Youth Wrestling

I don't understand competition. Why does there have to be a winner and a loser? There's no point in hurting someone's feelings just because they didn't perform as well as someone else.  In teaching you never tell the A students that they're winners, and the C students (C is the new F) that they're losers.

That's why I don't like sports.  Why is that team trying to take the ball away from the other team?  Can't they just share?

And I hate violence, so I especially don't like sports that are just stylized fights, like wrestling.

The only reason I pay wrestling any attention is for the homoerotic subtext of two guys grabbing at each other.

And of course for biceps and bulges in the revealing uniforms.

So I don't approve of "youth wrestling," where they take preteen boys, aged 5-13 (typically girls aren't admitted), and force them to compete and fight with each other.  It's nothing but a training school for bullies.

But there are hundred of youth wrestling clubs around the U.S. for parents to force their kids into.  They have state and national competitions with thousands of participants.

Thousands.

I don't get it.  Who would want to watch their kids doing this?

















And photographing their 5-year olds in creepy preteen beefcake shots, thinking "Soon my muscleman will be beating up fairies in the schoolyard."

The Wisconsin Youth Wrestling Federation even suggests proselytization.  To be fair, it cautions against using sexist rhetoric like "Are you man enough?"  Instead say things like "I think you'd be good at wrestling" or "Want to have fun wrestling?"

Team USA cautions that "Wrestling does not promote violence.  Matches begin and end with a handshake."  It also promises that youth wrestlers don't have to wear singlets, so no bulges on display (leave that for high school), and that "wrestling is for all ages, races, and genders."

It doesn't mention sexual orientations, but I doubt that gay kids are welcome.