Competition and Morality

This week I read a few more articles regarding sportsmanship, but one article–or in this case chapter–stuck out to me the most.  It had less to do about sportsmanship as a whole and looked at the morality of competition.  In the second chapter of  Robert Simmons’ book “In Fair Play: Sports, Value, and Society” (1991), he discusses how competition is sports and morality are considered together.  When I first started reading this chapter, I wasn’t very excited, but the more I read the more interested I became in his thoughts.  He talks about both the critics view of competition in sports as well as offering his opinion on the matter.  Here,  I am going to agree with Simmons and support the importance of understanding how competition plays an important role, not just in sports, but in our lives, and how it is morally acceptable to encourage competition in athletics.

Many people, i imagine, think of something negative when the topic of competition is mentioned about sports.  I can understand how the critics would argue how competition is selfishness in action.   Competition calls for one person (or team) to win and the other to lose, what is called a “zero-sum game.”

Should games such as these encourage competition, defining winners and losers, or should be more about having fun where everyone is considered a winner?

The critics call such a position selfish as it does not take into consideration the welfare of the opponent.  Thinking of the soccer games I played as a kid and I compare that to the tee-ball games of today, I tend to believe that competition is a part of life and where better to prepare for it than in a–preferably–friendly atmosphere of the sports arena.  When I played soccer as a kid, we understood that scores were being kept, winners were being decided, even ranking of teams took place.  As a result, we strived to win our games, even though as kids we had very little sense on how to effectively play soccer, as a team.  When I watched my nephew play tee-ball, and I learn that no one keeps score, nor does any player actually get “out,” I wondered what, then motivates the kids to keep playing.  Sure, everyone has a turn at bat, and numerous tries to hit the ball off the tee, but the only motivation they have to play is the reward, always in the form of treats.  So what’s the answer?  In my opinion, and Simmons’ too, coaches must learn to balance learning or improving skills with competitive success

To attempt to use your skills, however limited, to achieve victory in a contest, requires competition.  Yes, there are people, athletes, spectators, and coaches, that take competition too far.  They are the ones that make competition seem so morally reprehensible.  There problem is that their only focus is on winning, often by any means necessary.  If you remember the conversation of sports and violence, these are the people that blur that line.  For them, sports are combat experiences.  Opponents are enemies that need to eliminated, wiped out, destroyed, annihilated, etc.   I have to be honest here.  In high school, I had believed this was what competition was.  It bothered me.  I liked sports, what I didn’t like was this war-like competition that threatened all that played.  So I didn’t play.  I might run some drills, kick or toss a ball around, but no serious games.  I turned off by the competition.  It didn’t help me any hearing “war stories” from my brother as he played collegiate soccer.  But, I grew up, matured, and began to understand sportsmanship was more than playing by the rules, but it meant respecting the spirit of friendly competition.

With that understanding I began to see the other people as cheaters.  They break the unspoken contractual agreement to abide by the rules and regulations that enable fairness and equality. They ignore the spirit of friendly competition and focus only on what they can do to dominate others.  The thing about people who cheat at sports, is they are not alone.  There are cheaters in- and outside the wide world of sports.  As commuting bicyclist, I have seen drivers make some of the dumbest choices simply because they think they are superior to everyone else.  Whether it be to use the right lane that is about to end to speed ahead and cut in front of others waiting patiently in traffic to their left, or solo drivers using the carpool, or even people in the middle lane making a right turn, all these people are cheating–outside of sports.  Competition doesn’t breed cheaters, the predilection to cheat, according to Simmons, is a preexisting character flaw.

The moral view of winning, somehow, has become polarized.  Either you see it as wrong because “winning at all costs” promotes cheating or you see winning as having nothing to do with sports.  Really, winning does have a place in sports, as is does in life.  The feeling that accompanies victory in sports is like the feeling of finishing a big project for school, or tackling the job assigned to you at work, or even overcoming a personal challenge in life.  If none of these other victories receive criticism, then why should winning at sports, Simmons argues and I agree.  Life is full of challenges and opportunities to be successful, sport is just one more of those challenges that we can feel good about winning.  Still, some of us who feel competition is acceptable, but lack the knowledge to back ourselves up, might concede competing is morally wrong, when competing to compete.  But when you compete against yourself, there is no one who loses, so it must be right, right.  Well, critics happily complain about that notion as well.  Simmons says they do it so saying we change the meaning of competition.  But they are wrong, as Simmons clearly demonstrates. First, he clarifies what it means to compete against oneself.  It is better to say that you are “striving for self development or self improvement.”

Competing against your talents is a method of improving or developing your talents. However, a true measure of improvement requires a comparison of your skills against the skills of another, perhaps more talented.

This might sound like the answer to winners and losers, and it could be, possibly, but it does not rule out the need for competition against another person.  Once again, Simmons provides a clear example of a remote village and the person who can sink 15 of 150 jump shots with a basketball.  Compared to the other villagers, who can only sink one, he is highly skilled.  He might think of improvement as reaching 17shots out of every 150, until one day when a professional basketball player visits the village.  As a professional, his skills are unmatched by any in the village, but his ability sets the criterion against which the others now judge themselves.  As Simmons puts it, “success or failure is partially determined by how others perform.”  This means even when avoiding direct competition against others, there is an element of comparison of another’s skills.  All participants can improve, Simmons says, but not all participants can be win.  Putting it simply, competition is the ruler that measures improvement.

To conclude, now that I am an informed individual, I understand better the benefits of competition.  It is not some aggressive form of reducing your opposition to mere objects needing termination and removal from the arena.  It is not a selfish desire to be better than everyone else.  Competition is “a mutual quest for excellence.”  There is a reason why the word “friendly” is frequently used in conjunction with “competition.”  It is there to remind us the purpose of competition.  When people who truly love sports, play a game, they expect the other player (or team) to play their best as they will.  Whether they win or lose is not the top priority.  Often, the feeling of cooperative respect and admiration for one another’s talent prevails.  When I play a sport, even if it is just for fun, either on a team or one on one, I give everything I have.  I know winning the game is of minor consequence, but it still matters, even just a little.  Even if I lose (which is most likely given my specific lack of proficiency at any skill), I know I can measure my performance against my competitors.  But most of all, I know that friendly competition is a morally acceptable component of sports.