'Merikin priorities. No wunder ours kidz is stoopid

reply to post by Klassified


Are you serious? One of the major problems with Americans growing up to have no personal identity strength and will to overcome adversity is lack of competition and feeding them the your all winners no matter what line. America may not lead in education but our graduates are not stupid they are FREAKING LAZY and WEAK MINDED.

Originally posted by AlwaysWonder
reply to post by hotel1

 

As a matter of fact, America does have two rugby teams (last time I checked).

They played in the world cup in 2007 and 2011. The two teams they have is Georgia and USA.

However, I don't think that they are talking about rugby here, but American football. Rugby and American football is not the same thing.

Isn't this common knowledge???

edit on 13-5-2013 by AlwaysWonder because: (no reason given)

I couldn´t get whether it is sarcasm or not?

Georgia is a country in Europe, not another US team

reply to post by Cabin


Yikes!

Thanks for pointing that out! My bad...

Originally posted by DistantThunder
Coaches and teams don't generate revenue, they use the assets the state taxpayers allocates in a pointless distraction-entertainment-ponzi scheme.

Give any sound business investment $100s of millions to "generate revenue", and I'm sure they could exceed the revenue of a amatuer sports team....so sports isn't unique in that regard.

It's all an exercize in stupidity. "Team work", lol... how about thinking and working independently? Self-reliance, self-starting, PRACTICAL GOALS! All sports manages to do is entertain and brainwash dummies into a torrid state of ignorance.

If one gets distracted, then yes. Although most teams make enormous revenue with ticket fees, advertising deals, all the fan stuff (shirts, caps etc).

I have played soccer and basketball for over 15 years. In basketball I have been in the 2nd highest division locally and played a couple of games in top league also, soccer is currently 3rd strongest division. I sometimes watch sports, although in a way it can be very intellectual activity. Tactics, combinations, psychogical warfare. As long as watching, not doing is not a part of the lifestyle, everything is okay. Many people though identify themselves with the teams, waste enormous money on fan stuff etc. Pointless.


I do not agree at all with your statement about sports being an exercise in stupidity.

Team Work is essential in life, whether it is a family, team, company - when people have to work together to achieve their common goals, there is no I, but we. It is hard for any company when all the workers are competing against echother not working with each other. To be honest, when I worked in US, I noticed such attitude in my team, we were engineering a product and communicating/working together was not easy as everybody wanted the glory and money for themselves, instead of making a good product. From the teams I have been and am currently, it was the toughest as in a way it was a competition between members, which did not help with the progress.

I do not say the skills you mentioned are not good. Thinking/working independently is a good skill to have, although in a team, you have to do what is needed for the team, not for you. If a striker decides to shoot in a bad position, when there is an open guy to pass to, he is an idiot, no somebody working independently. The team might lose because of his ego and wish for the glory. You can still think & work independently, although remember that team comes always first.

All the skills you mentioned are necessary, although doing everything alone does not bring good results. Most larger projects require a team. A strong team can do the work faster, better. It has so many perks. Although when individuals start to be too independent, it slows the progress. When in a team, you must consider you are not alone and set team goals ahead of individual pursuits. There are many things that might be good for certain individuals but not good for the team. You can start stuff, as long as it does not slow down the team etc. All these skills can be applied in a team, although team must be the highest priority. Whatever one wants to do, the team is more important.

Originally posted by constantwonder
reply to post by Klassified

 

Are you serious? One of the major problems with Americans growing up to have no personal identity strength and will to overcome adversity is lack of competition and feeding them the your all winners no matter what line. America may not lead in education but our graduates are not stupid they are FREAKING LAZY and WEAK MINDED.

edit on 14-5-2013 by constantwonder because: (no reason given)

What you're describing has nothing to do with competitiveness. It has to do with learning to meet the challenges in ones life. "Personal identity strength" doesn't come from competition. It comes from being an individual. It comes from character, ethics, and consistency in ones life. It comes from knowing yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and challenging yourself to go further.
We don't need a society based in competition and polarization, such as we have now. We need a society that pulls individuals together to meet the challenges that lay ahead of us as a civilization, and as a species.

A strong society encourages individuality, yet supports group effort toward accomplishing goals. It isn't about competition, it's about setting goals for ourselves as a society, and accomplishing them.

So, yes sir. I am quite serious.

reply to post by Klassified


I get your point. But I still believe healthy competition is good for personal growth in life. I do not believe however that taking away a lot of the competitive spirit out of school or reallocating these dollars will improve anything.

