I happen to hate competitions, I don’t like watching matches. I attend between 3 and 7 events a year and only watch a handful of matches. Different folks have different interests, for some of us matches are not that interesting.
Eric, actually, some of us just enjoy the challenge of building the robot. Yeah, seeing it compete is nice but I would rather be going through the pits learning from what everyone else built.
I don’t think that it’s seeing someone who has different interests. I think it’s seeing someone who has different interests, but pretends that they have the same interest, then when they’re where they want to be (or don’t want to be), they show that they don’t really care. If you’re not going to care, why go to the trouble of joining the team, building a robot for 6 weeks, and traveling to the event, just to display your not-caringness to the world?
Not watching your own team’s matches while you’re at the event is, well, like traveling to your favorite sports team’s biggest home game, getting a seat in the stadium, and then not watching the game, only the mascot(s) and other stuff of that nature. You may as well be home paying the bills or mowing the lawn or shoveling snow.
Consider that people these days do stuff like livetweeting, texting, dynamic communication, and internet reference lookup on their phones and it’ll look a lot less bad. I’m sure if someone looked at me at Kickoff and saw me typing a tweet about it, it wouldn’t look the best.
Disregarding during ceremonies or in the pits, I will often be engrossed in electronics. Why? I update the team twitter constantly. I have the latest standings and scores before they are updated at the competition itself. I text friends at other competitions to ask how it’s going. I have scores from other competitions, keeping track of specific robots. While usually this might not look very good, it’s useful for us as a team to have someone connected, and I honestly don’t see a big problem there.
When I was a student, I was so on my gameboy during speaches/opening ceramonies/closing ceremonies. I don’t do it anymore.
I don’t resent those students that chose to not care about the speaches and discussions. And I don’t know how to combat it. Telling students to “stop that, put that away” only makes it worse. It has to be something you deal with ahead of time.
That’s true. However, if you’re in the stands during your team’s match, you obviously aren’t in the pit. I don’t mind missing matches if I’m in the pit–especially if I’m working or talking to teams.
But if you’re in the stands and you aren’t watching matches that your team is competing in, then I think you have a problem. You at least want to see if it works, right? If you don’t want to watch the matches in the stands, then you may as well stay in the pit area and keep talking to other teams, if that’s possible (read: mentor may say, “You will watch all of our matches”), instead of going to “watch” one of your team’s matches and instead not-caring it.
I’ll agree in that case, just wanted to be clear that there are many things to do at an FRC competition that some people think are more important than watching matches.
I would like to add something I saw today that really bugs me more than anything mentioned above. When the National Anthem is being performed, please remove your hats. Especially when you are one of the singers. It is plain disrespectful.
When the National Anthem is being performed, please remove your hats. Especially when you are one of the singers. It is plain disrespectful.
We had this issue at our regional a couple weeks ago…it has been my accepted “Miss Manners” rules that women can continue to wear hats during the Star Spangled Banner, in both the audience and the presenters.
One of my team members was in the robotics choir that sang and was told by the event coordinator to remove her hat; she did this out of respect for an adult but asked me about it later. My ruling: Hats must be removed by men, but can remain on your head if you are a woman.
The established rule of etiquette is that “fancy” women’s hats need not be removed. This is because of the time and effort necessary to put them on again. Simple hats – fedoras, berets, baseball caps, and the like – do not enjoy this privilege, and should be removed by men and women alike.
I also agree with a woman’s hat staying on if - it is part of formal attire, but also have to take exception to any female wearing *a “prop” or spirit type of costume hat *though. Doesn’t seem like a lot to ask or expect.
I get more annoyed by the often excessive chatter during the National Anthem. I’ve been to many events where you could hear a pin drop during another country’s anthem, then the chatter picks up during ours. 
This is what the accepted rule is. Fancy hats that are Pinned as part of an outfit can remain. Everyday hats, and the Costume hats that had me irritated this morning should be removed.
