Re:Art prodigy poses 'ethical nightmare' for parents
by dionidium on Sunday July 21, 2013 @11:32PM
(#6081580)
All of my anecdotal evidence is that those who played sports as a kid can do all sorts of varied stuff, too, but they're also (unsurprisingly) better at athletics. I'm struggling to find the downside in that. In fact, my friends who didn't play sports as a kid generally regret it, especially when they end up in a random holiday volleyball game (for example). But, you know, anecdotal. Feel free to ignore.
Re:Art prodigy poses 'ethical nightmare' for parents
by zanny on Monday July 22, 2013 @12:34AM
(#6081779)
I never played sports, and didn't like much physical activity past around 12, but before that I would hike around local forests (you know, random peoples private property) and we would build tree forts. I would have hated a forced competitive environment at that age and would have resented my parents for forcing that on me. It is important to introduce a child to the existence of sports, in the sense you need to expose them to as broad a spectrum of activity and skill as possible. But to force it upon them even if they don't take an interest in it is going against their personal interests, and they won't enjoy doing it.
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.