Get a Widget for this title
RSS FeedDoes competition help or hurt young people?
Results so far:
| Help | 81% | 974 votes | Total: 1206 votes | |
| Hurt | 19% | 232 votes |
Help
Write now
Print
Invite a writer™
Add to FavoritesThe playing-fields of childhood are about building - building the citizens of tomorrow, building tomorrow's warriors and tomorrows winners; for like it or like it not, life - even in the most outwardly egalitarian and artificial of institutions - is a battlefield. It may not feel like a competition when person x is passing the port, but a competition it is. It cannot be anything other, for we all have to survive the best we can, and if our existence can be enhanced by means of advantage, then so be it.
Where competition is damaging, of course, is where the competitor has no chance at all of winning.
A one-legged man, for instance, would be at a distinct disadvantage in an arse-kicking competition, as he would be in a three-legged race - even if he is from the Isle of Man. Likewise, an illiterate would find winning a poetry competition quite impossible - although in truth, all things are possible, even some of the things that aren't; so I dare call nothing impossible as such. Even so, when the odds of victory are stretched to infinity, the probability of an unfavourable outcome assumes the shape of certainty. In such circumstances do competitions become harmful because each defeat compounds even further the crushed self-esteem of the child, and she will grow to be resentful, reclusive - perhaps even hateful and, if not corrected, criminal.
But in other circumstances - where the competitor has an equal chance of victory dependent on either statistical probability or personal effort, then it is likely that naught but good can flow to her. For even should she lose individual contests, she will know that next time she can win - and if she puts the effort into a contest not ruled solely by blind chance, she can stack the odds even further in her favour. All this has the effect of building her self-belief and confidence, and she knows not to be utterly crushed when - and in life this is one of the few certainties - she loses. If the paths of victory and defeat have been well trodden, then she has armed herself with the necessary munitions for success, regardless of whether the individual battle is won or lost. After all, as Thomas Edison and countless others have proved, there is no failure except in no longer trying - but then, as in the German proverb, what is the use of running if you are not on the right road?
The essence of childhood is to find, through play and other activities, one's aptitudes. Everyone has aptitudes for different things - even so-called disabled people are compensated for their lack of ability in one area with an extraordinary talent in another. I know of one lady - a dyslexic - who nevertheless has a beautiful way with oil, and acrylic, on canvas. There is another person I know whose motor responses aren't what they could be, and yet he is the most extraordinarily talented virtuoso. Then there are people who may, in ordinary circles, be considered stupid, but who nevertheless know how to strip down an automatic gearbox and put it back together in better condition than when it left the factory.
Some of the most brilliantly gifted actors have been, and are, manic depressives: Spike Milligan and Jeremy Brett spring to mind immediately, but there are others. And so it goes on - autistic mathematical geniuses, ADHD creative colossi and an infinity of talent lost through politically correct short-sightedness. Of course, disability is regrettable - but everyone has some form of impairment.
Who among us could, after all, claim to be perfect?
Even as everyone is disabled in some way, so everyone has a special gift to give the world. The key to greatness is in recognising that special gift and using it for the benefit of all. Competition helps to bring it out - ergo, how can competition, correctly used, be harmful?
Learn more about this author, Tabitha Hergest.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
Hurt
Competition in large scale helps everyone, but when it is fragmented to different age groups I have seen it hurting young people. Old or elder people are moulded with time to face competition with changes in era but it is not the case growing children or young teenager's.
The development of a nation doesn't come informed to the younger generations whereby in other way a competition can also be seen as the direct impact of modernization. A student being taken as an example of young people, it is obviously hurting them. As a matter of fact, competition is seen everywhere from building up a home to getting to the top position in a firm. Lets take a student who just happened to graduate and is seeking job. It is evident to point out the time as a most competitive part of life and painful day's. There are always exceptions but taking the majority I believe there is no place in this entire earth where it is easy to secure a job. This is when competition first sneaks in ones life. With evolution assisted by fleeting times there is not a single moment where competition can be ruled out and this hampers the life of any individual.
From the day of birth, an offspring have to compete for its survival. Schooling itself trains us to be competitive in small scale but the moment someone steps into high school, the competitiveness of the world grows enormously. After completion of schooling and entering into the world of adulthood, that is the moment where life gives its greatest pinch. Being new into the world of employment which seeks the survival of the fittest, everyone definitely bears the pain. There are also billionaires at this date who have gone through the same phase of life. It also takes ample of time to get the right job, where you are asked for your experience the moment you have graduated. Thus competition becomes a barrier between you and your life of contentment. This is just an example to elaborate about the competitive world which can even go to the extend for a youngster to commit a suicide.
Similar to Darwin's theory of survival, one need to expose oneself as the fittest through competition or else there is no point of being in this world. Both, plant and animal kingdom have enough competition from the point of a young ones where one either blooms or wilts, survive or die and in our species we can be either what we want or remain a painful being for the rest of the life.
Learn more about this author, Sonam Tashi.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.
