Everyone Isn’t a Winner Anymore — and That’s a Good Thing, Maybe

We're living an era where everyone expects something for nothing -- for example, not having to work (or not even work hard) for a reward or an award. Youth sports groups seem to love this mentality... one youth sports group in Texas is bucking the trend.

One of the new trends that really bugs me is sports teams that don't keep score in a game because they don't want to hurt the feelings of the kids that lose the game. Isn't that the point of a game? You practice a lot, you try your best, and if you win, you win - if you lose, you lose. If you win or lose, chances are, you are going to learn something.

A youth athletic team in Texas was guilty of giving everyone a trophy just for playing football. Meaning, if your kid woke up and went to the field, they got a trophy -- even if they just stood there. The director of the association now says they're getting rid of the trophies for everyone because they want the kids to learn that everything in life isn't going to be handed to them (imagine that!). And get this -- the parents generally love the idea. One parent says his son has a dozen trophies in his room and none of them mean anything to the kid. Not all parents are happy, though. A few feel getting a trophy is a symbol of participation, regardless of winning or losing.

And as I was getting ready to write a paragraph that was going to start with, "in life, you don't get awards just for showing up at work" -- I realized that I am the most recent winner of the Cat Country Employee of the Month award, which, more or less, I won for just showing up at work one day.  Actually, I won it back in August and until now neither Joe Kelly nor Georgia have realized it's been months since anyone else has won the trophy (Cat Country weekend DJ John Reed isn't able to win the award -- but that's another story).

So, besides the Cat Country Employee of the Month award, you're not going to get a trophy just for showing up to work or a game. Unless, that is, you consider coffee a trophy and you're like us here at the station and your employer buys coffee for everyone and we all get to enjoy it. That is an award in it of itself. And occasionally at work you can help yourself to office supplies -- but that's stealing and that's bad. That's why they don't stock Post-It Notes here at the station anymore.

Anyway, my point is, in almost many instances, you aren't going to get an award or a trophy just for doing something when you're an adult. Except sometimes you will every once and a while. So maybe the moral of the story is this: that youth football team in Texas should only give half the kids a trophy for just showing up, then the parents can get into a fight because the trophy-less kids' parents will think their kid should have received a trophy, the video will get posted on YouTube, then I can write about it, post the video here on catcountry1073.com and I could win the Cat Country Employee of the Month award for writing such a great story.

Don't steal office supplies.