the summer after he finished 11/12 year olds.

 

 I saw him a few years later when that group had begun playing high school ball.  He walked up to me in a Walmart on the other side of the county one Saturday afternoon. “Hey coach!” he called out. He was wearing the practice jersey of the local high school team. “You always said I’d “get it” one day,” he reminded me. I just smiled and shook his hand.  “I moved in with my dad when he moved back to town and he started working with me like you did. I’m playing left field and batting fifth!”

 

I have other stories, good and not so good.  None of the good ones come from the participation trophy crowd.

 

My point in the op of this thread isn’t really so much about the kids as it is about the pervasive attitude that doing your best and trying to excell is now less than acceptable and that encouraging your children to try harder, practice, and to support them in these efforts is somehow wrong!!

 

What’s wrong is to lower the expectation of them giving their best effort!!  Teach them that they CANNOT win every time, but that to not do their dead level best is what will make them losers!!