Game Day JLT1 v Norf - Kingston Twin Ovals, Hobart - Saturday

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People aren’t pseudo-tough like the previous generations, sure, but you’ll definitely find that this generation is going to breed much more adaptable individuals

I strongly disagree with this, and I have young kids of my own.. This new generation are far from adaptable and tolerant and certainly aren’t mentally strong.. they are being weakened by this cotton wool approach that has them believe they are all fantastic and great and amazing.. It really scares me as a parent and what we’re going to have to deal with as I want my kids to be resilient and strong but that is exactly the opposite of what this society is creating.. Life isn’t fair or easy, but it teaches you how to handle adversity and being treated rough but also how good hard work can be..


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DeesFanTheMan

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Every generation thinks theirs is the best one. Every aging generation thinks the kids coming up in the next couple are soft, or as Topkent is suggesting less resilient.

It is a never ending cycle.

That aside, clearly the AFL is protecting the head simply to avoid concussions which in turn hopefully avoids brain damage to player's down the track which has a whole range of implications.

I don't think there was much Robbie Gray could do in the situation, hard to time a perfect bump these days and unlucky for McGovern he copped a clip, I am glad that the max penalty is 10k for him challenging though, much better than the previous system where the players were actively deterred from challenging or defending themselves at the tribunal.
 

Cannon82

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Every generation thinks theirs is the best one. Every aging generation thinks the kids coming up in the next couple are soft, or as Topkent is suggesting less resilient.

It is a never ending cycle.

There are reasons why the younger people coming through are softer, as mentioned earlier. That "people always say that" is neither here nor there; they might be wrong or they might be right. In recent years, they'd be spot on.

I don't think my generation is the best. Some people seem to switch off when you talk about standards / conditions being better in the past because they assume you're just taking a rosey-tinted view. When I first started playing Senior cricket, the lowest grade had a lot of very good older players floating around plus talented young kids. Fast forward 15 to 20 years and the middle grades are half-populated by social players and guys who would hardly have had a look in previously. That's only if you're lucky enough to be able to cobble together 11 players every week, which was another thing that got harder and harder over the years. The standard in local sport really has dropped markedly, and I'd imagine you can put that down to computers, video games, dance parties / weekend music festivals, Saturday becoming another working day, junior sports becoming a non-competitive-give-every-tom-dick-and-harry-a-go hand-holding session and, with some sports, mothers not wanting Little Johnny getting hurt.

There's a reason why we're not punching well above our weight in professional sports like we used to; the culture has significantly changed. We might have great facilities, coaches, sports science etc at the pointy end, but the pyramid is definitely getting narrower and weaker at the bottom.

Now, you can think this is just an older person thinking that the younger folk coming through are softer, but I'd love to hear some reasoning as to why they're not.
 

Cannon82

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Who cares about being tough anyway?

I quite enjoy being a sensitive little piss-ant living off my parents oil fields.

Call it resilience and independence then. They're not unrelated in my mind. Care is a strong word, but for example, if I'm working with someone and they're so afraid of making a decision because they've never had any significant responsibility that I have to hold their hand through every chore, or that I get dragged up in front of HR because someone can't take constructive criticism / honest feedback, then I definitely care then.

In a way, a lot of this "toughness" and the level / fullness of education I've been blabbing on about is preparing someone for the adult world. Schools and universities certainly seem to do a poorer job of that in general. Some of the products of our education system seem to have been raised in a bubble.
 

DeesFanTheMan

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I don’t know it needs locking. It’s vibrant and free spirited.
There are reasons why the younger people coming through are softer, as mentioned earlier. That "people always say that" is neither here nor there; they might be wrong or they might be right. In recent years, they'd be spot on.

I don't think my generation is the best. Some people seem to switch off when you talk about standards / conditions being better in the past because they assume you're just taking a rosey-tinted view. When I first started playing Senior cricket, the lowest grade had a lot of very good older players floating around plus talented young kids. Fast forward 15 to 20 years and the middle grades are half-populated by social players and guys who would hardly have had a look in previously. That's only if you're lucky enough to be able to cobble together 11 players every week, which was another thing that got harder and harder over the years. The standard in local sport really has dropped markedly, and I'd imagine you can put that down to computers, video games, dance parties / weekend music festivals, Saturday becoming another working day, junior sports becoming a non-competitive-give-every-tom-dick-and-harry-a-go hand-holding session and, with some sports, mothers not wanting Little Johnny getting hurt.

There's a reason why we're not punching well above our weight in professional sports like we used to; the culture has significantly changed. We might have great facilities, coaches, sports science etc at the pointy end, but the pyramid is definitely getting narrower and weaker at the bottom.

Now, you can think this is just an older person thinking that the younger folk coming through are softer, but I'd love to hear some reasoning as to why they're not.

There could be so many factors contributing to your experience though, your club cricket anecdote is just your personal experience, without having any knowledge or data of the situation as a whole it is hard to give you solid reasoning against.

