The hypocrisy of youth sports

There is a great deal of hypocrisy in this country, which, in most instances, is just fine. However, there are some settings, like youth sports, where it is totally out of line.

We want our youth sport community to be fair, just and equitable. We want all of our children to get equal playing time, and to get a chance to excel. We espouse that all are winners and that winning at an early age is not to be encouraged.

The problem, however, is that psychologically, sociologically, and developmentally this is not what is really happening.

We as adults live in a society where, at times, winning is the only thing that matters. We carry that philosophy -- despite attempts at times to mask how we really feel -- from the boardroom to our family game rooms and most predominantly into every level of sports.

No one remembers who finished second, nor does anyone really care. In fact, it doesn't take long to forget who our champions are. USA gymnast Paul Hamm turned us all into gymnastic fans, but he'll be forgotten in our psyches in a nano-second. The Florida Marlins, the reigning champions of baseball, are an asterisk, and unless you actually live in Tampa, you'd struggle to remember who won the Super Bowl two short years ago.

We have become an un-reverent nation, who turns quickly away from our sports heroes of the past. Our adoration is reserved for the moment and is gone in less than a heartbeat, as we crave the next winner, to achieve the psychological high and vicariously identify with them.

Our children are exposed to these attitudes every day in their homes by parents who spend their lives competing in sports and at work and rooting vehemently and violently for their favorite teams. Children receive a very strong message at a very early age. Win!

Even when playing legendary childhood games such as Candy Land, the goal is to win. No child says I'll stop at the Molasses Swamp and wait for you to catch up. They want to get a double red and finish you off.

Kids are competitive from a very early age, they have to be, or else they will not survive, or minimally thrive. Even in school, research shows that children in primary school can rank the class in terms of ability with startling accuracy. If it's happening in social studies class, you can believe it's happening on youth baseball diamonds and soccer fields.

Just walk onto a T-ball field full of seven and eight year-olds and you'll see parents and coaches screaming for and at the kids to perform better. On the soccer field, these actions are directed at children as young as five. In football, the modern-day Roman Coliseum, the obsession begins as soon as a child can carry a Nerf ball.

As a society we have "intramurals" and "travel teams." The former is supposed to be a place where the less gifted athlete has an opportunity to play. Yet experience and research show that's far from the truth. Even at the intramural level winning is stressed, favorites are denoted and a pecking order is established.

How does this happen? Our society is built on competition. Our capitalist system is the purest form of competition in the world.

We need to prepare our children for this world. We need to teach them to accept who and what they are. As it stands, we do not accept losing in any arena of life. If we do, we investigate why we lost and fix it, so next time we will win, or, metaphorically at least, die trying.

It is necessary to teach children how to compete and to show them that winning is a true and valued goal in our society. While hypocrisy is embedded in our culture, we need to do everything we can to shed our hypocrisy when it comes to children and athletic competitions. We need to help them cope with losing when it happens instead of telling them how they failed.

We must put them in sports venues where they can maximize their potentials and, hopefully, win. If given the proper reinforcement, this attitude will carry over from organized little league baseball to a simple game of hop-scotch in the driveway.

Moreover, each parent needs to look at and understand their child because parents remain the greatest influence on their child's development in the early years, in all venues.

There are some children who can be put in highly competitive situations, not perform well -- either by not playing or making mistakes -- and be fine with it. However, there are other children who cannot thrive in these situations. They must be taught how to cope or find other arenas to compete in. And many parents don't want to accept it, but that arena might not be on an organized playing field.

Ultimately, it's up to us as parents to decide what kind of youth sport experience our children will have. It can be one of fun and learning, or it can be a nightmare based on unreasonable expectations and unrealistic goals. Whether we know it or not, too often we chose the latter.

Charles Deitch contributed to the writing of this article.

This article was written by Dr. Richard Lustberg. For more of his articles, go to: Psychology of Sports.