UPSC Ethics Simplified | How should spectators behave according to sports ethics?

What fosters India’s unity in diversity, bringing us all closer and making us happier? One answer to this question is — Cricket and the culture of sports. The sports culture undoubtedly unifies us all, across lines of age, gender, class, religion, caste, socio-economic status, educational qualifications, and against all biases in our society. Let’s revisit the past—the memories of April 2, 2011, when India won the Cricket World Cup are still fresh. There were wild celebrations all over Mumbai. In fact, people across the country were equally ecstatic. The winning of a team meant the victory of the whole nation. What a beautiful sight it was! The whole stadium rejoiced on the tunes of Vande Mataram and other patriotic songs in one voice, for one nation. So, it was not just about sports and sportsmen. It was also about the fans or the spectators.

But what about failures and defeats

Sports also teach us righteousness and responsible ways to handle defeat. Do the spectators across the globe and even in our country have shown that kind of maturity on the edge of defeat? What lessons of self-conduct do we take in times of failure or especially when we are victorious?

Baron Pierre de Coubertin – a French educator and a founding member of the International Olympic Committee once said, “The important thing in life is not the triumph, but the fight; the essential thing is not to have won, but to have fought well.” This quote is supposed to be practiced in our daily lives. As the India-Australia series is over and like all tournaments one team has to lose the series, shouldn’t we continue to value our sports person, even when they are defeated? In fact, why shouldn’t we prepare ourselves to accept defeat too? As the above quote hints, there should be a persistent grace from the beginning to the end of the game and respect for the  sports that prepare us to behave and grow in the state of friendship from the soil of noble rivalries. Yes, sports add another identity to us. We are the spectators of the game. But this identity also brings huge ethical responsibilities on our shoulders. Though sports won’t teach mannerisms and ethics to the crowd yet certainly expect a kind of behaviour from the crowd which can keep the spirit of the game pious.

The fundamental questions for spectators on sports ethics

Why do we play sports? We respect our heroes or role models in the time of victory, but what about defeat? Do our role models expect us to stand by them when defeat brings that emptiness? Can they wish to look towards the stadium with the hope of open arms ready to hold them with a smile? Defeat is lonely and success has many stakeholders. What about sportsmanship for all those who are watching the sports? Should we refer to ourselves as a crowd or a million heartbeats for our heroes? Who are we when we watch a match in the stadium or are glued to the screen? What is our identity? Are we not sports stakeholders? If yes, are we not responsible for our behaviour? Do sports teach us only individual behaviour or collective behaviour too?

There have been debates and controversies in social scientist circles about the theory of collective behaviour which can be most applicable to sports crowd situations. It was at the end of the nineteenth century when in Europe, Gustave Lebon addressed crowd theory as a social phenomenon. When we say crowd, it is defined as a gathering of people who share a similar purpose. In any circumstance, crowd behaviour is the conduct or actions of a group of people who gather temporarily to focus on the same event. Psychologists opine that people who gather in a group setting, sometimes lose their individuality and ability to think or act rationally and this as a result becomes the reason for a kind of collective behaviour where reactions are spontaneous and lack any structural pattern.

One of the collective behaviour theories, the norm theory, developed by sociologists, R.H. Turner, and Lewis M. Killian explains that the crowd behaviour is formed through the process of social interactions and is guided by those unique social norms, which are established by members within a crowd. So for a country like Bharat, the impeccable performances by Bumrah, Shami, or Siraj create values of oneness. Also, the camaraderie of Rohit and Virat is a joy to watch. We not only see the team celebrating their victories but also see them united in their defeats. But why do we become so emotional when we see such a spirit of sportsmanship? That is because cricket is not only a sport in our country but a religion and therefore it produces such kinds of icons who are referred to as God. But what worries this ethicist is why can’t spectators show a certain form of maturity when their ‘Cricketing Gods’ don’t perform.

Society’s obsession with results, not efforts

We are living in a society that is too obsessed with the result rather than the spirit of effort. So it is easy to reject rather than accept. We are data-driven people and like any industrial society where the results are numbers, you are judged on how much you score. Mahatma Gandhi asserted that full effort is full victory. But does our society value effort? In ethics, the Deontological school focuses on the duty aspect of any act rather than only the result. Here the motive of an action is more important than the result of that action.

Even in corporate or government organisations, achievers or winners are those who bring results. Growth which pushes for numbers is the norm. Look at the family conversations with our children. It has shrunk down to numbers in their report cards. We assess our kids on numbers, just like our bosses assess us on numbers in the offices. Do we think of values? We all are competing and simultaneously becoming aggressive running behind numbers and results. And when we become spectators in the stadium, our attitude continues to remain on a similar line with our team or heroes. If we can not accept the defeat of our children or the self, how can we prepare ourselves to handle defeat as a spectator?

So what…

In a society where ‘who are you’ is synonymous with ‘what are you’, the values of care and compassion at the time of defeat will be rarely exhibited. However, we must learn to read the basic meaning of sports before becoming a stakeholder in sports. Victory and defeat both occupy equal space in sports. And if victories are shared, so should be defeat. Only then there can be a mature society due to the emerging focus on sports.

We must not forget that sportsmanship is an ethos that asserts the activities with proper consideration of fairness, ethics, respect and a sense of fellowship for one’s competitors. And the most important part is,  as David Lancy writes in an article, ‘It takes a bad loser to become a good winner’ — a sore loser refers to one who does not take defeat well, whereas a “good sport” means being a “good winner” as well as being a “good loser.” And therefore sports icons like Neeraj Chopra will not be measured on a meter scale of his javelin throw but as a human being who threw a javelin beyond eternity because it was carrying a human soul, years of hard work and the quality of humility. His competitors were not symbols of religion or border disputes but as mortals who even after a defeat by the victor had full right to remain together in the photo frame.

Sachin Tendulkar, for example, motivated at least three generations to sit and watch together the game of cricket. Can we weigh him on the scales of centuries only? No, he gave us the feeling of togetherness and we learned to be part of his victories and defeat. How can we forget Sudhir, a gentleman from Bihar, whose connection with cricket was to unfurl the Indian flag and print the name of Tendulkar on his chest. Sachin invited him to the Indian dressing room to join the team’s celebrations when India won the World Cup in 2011.  Sudhir was also given a chance to hold the World Cup along with Sachin. That’s sportsmanship, and that is the magic of sports that creates spectators like Sudhir who are always there for the team, at the time of defeat or victory. Even the Gavaskar-Border trophy deserved such kind of spectators and sportsmanship. Isn’t it?

Sudhir Gautam was helped by Sachin Tendulkar with visa issues. (Source: PTI)

(The writer is the author of ‘Being Good and Aaiye, Insaan Banaen’, ‘Ethikos: Stories Searching Happiness’ and ‘Kyon’. He teaches courses on and offers training in ethics, values and behaviour. He has been the expert/consultant to UPSC, SAARC countries, Civil services Academy, National Centre for Good Governance, Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), Competition Commission of India (CCI), etc. He has PhD in two disciplines and has been a Doctoral Fellow in Gandhian Studies from ICSSR. His second PhD is from IIT Delhi on Ethical Decision Making among Indian Bureaucrats. He writes for the UPSC Ethics Simplified (concepts and caselets) fortnightly.)