On participation trophies

[Bedrockgames]

On another thread in the main D&D forum a discussion was brought up regarding participation trophies. The discussion has moved past that subject, but I still had something I wanted to say.

I do not see why people are so opposed to participation trophy's. The desire to win can be a strong one, but making everything out to be a competition sort of sucks the fun out of things. If the only reason you play is to win, and that's the only way you can have fun, that's a poor sport.

Poor sports flip the Risk board when they don't win. They flip the monopoly board and all it's contents on the floor when they go bankrupt or lose. They throw their controllers at the TV and cuss out their team mates in an online FPS match. These people are not fun to play with.

A few observations here. I think one way to create poor sports is to let people win all the time or not let them learn what it is like to lose. Undefeated champions sometimes make the worst losers for example, because they have never really experienced defeat. Losing can build character if it is handled right. And winning can ruin character if it is handled wrong.

Also losing is how you get better, and so it can be helpful to know when you've lost.

I agree people who flip over the board are not fun to play with. Playing with people who are good losers is actually a quality I look for in gamers for this reason.

On participation trophies, I would say the reason most people are opposed isn't actually the stereotype of 'back in my day we had winners and losers". It is because they got participation trophies growing up and know how meaningless they are. It is like when a teacher praises every student no matter what. Kids are smart and they understand when someone in class or in a sport is better than them at something.

I remember participation trophies. I got plenty of them. I wasn't some great athlete. And I was terrible at team sports (which probably won't surprise many people here lol). But I did learn I was much better at solo sports, and eventually got into martial arts, where I appreciated having a three tiered victory system: gold, silver and bronze. Sometimes you did well enough to earn a medal, sometimes you didn't. Most people weren't getting gold all the time. But it gave you a goal that was tangible to work towards (if you were competing: not everyone competed and there were different events for competition, so it wasn't hard to find something you felt comfortable doing).

A better way would be that there is no trophy for winning in any low level sport or game. Giving everyone participations trophy's is much more fun, inspires more participation, and encourages the real reason to play in the first place. It should not be about the end destination, but the journey. You play because it's fun to play, not because it's fun to win. I'd say we'd be better as a society and as a people if we rewarded participation trophys more than we awarded winner's trophy's.

Think about it. I go to many conferences and at these things I get a ton of junk. These are not because I won anything, but because many people want my business or my interest. It's like getting a ton of participation trophy's. Almost no one gets a "you win" trophy unless it's those giving classes on success in their field, and those giving seminars or classes are there for work, not to compete. I love getting the junk (and yes, a lot of it is junk) at these things. Pens, notpads, business cards, they are all things that make it a little bit more fun...participation trophy's if you will.

I think I'd be turned off if they decided to only give things to people they thought were "winners" for whatever the conference was about.

I think the focus on winning is a detriment, we'd all be better overall and have more fun if there were more participation trophys and more focus on participation and having fun while doing it than simply trying to reward the "winner" of the group.

I think this applies even more to D&D than many other games out there. It shouldn't be an "I win" sort of game (and seriously, as a DM, it would be ridiculously easy to simply create impossible scenarios for the players, tpk them, and declare I win...how much fun is that for anyone but sadistic psychopathic maniacs?) D&D is about the experience of the game and enjoying the journey. Participation should be encouraged, rather than vying to be the winner when we play.

I would just point out getting bags of stuff for participating in an industry even is different from getting a trophy for winning a competition. I agree it would suck if you went to a conference and they pulled a "Coffee is for closers!". And in sales the goal is to make money, and improve your sales peoples' performances. At the same time, I wouldn't begrudge someone getting a best sales person award if they had the best sales.

Also I think you can reward merit, make winning a fun thing to aspire to, without being an ***hole about it (and without turning everyone involved into ***holes). One of my early experiences with team sports was with a soccer coach who was insanely competitive and would scream and throw tantrums over the smallest error. This might have worked for some people. But it just made me resentful and not want to make the guy happy, so I just quit the team (and I remember players being sent to me for weeks trying to persuade me to rejoin). But he was a jerk, I didn't want to play under those conditions, and I wasn't especially good either.

