Daily Discussion No. 7: How Do We Learn to Compete Fairly Without Resorting to Negative Actions?
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Competition, Good or Bad...
We live in a competitive world. And even though I'm not a particularly competitive person, I'll be the first to admit that fair competition can be a good thing that leads to positive outcomes.
Note that I used the word "fair," there.
A Lot of Competition is NOT Fair
Yellow summer flower
Sadly, much of the competitive world is not governed by fairness... from business, to sports, to religion, to personal rivalries, there remarkably oftentends to be an ominous subtext of malice in the picture.
As an avid people watcher and student of human behavior and motivation, I watch this manifest in many different ways:
The political candidate who doesn't stand on his or her own record and achievements, but instead spends most of their time trying to make their opponent look bad.
The business people who don't put nearly as much effort into developing their own excellence as they put into (sometimes falsely) spreading rumors about their competitors' shortcomings.
The religious congregations who are not happy with merely preaching a positive message of their own, but must also spend lots of time and effort engaged in smearing and invalidating those who think differently from they.
In personal rivalries-- sports, work, dating and more-- we see it as effort spent on sabotaging others rather than highlighting one's own positive attributes.
Fear and Control
On a personal level, negative paradigms like these leave me feeling uneasy. I look at what these people and groups are saying and doing... and it feels like someone's gains or opinions only feel "valid" to them, when they exist at the exclusion or expense of anyone else's.
Miniature wild aster
It's almost like they are thinking to themselves "I cannot be right (or have something good) unless everyone else agrees with me (or has something bad); my opinion lacks validity unless it is supported by the failure of others."
From where I am sitting, that seems very fear based. Fear based, like someone who isn't fully convinced that what they are fighting for (or selling) actually is the best... or even striving to be the best. In a sense, they are putting "winning" ahead of "being right."
I remember the uneasy feelings from working in my 20's where I often didn't have time to really do my best because I had to expend a lot of effort looking out for whomever or whatever was intent on tripping me up.
Inevitability?
Some would argue (and did!) that I should just "get over myself" and accept that such sneakiness and sabotage is merely human nature and "we all do it."
Purple dwarf lupin
But I am really not onboard with that, and I never really was.
Whether it served me well or not, I tended to be a "cage rattler" who would go to some trouble to expose what I thought of as "sketchy behavior." I still tend to do that, and I am still not sure whether it serves me well... except for leaving me with the sense that I acted from a place of honesty and justice... rather than just "looking the other way," or even countering the sketchy activity with dubious behaviors of my own.
I always thought it best to "lead by example" rather than assume a "if you can't beat them, join them" paradigm. Again-- possibly-- to my detriment.
The question still lingers, though, whether cheating, manipulating, competing unfairly and so on... is simply an inevitable part of human nature.
Let's Discuss!
What do YOU think? Does it seem to you that some people compete with malice? Does it seem like they cannot simply "win," without turning everyone else into "losers?" Do you engage in such practices, yourself? If you do, have you gained by doing so? If you do NOT do such things, do you find it distasteful? Does it seem like competition often is not fair? Leave a comment-- share your opinions and input-- be part of the conversation! I want to hear from you-- and others want to hear from you, as well! Share your thoughts and experiences below!
Remember... the purpose of the Daily Discussion initiative is to interact, and however little or large your contribution might be, it does matter! If you decide to write an entire post as a response to the above questions, remember to use the tag #dailydiscussion and include "Daily Discussion No. 7" as part of your title, and you are welcome share a link to your post in the comment section!
(As usual, all text and images by the author, unless otherwise credited. This is original content, created expressly for Steemit)
Created at 171211 19:43 PDT
Well, my dear friend @denmarkguy. After have been 17 months here in steemit. I gotta confess you something of supreme importance to add to this discussion. ;)
The only way to defeat that supposedly innate human nature tendency of cheating, manipulating and competing unfairly when you are in the middle of competing on anything at all. Is that you always simply see yourself as the greatest and only adversary to overcome.
I mean. When I was young, I used to be a formidable (almost unbeatable) pool player. Yeah! snooker, 8 ball, nine ball, straight pool... You name it!! And through those early years I had to face all kinds of hustlers, gamblers and tricksters using every sort of unfair strategies, (including those approved in the manual) to beat me up. I just never had to resort to any of those tricks, not even those approved in the manual either. Because in what came my turn to play, Haha, they would have to stay seated watching me masterfully play my game for a long long time. }:)
That's why I'm so sorry I did not have the opportunity to have attended to SteemFest in Lisbon and have played one or another pool game over there against some wealthy competitive steemians who attended to the event. I can assure you, that I would have returned from that fest with my pockets full with SP and undoubtedly I would have become an instant whale in steemit. LoL
So, ¡Again! The infallible cure to avoid the temptation to compete by cheating:
It's that you always simply see yourself as the greatest and only adversary to overcome. :)
I believe everyone has seen this type of people, cheaters, liers that only want to fake their road to success.
How can we avoid this? Simple. We need to have strong principles and we need to teach them actively, everyday if possible.
Liers and cheaters are like that because they suffer from lack of values. I believe education is key, and I mean “home education”, not academic.
the internet makes it possible to check the facts.
My first response to your question has to be... What do you consider to be a win?
I see many people use malice to gain an upper hand in money transactions because they simply want your money at any cost.
I also see those who already have more money than they could possibly need, yet continue to strive for more and will use deceit and trickery (perhaps even bribery) to get what they want. These people are not really motivated by monetary gain, but simply seem to thrive on getting their way. I believe this is a power trip for them and makes them feel successful and "smart".
Outwardly, it generally LOOKS like those who do 'what needs to be done in order to win' fare better than those who hold onto the moralistic side. Yet, I don't see a lot of truly happy "successful" people. They are always driven to find more and more "success". It is a bottomless pit for them. It would seem to me then, that real success is just an illusion for that type of person.
On the other hand, those who are not willing to cheat, bribe, extort, or use any sort of trickery to gain advantage often seem content and happy with what they achieve.
Who is the real winner?
who's doing the judging?
The individual.
if the Competition is driven by self betterment and self development then it's fair and healthy and it would definitely bring some good outcomes. But if it's driven by toxic ambition, envy or hatred - it will only do harm. and the second kind of competition kicks off the things cheating, lying and other unethical activities.
and i agree with @dedicatedguy - the education of possessing a healthy mentality comes from the family. home should be the place where you learn to compete in a fair manner :)
you never grew up in a home of sociopaths then....
haha, no - i don't think i did :D
competing in a fair manner = knock unconscious, so they can steal uninterrupted. lol
😀😁😂
Does it seem to you that some people compete with malice?
It does seem that way at times.
Like when someone prominent a day or two ago was promoting something that would only serve large accounts which are mining the reward pool with bots, and just outright bullshitting trying to say that it would not make a difference to manual voters. No presentation of facts just bullshit.
I have noticed that some people are psychopathic genetically. Others take on those traits willingly to get ahead. The latter seem to measure their own success by how many people they feel they can legitimately look down on.
I am not apposed to taking action to disrupt their activities.
excellent work dear friend @ denmarkguy, congratulations for this beautiful slogan, steemit is the best social network, are the people who make that possible, with the interaction between them, this space is contributing greatly for a better steemit.
The competition existed and will exist all of life, there will be good and bad losers, fair and unfair competition, everything is possible in a competition, so that the competition is fruitful, the comtite has to know how to lose and win, assume that it is inferior to the another in the case of loss and in terms of winning it is not the same to be victorious, to win at any price.
Thank you very much dear friend, for this space where we can express our thoughts
I wish you a wonderful day