I absolutely disagree with this. Kids should start to play sports from about age 4 or 5. It doesn't have to be intense. It doesn't have to supplant other interests. Community soccer, basketball, baseball, once or twice a week. It helps them learn to socialize and work in groups towards a goal, keeps them physically active, makes them less likely to be bullied or outcasts at school because they will have a wider circle of friends and will have had more exposure to dealing with confrontation/competition.
Also like it or not, especially for men, sports is a common bonding activity even when you get into adult life. If you can't at least talk about last Sunday's football games or play a game of pickup basketball after work, you are going to be excluded from a lot of networks.
And I absolutely disagree with your disagreement.
> Community soccer, basketball, baseball, once or twice a week.
Nope. They can just play together. It doesn't have to be competitive sport. What if they say they wanted to run around in circles or play spaceship on the playground, or say help one of the dad in the yard or fix a car. Some might like to play chess or paint for example.
> It helps them learn to socialize
Just playing together with other kids and making up their own games is good enough to socialize. They could be kicking a ball half an hour then climbing trees the next. They don't have to necessarily compete with other teams to get that.
> makes them less likely to be bullied or outcasts at school because they will have a wider circle of friends
They are in the wrong school or adults are not doing their job if they are bullied because they don't play sports.
> Also like it or not, especially for men, sports is a common bonding activity even when you get into adult life.
Well I don't like it. I would rather discuss virtual machine implementations or sci fi novels. I don't give a shit about who plays in the superbowl or what hockey teams names are.
> If you can't at least talk about last Sunday's football games or play a game of pickup basketball after work, you are going to be excluded from a lot of networks.
I am doing pretty well for myself. I can talk about politics, linguistics, computers, some music, sci-fi, movies, there is plenty of other stuff. If talking about sports is what is going to exclude me, then please, exclude me. I don't want to be included in that group to begin with.
I call BS on this. Sports as a way to socialize? As a kid I saw that sports were just another way to bully other kids or ridicule them, or call them names. I never ever saw sports as having any kind of positive aspect on the ones who were already ostracized by their peers.
And who are you to say that kids "Should" do this or that? Why don't you leave out the choice to the kids or the parents in that matter? As for me, I learnt much more by spending time on computers as a kid than joining sports clubs during the weekends.
> Also like it or not, especially for men, sports is a common bonding activity even when you get into adult life.
Huh? You mean like these people behaving like apes in these modern-days arenas, yelling at 20 people running on the grass and hitting drums while drinking beer ? Yeah, what a great way to socialize. I avoid people interested in these sports altogether, and my social life does not suffer from it. You just end up with different people.
Am I weird? Probably.
> Huh? You mean like these people behaving like apes in these modern-days arenas, yelling at 20 people running on the grass and hitting drums while drinking beer?
The implication was that the only bonding obtained through sports was through spectating obnoxiously, while many people enjoy playing sports together.
It mentions socializing and physical activity. What are you referring to ?
Children should be allowed to be whoever they want to be, and if our education systems cannot support that, there's a huge problem.
I understand your concern about physical activity, but that's something that should be instilled by parents and through health education classes. As children reach their teenage and adult years, they should understand the importance of exercise and well-being, not just that smashing into people on the football field keeps them fit.
Like it or not, the world doesn't revolve around sports. Some people will enjoy them, and others won't. Simple as that. Have you ever thought of, I don't know, letting the children decide what they want to do for fun? As I said, playing sports is not a requirement to becoming healthy. Those principles can be taught through different methods. I never played sports, but I still go the gym everyday and feel satisfied after a good workout.
I think that kids should be exposed to a wide range of experiences - it's important that they get to self-direct, but if we let all 4 year olds only eat and do what they wanted, we'd have very limited children.
Along those lines, it's important that children be made to play sports to a certain degree - they might find something that excites them, they might learn to love it after a little while, or later in life, they might regret never having had the opportunity to experience it.
But, I don't buy the less likely to be bullied argument, or the bonding activity argument. I played sports for years, stopped when more artistic interests took over, and I can't talk about what's going on in professional sports at the moment. And my basketball skills have gone to hell, other than a decent hook shot I somehow haven't lost.