When I did martial arts. I lost my first competition. I got knocked out at my second. I won the first match of my second competition but got a broken nose in my second match that day (and the force of the blow sent me to the ground so they treated it as a knockout even though I was fine to keep going). My experience here was the opposite at soccer. The master and the students didn't discourage you for losing. They helped you improve and they gave you respect because you were willing to compete. And I slowly got better. I remember the Master said something like "anyone can make a Ferrari drive fast, but it takes a lot more to make a jalopy break the speed limit". That really motivated me, and I started winning more. My point is there is virtue in being a grinder and that having winning conditions isn't in itself a bad thing. It can be highly motivational to have trophies that mean something to aim for. But I would advise balancing that out and if you look at it more as trying to achieve your personal best, rather than trying to beat other people, it can be more beneficial. You can lose and still come out with dignity and a sense of accomplishment

 

[billd91]

I'm not saying I totally disagree with you here but, in my experience, it's not uncommon for the recognition to regularly go to the same people. At a prior sales job myself and a small handful of people always were recognized for the most sales. I didn't think much about it, after all I was making the company more money so I should be recognized (even though my commission check already did that). However, at other jobs (like my current one) I am not a top performer but exceed expectations so am never recognized as a top performer but there is always a small group of the same people who are getting recognized for performance and seeing the same people constantly recognized over others is not motivational.

I’ve seen this happen before, and when I experienced it, it was largely because there were differences in how active managers were in pushing forward the recognition compared to other managers. For example, when I was a software QAer, I worked at a place where marketing and sales got a LOT more recognition at annual dinner events. But then, the managers of those divisions were a LOT more geared toward marketing their own divisions internally compared to the R&D divisions. And, yeah, it was kind of demotivational so thankfully the food was usually really good at those dinners…

 

[aco175]

I see several examples that reminds me of a problem of rewards at one of my jobs. The company would give out a set raise amount of say 3%. That would be across the board and managers could not reward good performers with more and poor performers with less- everyone received the 3%. It could be argued that it was/is a cost of living adjustment and not a raise, but people generally do not see it that way. This served to reward workers that perform below expectations and punish workers that go above expectations.

 

[Bedrockgames]

That right there is the problem for a lot of us. Who wants to just run around doing something that means nothing? Not me. I can have plenty of fun in the game outside of winning and losing, but if winning and losing are not a part of the game, then it's just a boring waste of time for me. That's the reason that kids quickly stop playing Tic Tac Toe. Always ending up in a tie with no winner or loser is boring as hell.

Winning and losing are not the cause of poor sportsmanship like you encountered there. Other issues cause that, which is why it also showed up in a game that meant nothing.

Not keeping score in a competitive sport makes no sense to me. Definitely people (particularly parents) can take the competition too far. But I do think there is value in learning to win and lose graciously

 

[Umbran]

That right there is the problem for a lot of us. Who wants to just run around doing something that means nothing? Not me.

What is so meaningful about winning a kid's soccer game, though? Isn't that "meaning" kind of made up anyway? Is stressing that meaning as important really a valuable thing?

 

[billd91]

What is so meaningful about winning a kid's soccer game, though? Isn't that "meaning" kind of made up anyway? Is stressing that meaning as important really a valuable thing?

This is why it’s important for the adults involved to give it some kind of meaning for the kids. If you’re not keeping score, chances are some kids in the team are and are actually noticing whether they’re winning or losing. So, you redirect them into ascribing some other meaning than winning and losing - learning the game, learning how to play the positions, learning how to work together as a team, keeping fit and having fun while doing so, burning off kidwiggly energy, etc.

 

[Ryujin]

When I did martial arts. I lost my first competition. I got knocked out at my second. I won the first match of my second competition but got a broken nose in my second match that day (and the force of the blow sent me to the ground so they treated it as a knockout even though I was fine to keep going). My experience here was the opposite at soccer. The master and the students didn't discourage you for losing. They helped you improve and they gave you respect because you were willing to compete. And I slowly got better. I remember the Master said something like "anyone can make a Ferrari drive fast, but it takes a lot more to make a jalopy break the speed limit". That really motivated me, and I started winning more. My point is there is virtue in being a grinder and that having winning conditions isn't in itself a bad thing. It can be highly motivational to have trophies that mean something to aim for. But I would advise balancing that out and if you look at it more as trying to achieve your personal best, rather than trying to beat other people, it can be more beneficial. You can lose and still come out with dignity and a sense of accomplishment

