Participation Trophies And Letting Overweight Kids Avoid PE Is Lowering The Bar?

As an American that grew up before things like smartphones were super common, as we had what I’d say are dumbphones by the time I graduated but we didn’t have even social media until I was a senior. Anyway, the idea of participation trophies and it making the kids weaker has always made me wonder how true it is because I see it on Facebook and now this post on Quora came up in my feed so I’m going to talk about it.

I actually think I was given a participation trophy but it wasn’t called that. It was for most improved or something like that when my goofy ass kid self tried to play soccer and they felt sorry for me I guess. I didn’t feel like I was most improved or anything like that, I was the kid with the glasses nobody would do teamwork with so I kinda just didn’t give a shit and got a trophy anyways for just showing up.

Did I realize at the time what it was? Yes, I actually remember my mom telling me to put it on the shelf and be proud of it and I thought it was funny so I did but it made me think about how lame all that shit was every time I looked at it and so no I don’t think participation trophies ruin kids because if you think kids don’t know what it is too you’re crazy.

The sky out by the ocean.

What I’m trying to say is that it doesn’t inflate your kid’s ego or whatever and make them do more failures to get a stupid trophy. If you’re so concerned about how sucky things are that your kid does, maybe that’s on you honestly because a lot of the time they are emulating you or if you’re not in their life then who knows who they emulate.

Another thing in the top comment in the Quora post that got me thinking was he says something about larger kids being able to sit out physical education now, which I never knew but I for sure wasn’t even overweight as a kid and got creative when finding ways to skip PE. I was out of shape and didn’t care much for all that even though in high school I was taller than everyone but wasn’t interested in that kind of thing at that point so I’d sit out to this day if I was back in school probably and it’s more the people than the exercise.

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The fact is, kids with eating disorders aren’t just the ones that are too skinny or obsessed with being a model. They are also the kids that overeat. They have body image issues all the same, I just think when people say eating disorder or disorded eating we always think about a female of a certain type and that’s it but there’s a whole range of people with these issues, much like a spectrum they use in something like autism or hell it could be used with any mental issue.

What the kids need isn’t to be embarassed in front of everyone until they get into line or whatever. That never works, it’s why people don’t get off of drugs or change their behavior. What they need is therapy and basically that’s a surrogate parent ’cause theirs is either making their eating problems worse or isn’t providing them with something that they cure with either too much food or a lack of it.

So next time you start thinking about how you dislike someone on just their size, think about what it would be like if you had to wear your problems on the outside all the time. I’m sure at least someone thinks you’re an asshole, among other things, especially if you look down on others all the time. And I get it, we all need a version of “at least I’m not like that” but we really need to start directing that towards people that deserve to be hated like those in politics not your neighbors.

Anyhow, if ya’ll have comments let me know. Click the name signature or see the bottom of the site to email me.

-Brandon