No Contest: A Case Against Competition

[grandpa]

Hre is an interesting discussion that should easily apply to philosophy.

"No Contest: A Case Against Competition
by Alfie Kohn

from New Age Journal, September/October 1986, pp. 18-20

"Fair Use"

This is a very short condensed article about Alfie Kohn's No Contest: The Case Against Competition, published in 1986.



The tension between you and your spouse at breakfast this morning was part of a running argument about who is giving more in the relationship. A few hours later at the office you eye a colleague warily, wondering whether she will snatch that promotion from under your nose. Playing tennis after work, you are again amazed at how unrecog­nizable your closest friend seems on the court, because he will do anything to win. At home you find your child in tears: this afternoon at school she was eliminated from a spelling bee in the first round. That night on the evening news you hear about a medical re­searcher who admitted to fabricating his data so he could stay ahead.

Because these events take place in different arenas of our lives, it is easy to overlook their common denominator: competition. All reflect our culture's obsession with winning. Competition is so pervasive, in fact--infecting the workplace and the classroom, the playing field and the family--that many of us take it for granted, failing to notice its destructive consequences.

Competition can be defined as "mutu­ally exclusive goal attainment": my success requires your failure; our fates are negatively linked. Put differently, two or more individuals are trying to achieve a goal that cannot be attained by both or all of them. The all too ­familiar pressure to be number one grows out of this arrangement. We have become accustomed to living with it and quick to defend it. We have been trained, in effect, not only to compete, but to believe there is value in doing so.....

Read the rest here:
http://www.angelfire.com/or/sociologyshop/myths.html

[Flip Jackson]

Thanks, grandpa, its nice to have a bit of a break from the religious stuff here. This is a great point. I wish we would talk about his kind of thing more. Its crazy to see how large a role competition plays in our lives.

We need to have more things that require either doing our best or having fun, instead of being above everyone else. I think schools have a huge part to play here. High school's and colleges need to erase bell curves completely. That way classmates are pitted against one another for better grades. We need to put a smaller emphasis on many competitive sports' also. Maybe we could teach other things, like entertainment. We already have things like choir and art. We could have more things like this.

I hope this idea permeates a little bit.

[grandpa]

Thanks, grandpa, its nice to have a bit of a break from the religious stuff here. This is a great point. I wish we would talk about his kind of thing more. Its crazy to see how large a role competition plays in our lives.

We need to have more things that require either doing our best or having fun, instead of being above everyone else. I think schools have a huge part to play here. High school's and colleges need to erase bell curves completely. That way classmates are pitted against one another for better grades. We need to put a smaller emphasis on many competitive sports' also. Maybe we could teach other things, like entertainment. We already have things like choir and art. We could have more things like this.

I hope this idea permeates a little bit.

Yes, deifinitely. In high school I could never take anything competetive very seriously. I even tried to do it, but it seemed completely irrational, cruel and unsual.

Adn in my experience, cooperation is infinitly better than competition. This is not to say I'm against boardgames, but Ithe whole "dog-eat-dog" attitude really just sickens me--and I see no reason to endorse that attitude. Enough people do already.

Grandpa h.

[Flip Jackson]

I always got frustrated with how big a deal stuff like football games were. We would have big pep rallies every other week to "get us in the spirit" to win. I also thought it was ridiculous how some people took only difficult, high credit classes because they were "trying" to be valedictorian. They weren't satisfied unless they were the best in the school. Such attitudes are annoying and often a waste of time and money.

It always makes me cringe when I hear that teachers are fired because of budget problems, but the same year, the school puts up fancy scoreboards to attract people to sports events.

I just wish that fun non-competitive activities were encouraged more often. They seem hard to find. Maybe that's why I like single player video games so much.

[Morgan_Freeman]

The article you cited manages to completely skirt the issue. I suppose in a sense there are two kinds of of competition. The one covered by the article refers to competition in the sense of social metaphysics -- deriving one's sense of self-worth by besting others. The kind of competition I'm interested in, though, is the kind that operates in the free market. Companies have to compete for the consumer base. This kind of competion does, in fact, boost productivity and excellence.

