Taking Values from Sports

By Sean Gough

Vice-Chairperson, Board of Directors

Imagine that you overheard this:  "The way to bring people together is to beat other people." 
 
Aside from the sadists in our midst who would perk up the way Kenny Bania does in Seinfeld ("That's gold, Jerry!"), most of us would find that beating other people is a pretty weird way to bring people together. 
 
Then imagine that another person offered a more detailed alternative:  "The way to bring people together is to make them compete over the number of points they score.  But make them do that in an artificially limited amount of time so that they can declare one group the winner and the other group the loser." 
 
Even the sadists in our midst might back away and raise their eyebrows.  "Wow, that's pretty twisted.  But yeah, I guess, if you say so." 
 
And yet that's exactly what we say about sports.  "The great thing about sports is that they bring people together." 
 
So, does that make every sports fan a sadist? 
 
No.  When people say this, they're referring to a fun and shared interest that people gather to watch or to play.  Others might add that winning isn't the only purpose of sports:  it's about staying in shape, fighting adversity, embracing a challenge, doing the best that you can, and collaborating as a team toward a common goal.  These are all true. 
 
However, it's also true that none of these things are exclusive to sports.  Hiking, learning a language, gardening, volunteer work, and more can satisfy these demands. 
 
But in a way that's true of few activities aside from war, the purpose of sports really is to win. 
 
Politics might be offered as another arena where that's true.  "The Purpose of Government Is to Win" is either the title of Kim Jong Un's autobiography or a perspective of exactly what's gone wrong with American politics.  To approach society as a sports-like battle over a fixed number of units in a fixed amount of time does not necessarily help. 
 
For a politician amid a campaign, the sports analogy might be fair.  They must be ready to take the proverbial punches and stick that out to the election to achieve their goal.  But elections exist to serve the government, not the other way around.  And the government exists (or at least democracies exist) to guarantee the rights, freedoms, and resources of the people.  Whoever wins is supposed to serve all constituents, not just the people that voted for that candidate.  It would be a stretch to say that's just as true for sports, as the workers at the stadium who must collect the broken beer bottles can attest. 


Business might be offered as another arena where "the purpose is to win."  But in business too, the problem with that mantra is obvious.  If whoever wins does that by making the best product or by offering the best service, then sure, the purpose of business is to win.  But if the purpose of business is to beat competitors by cutting corners, polluting rivers, or screwing over employees and consumers, then to win is a dubious business. 
 
That's why the substitution of the arts with sports (or the mandate to choose one instead of the other) is such a troubling trend in schools.  This is done under the guise that sports teach us the harsh reality that "life's not fair."  But the unfairness of life is encoded in the genetic material we didn't choose, made by the parents to whom we didn't choose to be born, from the areas of the world where we didn't choose to be born.  We don't need sports to recreate that for us, especially in free societies where we do choose what to value and where we do choose what to reward. 
 
The struggle to be a good person is hard enough without declaring other people to be losers.  That's why no great teacher, faith, or spiritual guide ever tells us, "The purpose is to win."  And that's why the arts are essential.  Other than the struggle to be a good person, the struggle to be a good artist is the ultimate example of intangible greatness.  It is the shared interest without sides.  It's the challenge without point totals.  It's collaboration without opponents.  It's victory without a scoreboard.  It's beauty without a clock.  And until that greatness is as valued as "winners and losers," the competitive arena will continue to be an excuse for maladjusted desires to dominate our public life.
 
To the extent that sports are a harmless outlet for competitive impulses (a substitute for war), sports do bring people together.  We just shouldn't pretend that sports are a blueprint for a society.  The best things about sports can only thrive when we stop turning to sports for our values.  That's how we win.