So, yes, it's important to expose your kids to sports to a certain degree, in order to expose them to a broader life generally than the one they might choose to experience at a young age. But I don't think sports in and of itself is a requirement for a well-adjusted upbringing.
A young hacker shouldn't be told to set aside the computer and play Little League baseball.
And what I meant there, and thank you for joining issue with this so that the issue is clear to onlookers, is that no child should be forced to DROP something personally important and educational for them solely to fit in with what everyone else is doing. In actual fact (and I think a reader who used the search function on HN could find examples of me saying this) I encourage all of my children to participate in team competitive sports. Because of the healthy developmental nature of our local youth soccer club, all four of my children, from my hacker son who now lives in New York City to my daughter, have played "travel" competitive soccer through that club. All three of my boys have qualified for the Minnesota state championship tournament at various age and competitive levels, and my second son has won a state championship with his teammates. So I by no means disdain sports. I'm very proud of having four children who all have achieved more in sports than either of their parents ever did. (Sports were not emphasized in my upbringing in my family, nor in my wife's upbringing in her family.)
I do indeed promote activities for my children that provide "well-roundedness" and especially activities that provide commonalities with other young people growing up in the same time and place. It's just that I don't do that at the expense of my children having a LOT of time to pursue their own interests. (That's why we homeschool--to have the schedule flexibility to allow a both-and of deep involvement in something meaningful to each child and broad involvement in things that build connections with other people.)
Thanks for checking. I FULLY agree with you, based on my own experience, that men growing up in the United States are well advised to have sports involvement. That helps them have a lot to talk about with other men. It's not strictly necessary, but sports involvement is awfully helpful.
Children already experience far too much pressure to conform to expected norms of social interests, particularly gendered social interests. Parents ought not add to it by implicitly or explicitly telling them there's something wrong with them for their interest or lack thereof in sports.
As for the expectations of adult men, I cannot remember a situation in my adult life in which something like a simple joke along the lines of "baseball.. let's see, that's sports, right?" hasn't been enough to convey that I'm not interested without being hostile or disrespectful to others' passions.
My parents sent me to a school where painting, woodworking and handworking (basically knitting, sewing, crocheting) were all mandatory. It pays dividends now because having a background of creativity helps nearly everyone, even plain-jane computer programmers like me. Everyone had to perform in a play every year, no matter how much you didn't want to. That helped build confidence and the ability to speak in front of people. Gym and sports and recess are all important too -- no one regrets having too much hand-eye coordination, or the ability to play a pickup game of basketball without making a fool of oneself later in life. It's great to be able to relate to and be friends with people who are into sports even if you aren't, because the alternative is to politely remove yourself from all those interactions, and that's no fun for anyone.
I really do think that all kids should play team sports. If it's totally obvious that their passion is theater, or computers, or art, or music, or whatever it is, then there's no need to try out for the varsity team in high school, but giving kids diverse experiences and making sure they are physically active and aware of their bodies is never a bad thing.
Not only do I disagree intensely with your post, but I'm a male high-school student, and trust me, I wouldn't want to be included in those "networks" you speak of anyhow. Sports aren't for everyone. Every single positive you have named about sports can just as easily be attributed to other activities. Socialization? What are we doing here on HN? What do kids do when they go to school and talk and gossip? Working in groups toward a goal? What about them tackling a computer programming project together?
I found your comments about bullying and friendships downright belittling. A wider social circle does not mean better friendships, in fact, it tends to be quite the opposite. My wounds are still fresh; it is wiser to have fewer and closer than more and shallower. Physical activity also doesn't have to involve sports per se -- lots of outdoor time is wise. Also, why can't competition be encouraged through academic competition? Or, for that matter, anything intellectual?
This overarching, sexist, and patriarchal view that men have to resort to primal physical exertion in order to be accepted in society is quite insulting, so if you would please broaden your outlooks, we'd be all the better for it.
It was night and day between the last day of high school and the first day of college. You suddenly get access to associate only with who you want to, rather than who you are stuck in a locked building for 8 hours a day with.
Physical activity has much to recommend it but I never gave a shit about watching or playing team sports and my various school's focus on team sports over any other physical exercise put me off exercise for a long, long time. If all of your experience of "exercise" is that it is one or all of boring, unpleasant or full of wankers it does rather put one off it.