That being said, I am still very glad that many FIRST students know the National Anthem, and will perform it. It amazes me some places I go and how our youth does not know the National Anthem.
I have learned many things from FIRST and I will include a lesson on manners. I will revise my opinion of women wearing hats during the National Anthem, to: Women wearing fancy hats (with a hat pin) will remain on, while other less-fancy hats and costume hats will be removed.
Thank you CD and FIRST.
Related to post, not to thread.
The most awe inspiring moment at any FIRST competition was the Flint FLL tournament (I can’t recall which one) last year. The AV equipment cut out 30 seconds into the Anthem. Without missing a beat the entire auditorium picked up and sang the rest of the Anthem. Sorry, I thought it was epic.
I was thinking about this thread yesterday during Dean’s speech in Boston. My godson was there with family, and he is 10. Over lunch he was playing games on his phone, and I wondered if I would see a repeat of this thread during the awards ceremonies. Dean gave a very typical Dean speech, but my godson sat there quietly with his head on his mom’s shoulder and paid attention the ENTIRE time. He didn’t fidget or whip out his phone, and he has never been involved in robotics or even seen an event before. It was a simple matter of knowing when to show respect. I was really proud of him 
Another thought about the National Anthem (s), our National Anthem (not sure the policy in other countries) was written and intended to be a collective experience of patriotism and national pride. It is actually considered BAD MANNERS to stand quietly during the singing of the anthem. Unfortunately, our culture has allowed the anthem to turn into a performer/audience situation, which it was never intended to be. It is actually against United States flag code to applaud for the anthem.
I must respectfully disagree. It is not wrong to stand quietly during the National Anthem.
§301. National anthem
Designation. — The composition consisting of the words and music known as the Star-Spangled Banner is the national anthem.
Conduct During Playing — During rendition of the national anthem —
when the flag is displayed —
individuals in uniform should give the military salute at the first note of the anthem and maintain that position until the last note;
members of the Armed Forces and veterans who are present but not in uniform may render the military salute in the manner provided for individuals in uniform; and
all other persons present should face the flag and stand at attention with their right hand over the heart, and men not in uniform, if applicable, should remove their headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart; and
when the flag is not displayed, all present should face toward the music and act in the same manner they would if the flag were displayed.
I really prefer not fussing over details in the Anthem. Does someone’s singing, silence, posture, and position really determine the level of one’s respect for the country? It’s no big deal either way, really, as long as people have good intentions and put in an honest effort. If they directly don’t observe the anthem out of protest or whatever, then try and be subtle and don’t make a scene. Pretty simple…
Yes it does, at least to me, and I am sure other people. However, this enters the discussion into Politics and Beliefs which we are kindly asked to refrain from on CD, so I will leave it at that.
In the grand scheme of things, I have noticed that FIRSTers are far and above on of the most respectful groups when it comes to things such as this, and I think that says a lot to the sense of professionalism that FIRST has instilled in us all.
Standing at attention implies standing quietly.
UNITED STATES CODE, TITLE 36, CHAPTER 10, §171. Conduct during playing
During rendition of the national anthem when the flag is displayed, all present except those in uniform should stand at attention facing the flag with the right hand over the heart. Men not in uniform should remove their headdress with their right hand and hold it at the left shoulder, the hand being over the heart. Persons in uniform should render the military salute at the first note of the anthem and retain this position until the last note. When the flag is not displayed, those present should face toward the music and act in the same manner they would if the flag were displayed there.
I don’t know of anything in the flag code that says that. I think you might be confusing the National Anthem with the Pledge of Allegiance.
I’ve seen things in my travels from regional to regional these past couple of years that by far surpasses ignoring Deans speeches (like openly using abusive language towards other teams, team members when the team loses and generally ignoring arena rules - the barrier is there for a reason not to jump over) but the kid barking out " WRAP IT UP!" in Boston would have probably seen his last moments as a member of my team if he pulled that stunt.