I saw a kiddie game where an adult attacked a teen kid full on! Wow...steriods anyone??? PJ

Try this http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/10/23/football.dad.reut/index.html.

Scary!

I think that demonstrates what's wrong with people moreso than what's wrong with sports, although there's plenty wrong with sports these days. If parents would just stay out of it, if kids could just be left to put their own pick-up game together on the school yard, without coaches or parents, they'd be a lot better off. I think that man has serious anger issues (an understatement!) and I hope the police are looking for bruises and other injuries on the wife and kids of that man.

Sally

Should I go on a rant about the importance of self defence lessons or let it go? I must say though, it's amazing how people who are "totally out of control" can find some self-control with the right incentives!PJ

Oh Crikey, here we go againÂ
Sports  BAD.
Competition  BAD.

Humans in Texas, living naked in and under trees, having minus 3.2 children per pregnancy, foraging barefoot for dandelion leaves, sea oats, muscadine grapes and mayhaws, alligator eggs, and Africanized bees honey  good, yea, PRICELESS.

Forget playing bridge. Forget "playing" anything. Jeez, we wouldnÂt want anyone to go so far out of line to suggest a game of Wildflower and Native Grasses Monopoly, would we? The heresy! "Do not pass pee in wetlands, do not collect unfallen pecans."

The sentence for sneaking so insidious a reward as Drip Line or Root Zone of the Month? Twelve months exposure to mosquitoes - NO mud packs, NO grass skirts!

The Thousand-Hour Reign of the Tejasexican Tree Tyrants would peak its power at its erasure of all vestiges of what used to be called Homeowners Associations. This would occur by spontaneous and simultaneous universal enlightenment of The Moral Code. All peoples would recognize and voluntarily, without exception, avoid trespassing in the forbidden territories and edifices of the Sprawlurban Reliclands, where the Unwise Ancients once practiced all manner of evil - including beisbol, futbol, and plant swaps - on BERMUDA GRASS! Every stray stem and stolon of Demon Augustine would be stripped out of Mother Earth and sacrificed on the Great Compost Pile of Penitence.

Inevitably, inexorably, extinction of The Proud Race would occur. But of course, not because of any competition with or by any other species.

The next re-writers of history would likely return to the Reliclands, collect and smoke crushed oak acorns in re-utilized sprinkler-pipes, kick baseballs and slobber all over soccer balls before throwing them, and pen the epitaph of the TTTs thus: "They had so many Strayhorns stuck in so many of the wrong places, they couldnÂt even think, let alone think clearly. Alas! In the end, they fared no better than the Bush Tribes."

"Courage," ye Kinky whoÂd Rather be saved by the Bell.
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Rant on, PJ! You might enjoy the article at the link as much as I did.

Sally, I go largely with what you say. I think the problem is deeper than sports. It stems from a per capita coarsening of culture that results from excessive emphasis on leisure and "self-fulfillment" over kind, liberal and mutually beneficial other-interestedness, including the art of compromise. Basically, itÂs a reflection of (I dread) a possibly irreversible degradation of a societyÂs educational support system, where ignorance is celebrated, passion alone is the measure of credibility, and willful ignorance (blindly hateful bigotry, by any other name) is idolized as the ultimate "integrity."

IÂm Rap, and IÂm one tough environmentalist grandpa.

Here is a link that might be useful: Daily Mail - One Tough Grandpa

That's a neat story, Stitches, especially since he was able to do that after drinking a few beers!

But I'm afraid you lost me with the rest of your post. I guess I'm dense, but I really didn't understand it.

Sally

I think I understood the post. No going back to being the folks that had lives in tandem with nature I'm afraid. (Before Europeans got here.)
The old guy(article) reminds me of my favorite instructors and a friend. My friend looks like what he is.Career ex miltiary whatever. He's in his 60's but still built like a draft horse. My favorite instructor of all time looks like a frail old man with better posture than most. There are little quirks with the way he walks (a "rolling" motion??? Can't describe it.) that will let a person who is paying attention know he has fantastic foot work. A stupid/stoned/too young thug might not catch it. I hope I'm that good when I'm in my 70's! I went up against 5 but 3 backed down. Criminals are self serving. They aren't trained to work as a team. More often than not, taking out the "leader" discourages a team effort. Garden variety thugs wait for the "leader" to incapacitate the victim before they join in and act like they are tough. In reality they are cowards and run away like a sissy at the first sign of any damage possibility.PJ

PJ got a major point of my post. PJ, your favorite instructor sounds eerily like a guy who was one of my son's favorite role models. Son, back in his days of training, could not believe how this old, scrawny, crumpled-looking guy would show up at his martial arts club's meetings and turn the biggest, baddest college football players literally into whimpering pretzels.

Those stories at least give me hope, at my age. Heck, I still even drink beer now and then! Punks beware!

Sally, sorry, it's all on me if my post wasn't clear. I lose patience with absurdity too easily, and when I lose it, too often I "go Picasso" with sarcasm. But I really was trying to keep on the lightened-up side, unlike my posts in another recent thread involving some of the same subjects.

Obviously, my problem stems from participating in competitive sports. Oh well - doesn't matter - Sunday I converted to Amish Islam, and therefore no longer discuss such topics with Englishmen. Ruh y salaam, amigos!