I'm glad I found jogging and later weightlifting and if my friends are going to be drinking while watching some sports game, awesome, I'll come to the pub too. But I'm not going to pretend interest in sports for the same reason I do not moderate my political opinions though I do censor them. I do not care about this shit and am unwilling to pretend to care, and if you prod me I will tell you I. just. do. not. care.
EDIT: If you feel like taking part or you enjoy it, fine, whatever. Exercise and bonding are both generally good. I'm just glad my father gave up when he saw I was more interested in seeing the gravel trickle through my fingers than watching the rugby game he was watching. Forcing people who are not interested in team sports to play or watch just leads to many having a negative association with exercise, which is a pity.
Where I grew up, pretty much all the kids who were awkward and unpopular and got bullied in junior high and high school did the same youth sports as everyone else when they were 9-10 years old. It didn't help them out too much later on.
Kids need exercise and socialization, though. I'd argue that they should learn things where starting very early offers a big advantage. Sports such as surfing, gymnastics, skiing, ice skating, swimming, etc. It seems like if an activity heavily involves balance or the water it helps to learn it as early as possible.
This may be true, but I'm curious what you feel the value of these "networks" has been or will be in the future.
I can only relate my own experience, which is that of supreme disinterest in just about every American team sport. I'm quite capable of following last Sunday's game, I just don't give a damn.
Thus far in my adult life I haven't felt the need to slither my way into a social group. Should I start? If so, why? I obviously haven't felt significant pressure to do so yet, or I would have already. This is actually a genuine question, although I'm obviously biased towards my own answer.
i was one of the youngest kids in the class and a pretty dorky kid growing up but, without a doubt, playing sports throughout elementary school made all the difference between being the subject of an occasional joke and being picked on continuously. i was bored to death, and was honestly pretty bad, but i'm glad my mom signed me up each year.
i have two sons, my oldest heading into 1st grade, and i can already see the same effect.
Personal anecdatum: when I was 5 or 6, I beat my father in a game of chess. That was the last time he ever played me, and the last game of chess I was allowed to play for a number of years (this was about the time Bobby Fischer was getting a lot of notoriety as a maladjusted prodigy). It still rankles after 60 years.
I don't know if it's a generational thing or what, but if my child beat me in chess at 5 or 6 years old, I'd be thrilled. Granted, I'm not great at chess, but I'd still get them signed up for lessons pronto, and I certainly wouldn't stop playing with them.
fml
I'm truly astonished by the West that this sort of thing is worthy of remark. I studied all my life in India, both in government schools and in different private schools, and every kid who did something that was atypical was always cool for it.
You're the tennis star? Nice, everyone loves you. You're the guy who plays Golden Axe better than anyone else? Damn, nice. You top the math class or are good at building things? "Wow, I wish I were that smart".
I would never have suspected that in the land that ostensibly worships individuality, not being "ground into sameness" is worth mentioning.
The UK has always seemed to have some respect for eccentricity but I wouldn't say they've been known as a place that "worships individuality." They have had a historical reputation for merciless bullying at the grade school level, though.
(It's also worth noting that the vast majority of the recent nonsense over abortion has entirely to do with the last trimester. The fact that something is a "strongly held right" doesn't mean some people won't from time to time argue it should be modified or changed. That's just healthy political debate.)
Minnesota and asian countries are particularly bad about that sort of thing, but in Los Angeles nobody would look twice.
And everyone loves Keith.
AFTER EDIT: I was Keith's classmate in law school. I like Keith too. I can't vote for him (I don't live in his district), and I don't share many policy preferences with him, but I like him on a personal level.
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/health/wellness/marriage...
That's not a criticism of the state or anything, but it does refute the idea that Minnesota has a very high percentage of interracial marriages.
