运动员不应是行为榜样

风的色彩

发现我们大学英语课本里一片非常精辟的文章，讲得太好了。不过中国女排的队员除外。

Athletes Should Not Be Role Models
运动员不应是行为榜样。

[1] These days there are so many stories about the criminal activities of athletes that sports pages are beginning to look like police reports. What's going on? American sports fans ask over[N] their morning toast and coffee, What's happening to our heroes?
如今有关运动员犯罪行为的报道如此之多,以至于体育专栏变得像警方报告栏了。这是怎么回事？美国的体育迷们在吃早点喝咖啡时不禁都会问：我们的英雄们怎么了？

[2] It's not difficult to understand our desire for athletes to be heroes. On the surface, at least, athletes display a vital and indomitable spirit; they are gloriously alive inside their bodies. And sports do allow us to witness acts that can legitimately be described as courageous, thrilling, beautiful, even noble. In an increasingly complicated and disorderly world, sports are still an arena in which we can regularly witness a certain kind of greatness.
我们渴望运动员成为英雄，这不难理解。至少从表面上来看运动员们展现出了朝气蓬勃、不屈不挠的精神，他们体内焕发着活力。体育运动的确让我们目睹了真正可以称之为勇敢、紧张、优美乃至高尚的行为。在一个日益复杂无序的世界中，体育仍是一个可以让我们时常目睹某种伟大表现的竞技场。

[3] Yet there's something of a paradox here, for the very qualities a society tends to seek in its heroes—selflessness, social consciousness, and the like—are precisely the opposite of those needed to transform a talented but otherwise unremarkable neighborhood kid into a Michael Jordan. To become a star athlete, you have to have an extremely competitive outlook and you have to be totally focused on the development of your own physical skills. These qualities may well make a great athlete, but they don't necessarily make a great person. On top of this, our society reinforces these traits by the system it has created to produce athletes—a system characterized by limited responsibility and enormous privilege.
然而这显然是自相矛盾的。社会想从英雄身上寻求的品质，如大公无私、社会意识等等，恰好与运动员所需的品质大相径庭，用这些品质是无
法把一个有体育天赋而在其他方面表现平平的街坊小孩变成迈克尔•乔丹的。要成为一名体育明星，你必须具备非凡的竞争意识，并全力以赴提高自身的体育技能。这些品质很可能会造就一名优秀的运动员，但却未必能塑造一个伟人。此外，我们的社会用它自己创建的培养运动员的制度，进一步助长了这些特征。该制度的特点是：责任有限，待遇丰厚。

[4] The athletes themselves suffer the costs of this system. Trained to measure themselves perpetually against the achievements of those around them, many young athletes develop a sense of what sociologist Walter Schafer has termed "conditional self-worth"[N]. They learn very quickly that they will be accepted by the important figures in their lives—parents, coaches and peers as long as they are perceived as "winners". Unfortunately they become conceited and behave as if their athletic success will last forever.
运动员自身也为这种制度付出了代价。由于受到的训练是，永远拿自己与周围人的成绩相比较，许多年轻运动员便产生了一种意识，这种意识被社会学家沃尔特•谢弗称之为“有条件的自我价值”。他们很快就明白了，只要自己被看作是“胜者”，便会被父母、教练以及同伴这些自己生活中很重要的人所接受。不幸的是，他们变得很自负，表现得就像他们的运动生涯会永远辉煌下去。

[5] Young athletes learn that success, rather than[N] hard and honest play, is what brings rewards. And for those successful enough to rise to the level of big-time college sports[N], the "reward" is often an artificially controlled social environment, one that shields them from many of the responsibilities other students face. Coaches—whose own jobs, of course, depend on maintaining winning programs—protect their athletes to ensure that nothing threatens their eligibility to compete. If an athlete gets into trouble with the law, for instance, a coach will very likely intervene—hiring an attorney, perhaps even managing to have the case quietly dismissed. In some schools, athletes don't even choose their own classes or buy their own books; the athletic department does all this for them. It's not unheard-of for athletic department staff to wake up athletes in the morning and to take them to class.
年轻的运动员们深知，是成功给他们带来了回报，而不是艰辛和诚实的比赛。对于那些能在最高水平的大学体育竞技中崭露头角的运动员来说，“回报”往往是一种人为设置的社会环境，这种环境使他们免于承担其他学生要面对的许多责任。教练自身的工作当然取决于如何保住获胜的项目，他们会保护运动员，确保他们的参赛资格不受到任何威胁。例如，如果某个运动员惹上了官司，教练便很可能会干预——请一位律师，甚至还会设法使案件悄悄驳回不予受理。在某些学校，运动员甚至不用自己选课或买书，体育系替他们包办了一切。体育系的员工早上叫醒队员并带他们去课堂，这也并非闻所未闻的事。

[6] Given[N] this situation, it's not too surprising that many young American athletes lack a fully developed understanding of right and wrong. Professor Sharon Stoll of the University of Idaho has tested more than 10,000 student athletes from all over the country, ranging from junior high to college age; she reports that in the area of moral reasoning, athletes invariably score lower than non-athletes—and that they grow worse the longer they participate in athletics.
鉴于上述情况，许多年轻的美国运动员缺乏成熟的是非观也就不足为奇了。爱达荷大学的莎伦•斯托尔教授对全国从初中到大学的一万多名学生运动员进行测试。她报道说在伦理道德方面，运动员们总是比非运动员得分低，而且从事体育运动的时间越长，得分越低。