[Morgan_Freeman]

I always got frustrated with how big a deal stuff like football games were. We would have big pep rallies every other week to "get us in the spirit" to win. I also thought it was ridiculous how some people took only difficult, high credit classes because they were "trying" to be valedictorian. They weren't satisfied unless they were the best in the school. Such attitudes are annoying and often a waste of time and money.

Agreed. These goals, in and of themselves, have no economic value. They are completely different from the kind of competition that happens in the marketplace.

[Flip Jackson]

While I get your point, the article doesn't completely skirt the issue. It just addresses the issue on a personal scale. On an economic or business scale, we have other issues to worry about. Monopolies, regulations,and all sorts of things that encourage and set rules around competition.

Unfortunately, I probably don't have enough understanding of these kind of things to have a good discussion with you Freeman.

[grandpa]

I always got frustrated with how big a deal stuff like football games were. We would have big pep rallies every other week to "get us in the spirit" to win. I also thought it was ridiculous how some people took only difficult, high credit classes because they were "trying" to be valedictorian. They weren't satisfied unless they were the best in the school. Such attitudes are annoying and often a waste of time and money.

The most humorous thing is how practically every sports team claims to be number one. But, that's true with nationalism as well.

It always makes me cringe when I hear that teachers are fired because of budget problems, but the same year, the school puts up fancy scoreboards to attract people to sports events.

Yeah. The way schools are set up is irrational. But that comes with the incredibly anal retentive territory.

Grandpa h.

[grandpa]

They are completely different from the kind of competition that happens in the marketplace.

Not realy. the basic idea is the same--"We have to be the best."

I prsonally believe people could dramatically improve the world by cooperating on the same goals and by not trying to dominate each other. Why stress out, for example, over who can make the best burger or clean the floor the best? How does this process not sound ridiculous? And how is it that different from wanting to have the longest throw on the football team or be the fastest one in the race? Does this build character or diminish it? Is it intellectual?

Grandpa h.

[Morgan_Freeman]

Not realy. the basic idea is the same--"We have to be the best."

Not at all. The goal in the marketplace is not to "be the best", but rather, to make a profit. Money is, of course, its own reward.

Why stress out, for example, over who can make the best burger or clean the floor the best?

In order to capture a larger market share, and make more money. Failing that, how about having some goddamn pride in your work?

Spoken like a true communist.....

How does this process not sound ridiculous?

Because it's necessary in order for people to make a living. You have to provide a product that people want to buy.

The alternative? Horticulture.

And how is it that different from wanting to have the longest throw on the football team or be the fastest one in the race?

Football and racing have no practical application, unless you're selling tickets and therefore making a profit.

[SteveA]

Hre is an interesting discussion that should easily apply to philosophy.

"No Contest: A Case Against Competition
by Alfie Kohn

from New Age Journal, September/October 1986, pp. 18-20

"Fair Use"

This is a very short condensed article about Alfie Kohn's No Contest: The Case Against Competition, published in 1986.



The tension between you and your spouse at breakfast this morning was part of a running argument about who is giving more in the relationship.

Having a marriage with someone who did little wouldn't be beneficial. If there's a problem, then it should be addressed.

A few hours later at the office you eye a colleague warily, wondering whether she will snatch that promotion from under your nose. Playing tennis after work, you are again amazed at how unrecog­nizable your closest friend seems on the court, because he will do anything to win.

There's no benefit to having a bad relationship with someone. What does it gain either of them to resent this possible competition?

They should both do their best and remain friends as far as I can see.

At home you find your child in tears: this afternoon at school she was eliminated from a spelling bee in the first round.

Why keep a child on the team if they're in over their head and would gain little from continuing on in complete failure later? Should we tell children they did well even when they didn't? Would such an approach help them later or leave them handicapped and unable to take care of themselves?

If she's overly sensitive about being disqualified early, what parental skills might be lacking. It could be very likely the parents haven't adequately taught the child to overcome obstacles and still meet their desires.

That night on the evening news you hear about a medical re­searcher who admitted to fabricating his data so he could stay ahead.

Time to get police involved if this likely did some damage. Other people have a right to compete in a free marketplace without having that capacity dimished by fraud.