I agree with your reasoning about the potential causes for your experience (being that there are more substitute activities which are potentially more fun or rewarding for the participants and a culture change in many different levels of our society) but not the conclusions you have drawn.

Some anecdotal evidence of my own, certain local footy clubs have done very well and thrived over the last 20 years in the area I live. I have heard players from these clubs talk about the strong culture they build there.

Maybe that is a potential reason for a drop off at the local level you have seen, maybe clubs are not fostering a strong culture now days.

My generation though, certainly the best one.;)
 

Cannon82

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There could be so many factors contributing to your experience though, your club cricket anecdote is just your personal experience, without having any knowledge or data of the situation as a whole it is hard to give you solid reasoning against

It might be anecdotal, but seeing the same issues in four different areas paints enough of a trend for me. I played with guys who worked for Cricket NSW who do have access to the data and they mentioned the same thing about the drop off in numbers. Juniors is up in quantity, but when kids reach high school age, the numbers tail off and Senior cricket is struggling.

I agree with your reasoning about the potential causes for your experience (being that there are more substitute activities which are potentially more fun or rewarding for the participants and a culture change in many different levels of our society) but not the conclusions you have drawn.

Some anecdotal evidence of my own, certain local footy clubs have done very well and thrived over the last 20 years in the area I live. I have heard players from these clubs talk about the strong culture they build there.

Maybe that is a potential reason for a drop off at the local level you have seen, maybe clubs are not fostering a strong culture now days.

Sure, certain clubs are still going to be doing well. Some clubs are going to be struggling. The better run and better-performing clubs are going to be able to attract and keep more of the available players than the strugglers. I'm looking at this from a higher level than individual clubs though.
 

HANDSOLO

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Ive got a 2 year old son, and as some of you know, I have to raise him in Santa Monica, which I'm quite sure is the Epicentre of helicopter and cotton wool parenting, here are my thoughts

We often conflate multiple issues when thinking about resilience and "toughness" in my opinion

Firstly, is the world an easier / harder place to get by these days?

-> Is life physically easier now? I would say definitely, there is much less physical labor as a value added portion of the economy, access to food, higher in calories (often lower in nutrients) is greatly increased, cheaper, and available all the time. transport is safer and easier and so on, I would even argue many examples of physical violence have decreased in a rate

-> Is life mentally easier now? Hard to say, I lean towards no, fundamentally because most uni or working age adults have a) increased competition, b) increased uncertainty and change c) A breakdown of community (I don't mean this in a conservative sense), people have more choice of mate, friends, where they live and so on, but I believe as social animals the paradox is also that we are lonelier. Finally, I have this theory that our stress of work is higher - we have many technology advances that greatly improve our productivity. But even if all the tasks take 10% of the time to complete, having a to do list that is 10 times longer is inherently stressful for most people. (I have to share my EA among st 2 people for chrsit!) And thos of you in accounting, logistics, driving, analytics will all be replaced by cheap AI in the next 15 years so please re train

Secondly, are we being "soft" in the way we raise kids?

-> Certainly, I think the concepts of independence, takings risks, letting them hurt themselves, wrestle with other kids and so on are out of favor. I am striving to teach him to solve problems himself (ie not immediately helping him, or showing him) and letting him hurt himself and dust himself off and be adaptable. This is all important stuff in teaching them to "meet with triumph and disaster and treat the two impostors just the same" to borrow a quote.

-> Do they need to learn to be physically tough just for the sake of it? NO. Our world is easier physically, and a healthy human can adapt to pretty much any new set of physical circumstance which is challenging after a week or two. The independence, problem solving and adaptability are what take a long time to develop, and need to start early. I don't think you learn these things by getting hit in the head by bouncers. The more important lessons is how to deal with pain, that it is usually temporary, and not to do the same thing again....
 

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Mate it's not even 30 years ago. Watch the 2006 elimination final against StKilda. It's almost a completely different sport.


Don't he stupid mate, he's not wrong. Kids of today have far less resilience than ever because they are put in cotton wool so young they are scared of adversity

6-7 years ago Josh Kennedy from the eagles picked off Sylvia and broke his jaw in a pre season game with no case to answer. That is the type of bump we want out of the game.

Gray was stiff, i can see the arguments why he shouldn't be suspend but unfortunately even incidental contact to the head in that scenario is deemed suspend-able.
 

Topkent

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6-7 years ago Josh Kennedy from the eagles picked off Sylvia and broke his jaw in a pre season game with no case to answer. That is the type of bump we want out of the game.

Gray was stiff, i can see the arguments why he shouldn't be suspend but unfortunately even incidental contact to the head in that scenario is deemed suspend-able.

You can't play aussie rules without incidental contact to the head. Like I said before and everyone brushed over, why are you allowed to use your knee in a marking contest then? That should be outlawed. Oh wait people still like it so we will leave that in.
 
I don’t know it needs locking. It’s vibrant and free spirited.
Carry on then.