That last paragraph reminds me of the last time I went to motorcycle racing school. It was my 8th time. At the end of the day, when they were handing out awards, the owner said, "Have we never given you one of these things?" "Nope, never got one." So I got one. It was a case of concentrating on different things. Everyone else was always working on better lap times. I wanted to become a better technical rider. "Go slow to go fast." Choose the best line though a corner. Be able to take a corner faster and not care about top speed between the corners. That sort of thing. I flew under their radar for 10 years

 

[BookTenTiger]

That right there is the problem for a lot of us. Who wants to just run around doing something that means nothing? Not me. I can have plenty of fun in the game outside of winning and losing, but if winning and losing are not a part of the game, then it's just a boring waste of time for me. That's the reason that kids quickly stop playing Tic Tac Toe. Always ending up in a tie with no winner or loser is boring as hell.

Winning and losing are not the cause of poor sportsmanship like you encountered there. Other issues cause that, which is why it also showed up in a game that meant nothing.

Is it really so difficult to think of reasons people would want to just "run around?"

Exercise, building skills, building team work, social connections, enjoying the outdoors, fun... These are all reasons why someone would play a game without keeping score.

I'm in a beginners-only adult soccer league. Every other week we work on some skills, and every other week we play a game against another team. We celebrate our goals and try to prevent the other team from scoring. But at the end of the game we don't total the goals, we instead celebrate using the skills we've been working on and come up with strategies for the next game. It's super fun, feels good, gives me great exercise, and means people of different skills can play together.

 

[Bedrockgames]

What is so meaningful about winning a kid's soccer game, though? Isn't that "meaning" kind of made up anyway? Is stressing that meaning as important really a valuable thing?

Competition is fun though. Kids enjoy competing to win. And measuring performance is helpful. I don’t personally care to play team sports but they can develop useful skills working to improve and work together as a team. It’s also helpful to experience victories and losses. I think it can be taken too seriously. But having victory conditions in soccer is part of learning how to strive for something and test your skill. When we play chess or risk, or a game like Axis and Allies, we don’t just chuck competition out the window and move pieces around just for the fun of moving things; we have winners and losers because it’s fun and mentally stimulating to.

 

[Ruin Explorer]

It's one of those things almost no one cared about until they were told they should care about it.

Yup. Also before they became a forced "talking point" most people who did care about them were for them.

Unfortunately, it got popularized as a talking point in the 90s

Also yup and this is important because people today frequently act like they're a Millennial thing, and it's like, no, that's grotesque historical revisions/just outright re-writing history. The people who made the decisions re: participation trophies existing were Boomers and the oldest Gen-X, i.e. people who were in their 30s and 40s in the '90s. The very age groups now acting like they're a shocking surprise.

Competition is fun though. Kids enjoy competing to win. And measuring performance is helpful. I don’t personally care to play team sports but they can develop useful skills working to improve and work together as a team. It’s also helpful to experience victories and losses. I think it can be taken too seriously. But having victory conditions in soccer is part of learning how to strive for something and test your skill. When we play chess or risk, or a game like Axis and Allies, we don’t just chuck competition out the window and move pieces around just for the fun of moving things; we have winners and losers because it’s fun and mentally stimulating to.

Competition rapidly becomes un-fun if you always or usually lose, though.

This is unarguable. It's not an opinion. People have dedicated huge resources finding ways to make competition stay fun and avoiding "usually lose" being the norm. That's one of the key reasons matchmaking systems exist. It's part of why so many videogames have some kind of incremental reward even if you lose. And it's part of why participation trophies (and bronze and silver medals and so on) exist, too, to encourage more people to feel the thrill of some kind of victory, even if it's a lesser one. Personal bests and so on are another (it's funny how that concept has escaped criticism, even though it's much the same thing).

Before things like matchmaking, I could clear out a Quake server just by getting on it and suddenly the score is me 150 kills, next guy 30 kills, and I've only died like twice and most people live seconds before they get a rocket to the face. People just leave, because how is losing over and over "fun"? #humblebrag but seriously, I've been the winner in that situation and it's not even fun.