[7] Overprotected by universities, flattered by local communities, given star status by the public, rewarded with seven or eight-figure salaries, successful athletes inevitably develop the feeling that they are privileged beings—as indeed they are. The danger arises when they think that because they are privileged they can have anything they want.
大学的过分呵护、当地社区的吹捧、公众给予的明星地位，以及七八位数字的年薪，这些使得成功的运动员必然形成这样的感觉：他们是有特权的人——他们也确实是有特权的人。当他们因为享有特权便自认为可以为所欲为时，危险就随之而至。

[8] Mike Tyson, of course, is the most obvious example of this phenomenon. Having been taught as a young man that he was special—his trainer, Cus D'Amato, had one set of rules for Tyson and another, more demanding, set for all his other boxers—and having lived his entire adult life surrounded by a team of admiring "slaves", Tyson eventually came to believe, like a medieval king, that all he saw rightfully belonged to him. Blessed with money and fame enough to last a lifetime, he spent his time outside the ring[N] acquiring and discarding the objects of his desire: houses, automobiles, jewelry, clothes, and women. As a result of the publicity surrounding his rape trial, countless women have related stories of Tyson asking them for sexual favors and then, upon being refused, saying with surprise, "Don't you know who I am? I'm the heavyweight champion of the world." Needless to say, not all athletes are Mike Tyson; there are plenty of athletes who recognize that they have been granted some extraordinary gifts[N] in this life and want to give something back to the community.
迈克•泰森当然是这一现象最明显的例子。他年轻时就被灌输他是与众不同的-他的教练员屈斯•达马托单独为他制定了一套训练规则，而为所有其他拳击手制定了另一套要求更高的规则--而且他的整个成年时期都生活在一群仰慕他的“奴隶”中。泰森终于渐渐相信，他所见到的一切都理应归其所有，俨然一个中世纪的国王。由于一生可享尽荣华富贵，他将拳击台外的时间都用来追逐又抛弃他所要的东西：房子、汽车、珠宝、服饰以及女人。由于强奸案的曝光，无数的女人讲述了当泰森向他们提出性要求而被拒绝时，他竟吃惊地说道：“你们难道不知道我是谁吗？我是世界拳击重量级冠军。”不用说，并不是所有运动员都像迈克•泰森那样；有许多运动员认识到自己此生被赋予了非凡才能，愿意给社会一些回报。

[9] Some remarkable individuals will always rise above the deforming athletic system we've created. After retiring from football, Alan Page of the Minnesota Vikings became a successful lawyer and established the Page Education Foundation, which helps minority and disadvantaged kids around the country pay for college. Frustrated by the old-boy network[N] by which Minnesota judges were always appointed, Page challenged the system in court and was eventually elected judge in the Supreme Court. He thus became the first black ever elected to a statewide office in Minnesota. Thankfully, there will always be some legitimate heroes (or, to use the more contemporary term, role models) to be found among professional athletes.
总有一些杰出的个人会从我们所创建的畸形的体育制度中脱颖而出。明尼苏达海盗队的艾伦•佩奇从橄榄球队退役后，成了一名成功的律师并创立了佩奇教育基金会，资助全国的少数民族和贫困儿童上大学。明尼苏达州的法官原先总是由联谊会任命的，由于对这一体制不满，佩奇在法庭上对此提出了质疑，并终于获选为最高法院的法官。他于是成为第一个当选为明尼苏达州州级官员的黑人。令人欣慰的是，在职业运动员的行列里，总能找到一些真正的英雄（或者，用一个更现代的词：行为榜样）。

[10] Still, it's probably misguided for society to look to athletes for its heroes—any more than we look among the ranks of, say, actors or lawyers or pipefitters.[N] The social role played by athletes is indeed important (imagine a society without sports; I wouldn't want to live in it), but it's fundamentally different from that of heroes. (930 words)
然而，人们期望运动员来充当社会的英雄是一种误导，也许比我们期待在演员、律师或者管道工等行业中产生社会英雄更不明智。

刹车

[s:579] 首先对你的努力表示24分的敬意。。。人除了有道义上的责任还应有社会赋予的责任。。。做为成功的运动员他们在接收大众给予的掌声的同时，也必须付出相应的回报。。这个应该是可以理解的说

所谓永远

我想这也是从一个侧面让我们分析自己对于运动员的要求。

他们不是圣人。。

苛求有时不是理智之举。

啸傲乾坤

但和平年代里,已经把运动员看成一种激励人们的一种方式之一!!!!

刹车

就好比如商人和企业家最大的区别，在于。企业家有取之于民，用之于民的胸怀。。。。 [s:580]

毕业生集市

运动员多少不容易啦~
他们每个人都有一部血泪史~

风的色彩

这篇文章指的人，我觉得仅限于那些赚大钱，耍大牌的运动员。比如NBA的，欧洲各足球联赛的，美国拳击等等。所以像在中国，就限于足球运动员，部分篮球运动员等等，对排球运动员不适用。

杰克船长

那些靠吃药拿冠军的运动员的确没资格成为榜样。

drdr

大牌是一个相对概念，只要你买他的帐自然就会显示出优越感。而这种优越感不一定会昭示给每一个人。