As someone young who has had depression, i'm going to leave before i get argumentative
 

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You can't play aussie rules without incidental contact to the head. Like I said before and everyone brushed over, why are you allowed to use your knee in a marking contest then? That should be outlawed. Oh wait people still like it so we will leave that in.
Knees and heads don’t come together that often though, right? If somebody elected to enter a marking contest with their knee and caused injury (or was deemed dangerous enough that it could have caused injury), I imagine in the current system they would be cited and have a case to answer.
 

Topkent

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Knees and heads don’t come together that often though, right? If somebody elected to enter a marking contest with their knee and caused injury (or was deemed dangerous enough that it could have caused injury), I imagine in the current system they would be cited and have a case to answer.

So now you are advocating the banning of hangers and contested marking?
 
I don’t know it needs locking. It’s vibrant and free spirited.
With you, will allow it because preseason.

Now, if this happens in the regular season...
 

DeesFanTheMan

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So now you are advocating the banning of hangers and contested marking?
The point is *head contact* not a knee in the back. It's not rocket science, AFL doesn't have a problem with hard footy, marking contests. They have a problem with intentional, reckless or careless head high contact that can lead in the short term to concussions and in the long term brain damage.
 
So now you are advocating the banning of hangers and contested marking?
Lol I’m not advocating anything, and I haven’t with the earlier discussions either. I’m just thinking rationally, and commenting based on rational thinking, rather than letting emotion associated with nostalgia drive my comments.

I don’t want the game to change.

But just as with racism, equality, and a lot of other topics of debate recently, modern society (and law) has set itself a higher bar regarding “acceptable level of risk in the workplace” than during previous times. I’m simply putting forth the explanation that these changes by the games governing body are in line with those societal and legal changes. Nothing else mate.
 
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There are reasons why the younger people coming through are softer, as mentioned earlier. That "people always say that" is neither here nor there; they might be wrong or they might be right. In recent years, they'd be spot on.

I don't think my generation is the best. Some people seem to switch off when you talk about standards / conditions being better in the past because they assume you're just taking a rosey-tinted view. When I first started playing Senior cricket, the lowest grade had a lot of very good older players floating around plus talented young kids. Fast forward 15 to 20 years and the middle grades are half-populated by social players and guys who would hardly have had a look in previously. That's only if you're lucky enough to be able to cobble together 11 players every week, which was another thing that got harder and harder over the years. The standard in local sport really has dropped markedly, and I'd imagine you can put that down to computers, video games, dance parties / weekend music festivals, Saturday becoming another working day, junior sports becoming a non-competitive-give-every-tom-dick-and-harry-a-go hand-holding session and, with some sports, mothers not wanting Little Johnny getting hurt.

There's a reason why we're not punching well above our weight in professional sports like we used to; the culture has significantly changed. We might have great facilities, coaches, sports science etc at the pointy end, but the pyramid is definitely getting narrower and weaker at the bottom.

Now, you can think this is just an older person thinking that the younger folk coming through are softer, but I'd love to hear some reasoning as to why they're not.
I don’t know whether I agree or not - but this made me think of something that interested me at the time.

I was once sent along as some type of Department rep (spare wank) to monitor/observe some Gvt funded training. Basically it was some consultant teaching a bunch of traditional tradesmen how to train/supervise/mentor their apprentices.

At some point the discussion turned to differences in attitude and thinking of recent generations compared to former. The consultant guy made an interesting point. He said 30-40 years ago when the school holidays were approaching, parents would tell their child what had been arranged for the holidays. “We’re staying in Apollo Bay for 2 weeks” and the family would go on the arranged day and all have a good time or whatever.

Since then, you are likely as not to find parents will consult with children about what they would like to do - seek views and opinions, even vote.

I thought it was interesting, and thought that there might conceivably be some positives and negatives in raising a generation where a very young person so many choices and a strong sense of importance without the person being sufficiently credentialed in life experience to hold informed and valuable opinions, or have earned a right to refuse tasks or projects.
 
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Call it resilience and independence then. They're not unrelated in my mind. Care is a strong word, but for example, if I'm working with someone and they're so afraid of making a decision because they've never had any significant responsibility that I have to hold their hand through every chore, or that I get dragged up in front of HR because someone can't take constructive criticism / honest feedback, then I definitely care then.

In a way, a lot of this "toughness" and the level / fullness of education I've been blabbing on about is preparing someone for the adult world. Schools and universities certainly seem to do a poorer job of that in general. Some of the products of our education system seem to have been raised in a bubble.
I've also had shitty experiences w/ HR when the proles have complained about the manner in which I've whipped them (or, as you describe it, "constructively criticised"- I like that!).

To be honest though, I'm not sure whether this is a result of a "softer" generation or the fact that people like me are just complete assholes to work for.
 
I've also had shitty experiences w/ HR when the proles have complained about the manner in which I've whipped them (or, as you describe it, "constructively criticised"- I like that!).

To be honest though, I'm not sure whether this is a result of a "softer" generation or the fact that people like me are just complete assholes to work for.
Boy I like what you did there
 
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Can one of you blokes tell me who the blond bloke is that is holding Daw out of this marking contest?

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