Personal identity strength" doesn't come from competition. It comes from being an individual. It comes from character, ethics, and consistency in ones life. It comes from knowing yourself, your strengths and weaknesses, and challenging yourself to go further

All of these things are developed during competition and are certainly not taught in classrooms or the majority of homes. And it isn't because football coaches make what they do to bring a lot of revenue to their districts.

Of course our focus should be on society and moving forward together.... The problem there is that everyone wants something different. How are you going to convince the world to move in the same direction towards a better life for the species when the direction we should go and the means we should use are debated ad nauseum.

The whole point I wanted to make to begin with is that the problem goes way way beyond what you have shown in the OP. The fact is that if every dime spent or made by sports teams were redirected into class rooms it would not be put towards teaching our youth the principles you describe.

Take one look around and tell me our youth isnt lazy and weak minded. This is an issue that has to be addressed in the home. The education system itself is broken... Schools turn our kids out as robots and people who need their hand held. This is not about the salary of coaches.

What is polorizing our society is not football or soccer or any sport for that matter. It is media and politics the devaluation of family and the arm big brother wants to kindly wrap around your shoulder so you may be guided through life. It is my religion is better than yours my country is better than yours. Its the endless wars and deaths and finger pointing and talking heads. It's money and pop society and labels that polarize us.

You are right I do not disagree that priorities are warped but you are pointing the finger in the wrong direction in my opinion. Just my opinion nothing more. Interesting debate topic though certainly.

not sure which football coach that is a public employee you're referring to in Illinois...but you're wrong.

Merika is good at playing with balls

If there was a substantial increase in student performances, would there be enough high paying jobs awaiting them once they graduated ?

Or would it feed into a process of academic inflation, whereby degrees replace high school diplomas as the first rung on the ladder.

Can everybody be accommodated ?



________________________

Originally posted by FortAnthem
reply to post by DarKPenguiN

 

... and sometimes abuse that power by getting their players off ...

In the context of Penn State this comment was kinda gross.

I do not categorically dismiss sports like football, because it does teach the kids who play it the importance of teamwork and basic strategy. If your linemen don't block, and your receivers can't manage to get open, you're not going anywhere and it's going to be a long, slow game.

What turns me off about them are the #ing FANS. It is this aspect of sports that is the most unappealing to me. There are far, far too many people out there going WAY overboard with their emotional investment on something that is supposed to be a leisure activity.

I've never heard of a drunken mass mob of people pouring out onto the streets overturning cars and lighting fires when, say, their favorite golfer or pro fishing team comes up short or is hit with a shady call that costs them a win. I can't say the same about other more mainstream sports.

When I was a child and my parents saw me throw a fit when I lost at something like a board game, they took it away until I was mature enough to handle it. They did not join me in beating up the kid I was playing against and then go after his parents' mini-van, regardless of whether or not they "cheated".

I suppose the only other aspect of team sports that irks me are the showboaters. It's a team effort. THERE IS NO "I" IN TEAM, RIGHT? Yet, there are always one or two egomaniacs who insist on spiking and victory dances. If the whole offensive line joined in and huddled around or hoisted the player up that's a different story, but most of the time it is not the case, and it's annoying.

Now, extrapolate this behavior into the business world. You have an entire team that keeps the organization running, yet there are a certain few who insist that they are the ones who do everything and deserve all the credit. Just picture, at the end of a Superbowl, the coach giving the stiff-arm to the entire team that made it happen, trot out to the 50-yard line, and dump a whole cooler of Gatorade on HIMSELF. Pretty smug and shameful, if you ask me.

So, while I understand and appreciate the idealistic aspects of what team sports in general has to offer, it is the real-world applied aspect of it that really turns me off.

reply to post by DarKPenguiN

I used to think the way OP and apparently others do, but then I saw the light.

Successful sports programs are, for many schools, revenue-generating enterprises. Sales of tickets to events, broadcast rights, memorabilia and etc. create income that gets spread around to the other school departments that are cost centers. Taxpayers, and students and faculty at schools with successful sports programs should be delighted and supporting of those programs. If it takes a highly visible and highly paid coach to generate that income, so be it.

reply to post by luciddream


The problem is, without question, standardized testing. Students learn basically just "test taking strategies" so that they can pass the state's standardized test. Then things get even screwier as (at least in Florida where I grew up) the schools that "fail" the test get very little money from the state, while those schools that did well are given tons of money.

reply to post by octotom


True, to an extent.

Jest remember: When taking a "multiple guess" test, if you get stuck remember the magic word...

A B A C A D A B A!