| The Creative Expressions of... Bill Vivrett |
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| Updated 03.18.06 |
| COMPETITION: THE RULES CHANGED Whatever happened to competition? How did the meaning get changed so radically and by whom? Was there a vote? When did competition change from innocent games to anything goes? At what stage did we adapt the Machiavellian axiom that the end justifies the means? These new attitudes about competition seem so ruthless, so mean-spirited and inexorably tied to the care and feeding of the insatiable monster called �instant self-gratification.� The old time-tested attitudes about competition taught us that we had to work for what we wanted, that the Golden Rule still applied, and that we alone were responsible for achieving our goals and facing up to the consequences of our actions. As the last of America�s Depression babies, we welcomed all chances to compete: -To earn the leading role in the play. - To earn the varsity letter. - To earn the right to wear the varsity letter jacket. - To become the class clown. Whatever happened to EARN? When did everything become GIVE, or GIVE ME, or GIVE ME NOW! It seems the �me generation� has now spawned the �me too generation� and in our new century, we are confronted with those powerful three little words ME TOO-NOW! Test it out for yourself. Discuss ideas with teens like: national service, community service, any voluntary service, the draft as a rite of passage, commitment, perseverance, or self-sacrifice. Study facial reactions first. When it comes to teaching these attitudes, it seems the �me generation� moms are the worst. It could be that the �me generation� dads are too busy accumulating more money any way they can. Or it could be the dads still have a thread of that competitive up-bringing; that old school idea based on �earning what you get,� instead of waiting for handouts. In the 40�s and 50�s we used to compete every waking moment but it wasn�t with this mean-spirited winning-is-the-ONLY-thing attitude, and it wasn�t the organized sports version of dumbing down where every single athlete gets a medal at the end of the tournament. It was a playful competition among peers, and no one was labeled a loser. Perhaps the group was more homogeneous then, but I think the difference was attitude. Every competition was a game, and as far back as I cam remember, we made a game out of everything and we approached our competitive games every bit as vigorously in the classroom as on the play ground or in the street. With ideas taken from a similar time frame, Bill Cosby, growing up in Philadelphia, created a number of hilarious stories featuring this same kind of competition; street football, walking home scared and many others. |
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