Minnesota's percentage of interracial marriage is 4.4% (In contrast, California is 12.8%. The highest is Hawaii, which is 37.2%)
The Census Bureau says
"The U.S. Census Bureau collects race data in accordance with guidelines provided by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB), and these data are based on self-identification. The racial categories included in the census questionnaire generally reflect a social definition of race recognized in this country and not an attempt to define race biologically, anthropologically, or genetically. In addition, it is recognized that the categories of the race item include racial and national origin or sociocultural groups. People may choose to report more than one race to indicate their racial mixture, such as 'American Indian' and 'White.' People who identify their origin as Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish may be of any race."
http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/meta/long_RHI525211.htm
A similar statement is found as footnote 7 in the Census Brief 2010 "Overview of Race and Hispanic Origin: 2010"
http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-02.pdf
"The race categories included in the census questionnaire generally reflect a social definition of race recognized in this country and are not an attempt to define race biologically, anthropologically, or genetically. In addition, it is recognized that the categories of the race question include race and national origin or sociocultural groups."
This is so important, even for kids who don't have really obvious differentiating factors.
My wife and I are both educated, white, middle-class background, able-bodied, and so on. But that doesn't make our son "normal" or "average"; he's still different from every other kid. Part of supporting him is encouraging him to embrace differences, and encouraging other kids to do the same.
It seems it's simply "hybrid vigour" - when you cross strains, you can get the both of both pools. But there's a logical dark side - you can also get the worst of both. (In nature, hybrid vigour is a net positive, because the weaker ones are selected against...) I say "logical" because I haven't actually ever observed this in reality.
Anecdotally, Elvis Presley, Keanu Reeves and Tiger Woods seem to demonstrate this with other gene pools - but I have no idea of the statistics with respect to other actors/athletes. And there are other factors, such as non-standard features being considering more striking, the parents being strong-willed, self-determined and courageous enough to go against the norm, the other being considered so attractive and valuable to be worth the hassle, etc.
I would definitely encourage exploration and appreciation of differences but depending on one's surroundings, a bit of apprehension is warranted.
I think you are reading far too much into that one statement - to me, from reading the whole article, it sounds like the parents are being supportive and responsible.
That's a very neutral expression. In Japan, the non-offensive term is "Half", and it's probably worse than "mixed blood" :)
And, FWIW, in hawaii, hapa kids are generally considered the cutest.
> whatever differences they have with other people in their childhood environments--whether height, weight, hair color, low IQ, high IQ, physical weakness, athletic prowess, or whatever it would be
You seem to have bought into the fallacy of scientific racism. In terms of population biology, we all belong to the same race, Homo sapiens sapiens.
You can't collectively judge a race that you cannot tell apart from your own. Like wise, if a subset of your race were to look different from you, you would feel compelled to generalize about them. That's human nature.
The reality is irrelevant. Fine, races don't exist, but they are perceived to exist, and the parent is concerned with how his children will be perceived.
Note that I realize now I may have been quoting him out of context about the physical differences, kind of hard to tell.
Okay, based on recent comment, apparently a total misunderstanding.
What could you say besides interracial? Interpopulational? Intercultural?
I hope that is just a journalist quotation of an imprecise statement during live conversation in an interview. By contrast, as soon as I knew that my beloved and I would marry into an "interracial" marriage (she is from east Asia, and I am an American of a mixed assortment of European ancestry), I figured that my children would have no hope to "not be seen as any different." (I later learned my children actually look like typical members of the local population in some central Asian countries that none of us have ever visited.) I also had Taiwanese friends tell me even before I met my wife that if I married a local girl and had "mixed-blood" children (that is a polite term over there, not an offensive term), that the children would surely be smarter and better-looking than most children.
I'll leave to other people to judge both the intelligence and the personal appearance of my children. But what I very intentionally did in bringing up my children was plan to give them support so that whatever differences they have with other people in their childhood environments--whether height, weight, hair color, low IQ, high IQ, physical weakness, athletic prowess, or whatever it would be--they would still be cherished as our children. I haven't wanted my children to be other than who they are. Yes, everyone should indeed "relate to his peers" and not be arrogant or aloof. Everyone should cherish everybody else's differences. But that also means children ought to be able to follow the life path that fits them best after the shuffle of genes they receive from their parents, the influences of their early childhood, and the constraints of their youthful circumstances. A great artist shouldn't have to set aside his painting to have buddies in the neighborhood. A young hacker shouldn't be told to set aside the computer and play Little League baseball. To each their own. It happens that my children grew up in an environment in which most of their acquaintances are supportive of young people who pursue their own passions, and they haven't had to be ground into sameness to have peers who like them.