Quote:
Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery
It's not an all or nothing comparison. There's nothing "hypocritical" about saying that you want aspect X from the sporting world but not aspect Y. To be a hypocrite is to act in a manner that differs from the values you claim to have ("do as I say, not as I do"). How in any way is saying FIRST should emulate the positive aspects of sports but not the negative hypocritical?
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Absolutely. But you have to use something else to define what and why you want one element and not the other.
Justifying such a distinction based on a shared quality: e.g. FIRST shouldn't have adults on the field
because other sports don't (while simultaneously disavowing another aspect of those self-same sports) can be considered hypocritical because you're claiming to want something via a value that you do not apply universally. FIRST can and should pick and choose, so long as the distinction between "positive" and "negative" is justified somehow. For instance, abstaining from verbal abuse certainly has very, very obvious justifications, while the coach "sideline" debate is quite ambiguous.
For myself, I believe Frank's justification is very strong, between the survey and the blog post.
Al, thanks. I'd heard tell of this, but I didn't know the crossover year. 2009, wow--yeah, those results say more than I ever could!