“Here is your Participation Pin.” The most dreaded thing any elementary school aged boy could hear. During my younger years, the government had a fitness plan for children called the Canada Fitness program. Its secret codename was “Fitness through Humiliation”. There were six exercises: Endurance Run 2400 m; Sit-ups; Shuttle Run (Bean Bags 10 m apart); 50 m Sprint and the Standing Long Jump. There was also the most dreaded component that was dropped because kids were licking doorknobs to catch colds just to avoid it. The Flexed Arm Hang. They would time you to see how long you could hang from a chin up bar with your arms flexed at 90 degrees. My arms still hurt from a Flexed Arm test in 1984. The most interesting aspect of the Canada Fitness program was the award system they had. They set standards by age. They divided each exercise into ability level. Excellence. Gold. Silver. Bronze. Participation. They then added up all the exercises and the levels achieved. You could only get the Excellence level if you achieved the top level in each exercise. There would be a ceremony at the end of the school year where they would trot you across the stage to receive a badge based upon your achievement.
The ceremony has got to be the reason they got rid of Canada Fitness. There would be a handful of kids to got the Excellence badges. Good for them. Then with each descending badge the humiliation grew exponentially. When they trotted the Participation Pin kids across the stage, damn, it was silent. The “Thanks For Coming Out” prize. I never got an Excellence badge and I never got the Participation Pin. I fell in the middle. Never singled out. They should do a study of the kids at both ends and see what their average salary is. The pressure and anxiety of Canada Fitness probably cracked a bunch of kids.
Today’s kids all get Participation Pins. No one gets centred out. Not sure how I feel about this. We have bred the competitive nature out of our kids. We have created a generation that strives for mediocrity. I call them the “Survivor Generation”. On the reality show Survivor, the people in the middle usually win. The leaders and physical superior contestants get voted out because they are dangerous. The super weak get voted out because they can’t help their team win. Aiming for the middle. At the same time, you had to feel for that “walk of shame” the Participation Pin kids had to make.
This week I put the Canada Fitness challenges in a circuit and tried to do each one everyday. It was a really good workout. I even confronted my fears and did the Flexed Arm Hang a couple of times. I omitted the Standing Long Jump at the urging of my wife. When we first started dating we went to a cottage together with some of her friends and their boyfriends. The boys got ultra competitive and had amongst other things a Standing Long Jump contest on the beach. I threw out my back and was in agony for the rest of the weekend. I didn’t tell my wife that I had wrecked my back. She just thought I was mad at her. She thought I was going to break up with her. I finally copped to what was really bothering me. Hence, no Standing Long Jump this week.
On the last day I recorded my results. Based upon the requirements for an 18 year old (the oldest it goes) I would have gotten a Participation Pin. I would have done the dreaded walk. I was officially humbled.
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