A pretty far-fetched theory, resting on a lack of definition of what "grace" actually is, and a lot of very big assumptions that are not substantiated.
I think a better structure for this article would have been to make a good case for what "grace" is and why it matters, and then, once that concept is established, give examples of how "grace" is achieved by rowing... But even then, this would have been fairly hand-waving.
I may just be blasé about this, but it seems to me that the central point of this article is ultimately quite weak.
The post strikes me as a musing, a reflection based on the author's personal experience -- there is an idea which isn't fleshed out, but that's okay.
I used to be a runner. I often noted others' running styles and how fluid their mechanics were. I felt you could tell who was was a runner. They _float_. Other people might jog/run once a week -- which often isn't enough to teach your body to move without effort.
When racing, if someone made a move, I'd follow or if I moved, they followed me.
During the race, you wanted to make them pay. At the finish line, they made you better and you made them better, often the result of competition and you rarely end up in first. I can kind of see what he's hinting at.
It seems like an interesting topic to discuss...deconstructing a blog post less so.
I do actually define grace at the bottom: Helping others you are competing against without feeling conflicted about it.
My point was that unless you learn to do this, it's very difficult to achieve success as an athlete. So devoting yourself to sports sort of encourages a certain level of spiritual development.
I think the problem there is that this is a very novel definition of grace. You need it to be established firmly in the reader's mind before you can go on about how to achieve it. Focusing the first part of the post on establishing that definition would have worked better.
The reason elite schools play sports is to build a stronger sense of loyalty to the school among alums, especially alums with money to donate. But I think it's better for kids to separate the school from the sports. Put the kid into a independent sports league. And it's better, I think, to be playing in an environment where the competition for positions isn't as intense - i.e. a smaller school or sports club.
In a related matter I see that Sidwell Friends does play football. I had been wondering about that. Here in Washington State, the best small private high schools don't.
Caltech and MIT are elite private schools, and sports are not mandatory there! What a sad, pathetic, weak article... I wonder how this crap even got upvoted to the main page.
Considering John Taylor Gatto is a famous high school teacher, it's a logical assumption to make that he is referring to private high schools, many of which do in fact make sports mandatory.
Isn't it true that when one wants to make a point (especially a polemical one), one should remove all ambiguity? If "schools" refer to "high schools" not universities, then the writer should make that explicit.
"Mandatory sports" means "mandatory team sports", I presume. Schools don't want students to be in shape, they want students to feel loyalty towards their alma mater.
Maybe I am just being a pedantic academic, but in Math if you want to make a point using X, Y and Z, you usually start be defining X, Y, and Z. Human language is vague already, there's no need to make it even worse.
I think a better structure for this article would have been to make a good case for what "grace" is and why it matters, and then, once that concept is established, give examples of how "grace" is achieved by rowing... But even then, this would have been fairly hand-waving.
I may just be blasé about this, but it seems to me that the central point of this article is ultimately quite weak.