Because these events take place in different arenas of our lives, it is easy to overlook their common denominator: competition.

I agree these regard competition, which in itself is neither good nor bad.

All reflect our culture's obsession with winning. Competition is so pervasive, in fact--infecting the workplace and the classroom, the playing field and the family--that many of us take it for granted, failing to notice its destructive consequences.

That's what we have a justice system for. To assure competition remains healthy or at most neutral but not destructive.

Competition can be defined as "mutu­ally exclusive goal attainment": my success requires your failure; our fates are negatively linked.

Not if you operate under capitalism. Someone acting competitively isn't allowed to cross over and be destructive to others interests.

What you're seeing often in the examples you gave is where people felt entitled to something they hadn't acquired. They believed they lost something but truly never had a right to it in the first place.

1) The spelling bee championship is a prize for those who can spell well, and doesn't belong to people who can't win the competition.

2) A job promotion isn't something a person is entitled to either but something you will likely have to prove you can proficiently command before being handed the responsibility.

3) A marriage isn't something guaranteed for life but something you have to work to maintain. Not helping maintain a stable marriage inevitably causes conflict unless both people manage to agree simultaneously on a divorce (and then it still likely causes conflict once government wants to get involved in divorce proceedings).

Put differently, two or more individuals are trying to achieve a goal that cannot be attained by both or all of them.

Exactly, this is natural for many things. Two people can't eat the same apple or sit in the same chair (at least not without issues popping up) etc. This, in itself, is noones fault of course.

The all too ­familiar pressure to be number one grows out of this arrangement. We have become accustomed to living with it and quick to defend it. We have been trained, in effect, not only to compete, but to believe there is value in doing so.....

I've personally become much quicker defending it over time because many people desire to ignore the reality that every man, woman and child is necessarily motivated by these.

Imagine a population of deer that had no desire to run competitively from lions but instead laid down, or imagine if slaves in America had not felt the desire to compete freely with others. Communism is driven by competition with others as well. Competition is a necessary and unavoidable factor in this world. As long as these don't lead to real harm, we can't deny people competing without destroying their ability to survive. Survival is competition. Capitalism acknowledges that ones property is necessary for survival. If you can't claim a right to have your own food or the right to grow food for yourself, then a person could be robbed of their ability to survive by others. People often refer to such peaceful methods of competition, "healthy competition" (like a bicycle race, or weight lifting or a even, yes, a spelling bee). Noone is truly harmed by losing such contests. In fact these often give them skills that enable them to personally succeed better in the future so it's truly beneficial competition ... either way, if it's not beneficial, under capitalism the term "free markets" means you shouldn't have to participate in these competitions involuntarily.

[SteveA]

Why stress out, for example, over who can make the best burger or clean the floor the best?

You're missing the big picture. Some people need to eat and sometimes floors really do need cleaning (I'm not a big neat fanatic but obviously there are limits). Certainly, noone needs to stress over these as long as the job is being done well but obviously people should possibly stress over these when they aren't being done well. The stress in this case is what saves people from not having food or living in dirt hovels. Nature didn't create stress simply to be mean. It created pain so that we wouldn't burn ourselves, starve to death or submit to being taken advantage of by others etc.

I've assumed this work is part of an exchange, but it need not be. People should be free to make their own hamburgers however they want or clean their own floors how they like etc. But as an example of an exchange, the electric company keeps the lights on in exchange for something of value to them etc. Whether or not the electric company has 10,000 union employees matters little to people who need electricity. People are only willing to pay to trade what value they have to others, to the extent that value is offered to them. So if someone comes to your home to clean it and cleans it rapidly, they still deserve at least the same pay as someone else who spends half their time drinking vodka. Working slow might be preferable to them but it creates nothing of value to others so obviously noone else needs to pay for their pleasure in working slow, because they are receiving their own compensation by enjoying working slowly. You might even have to pay them less if this causes additional conflicts for you.

But I still agree that stress, in itself, isn't desirable but that it can be a natural tool people use to motivate themselves. If you set no standards for yourself then you can avoid having them motivate you by stress but that has consequences too.