The Amish Tradition of Baseball (The New Republic via UTNE)

[pinto]

Good read ~ pinto

The Amish Tradition of Baseball

Old-fashioned, led by communal spirit, and undaunted by anxiety and doubt, Amish tradition is ideal for the “mental game of baseball.”

By Kent Russell, from The New Republic
July/August 2013

One boy ran barefoot across the grass and positioned his shoes as bases. Then several more joined him, and they side-armed a ball around the horn with terrible mechanics but unflinching competence.

We all crowded against the right-side windows as our tour bus crept up on the Amish. There were three of them—brothers by the color and cut of their hair—and they sat in descending order on the driving bench of a horse-drawn cart. As they rolled on, some rusty contraption plucked cornstalks out of the ground and fanned them on the cart’s bed.

<snip>

I’d come back to Lancaster County, in the southeast of Pennsylvania, because years ago, when I was driving home from a work trip, I took a detour through Amish country and happened upon something that I’ve thought a lot about since.

A hard breeze combed through the surrounding cornfields, a shush I spun around to appreciate. Then I noticed the backstop. Not just saw it, but realized that all the other Amish schoolhouses I’d driven by—they didn’t have hoops or goals or uprights in their playfields—they had backstops and baseball diamonds. One boy ran barefoot across the grass and positioned his shoes as bases. Then several more joined him, and they side-armed a ball around the horn with terrible mechanics but unflinching competence. A lefty took up a bat, and I took a few steps back, understanding now that the fence I stood behind doubled as the right-field wall.

Read more: http://www.utne.com/arts-culture/the-amish-tradition-of-baseball-zm0z13jazros.aspx#ixzz2ZXi4pGLK

[enough]

1. This article is insufferably patronizing to the Amish, while simultaneously

blindly romanticizing their life. I'm hoping the author did not write the sub-head, because there is no way anyone who has lived in any proximity to the Amish community could think that they or their children are "undaunted by anxiety or doubt" in any of their pursuits, any more than any other human beings.

[pinto]

3. It's a slice of life piece obviously. No more nor less. And, yeah, sub-heads aren't author's choice.

I thought it was interesting. (disclaimer) Big baseball fan.

[dimbear]

2. A good fit, since the Amish nuclear family fills out a baseball team, roughly.

Folks who have some concern for the survival of the planet are more likely to think in terms of a mixed doubles tennis team.

[pinto]

4. So Amish families typically have nine children? Is there a stat on that?

In any case, I'd wager Amish families pose a far less threat to the survival of the planet than some others. And I think an us / them framework does little in the larger picture.



(ed for format and clarity)

[kestrel91316]

5. Eight is the average, IIRC, but that statistic probably dates to the 1990s.

Their carbon footprint is a tiny fraction of we non-Amish's, so I give their large families a complete pass.

[okasha]

6. +1

nt

[quakerboy]

8. If I recall they refer to us as "english"

rather than non Amish. Not really apropos of anything, just one of the tidbits of information i tucked away along with some of the best food ive ever had. Shame we dont have any Amish out west at this point. I want more of that cheese and jerkey.

[kestrel91316]

11. I know that, but I didn't want to have to explain that part since most DUers don't know that.

I hear there are Amish up in western OR and maybe WA. Here in CA there are Mennonites in the Inland Empire and also up around Fresno, IIRC, but no Amish.

[quakerboy]

24. My understanding is there was an attempt

to start an Amish community in Oregon, but that it folded up and headed back east, they found they just didn't have the numbers to be sustainable in the area. Could be wrong, but that's what I was told while visiting an aunt who has some ties in the Amish community in her area.

[dimbear]

7. Americans tend to look at the Amish as a cute antique, a toy religion.

A good hard close look is pretty horrifying. Stories of spousal abuse, child abuse, and genetic disease are easy to find, hard to deny.

[quakerboy]

9. They are much like any other group of Humans

There are, I am certain, many Amish who are all around good people. And others who are terrible. And most somewhere in between. There are admirable things about their culture, and silly things, and horrifying things.

[cbayer]

10. Oh, please. The carbon footprint for most of their entire families is probably

lower than yours alone.

There are reasons to criticize the Amish, I agree, but this is not really one of them.

[dimbear]

12. I am criticizing the Amish for having too many children.

Perhaps I am alone in this matter, but I suspect that the planet sides with me.

[cbayer]

13. Have you anthropomorphized the planet, dimbear?

Is that something like Mother Nature or god or something?

BTW, would you feel comfortable saying how many children you have had? Or what size family you come from?

Lots of rural families are large for practical reasons. There's a boatload of work that has to be done. And in this instance, their use of resources is incredibly low.

Do you think we should institute laws like the Chinese did? There is, then, that tiny problem of the selective abortion of girls, but I am sure we can get around that somehow.

[dimbear]

14. Dimbear, one of 3 cubs, one of the six grandchildren of my grandparents.

A modern. And so, so careful to live lightly on the land.

Amish families are large partly for the free labor, but mainly from vanity. They feel an imperative to reprint their sect, keeping alive the secret language of God which in this case seems to be what is technically called nieder Deutsch or what we would call platt-Deutsch. Do you feel that life is better in the United States for German speakers? Especially a long disused and scorned dialect of German? Do you feel that life is better for women when they are under the thumb of patriarchal men?

I'm glad you bring up the Chinese response to this problem. As I say so often, Mao acted harshly as a last resort. Irresponsible reproducers forced his hand. A better solution would be for folks to reproduce responsibly on their own hook. A good first step would be scorning patriarchal religion with both hands.

[cbayer]

15. And no children of your own?

I agree with you, and have for a long time, that zero or negative population growth is a goal. And I also agree with you that religion plays a part in the problem in some areas.

But it's a complex problem and multifactorial. IMHO, eliminating religion would not eliminate the problem. Nor would instituting harsh laws.

Access to birth control, advancing the rights of women, addressing patriarchy and the role of religion, improving health care, decreasing poverty - these would all help.

I am glad that you are careful to live lightly on the land. I am as well.

[dimbear]

16. Instituting harsh laws is what did work in China. It's not a

desirable way to go, it's a last ditch. I hope we can do better.

One good start is to treat overly large families with scorn rather than amusement.

Eliminating patriarchal religions wouldn't solve the problem either, but it would be another good place to start.

I agree with your list of pluses. Do you agree that most of them have sometimes been opposed by the religious folks? Hardly ever opposed by the seculars?

[cbayer]

17. I think the China solution did more harm than it did good.

And I think it was a patriarchal mandate that had nothing to do with religion.

See, I don't see this as a team sport. Religion has done some good, some bad. Secular governments and causes have dome some good, some bad. But I'm not keeping score. I'm just trying to promote those that do good and confront those that do bad.

[dimbear]

18. The China solution did some harm. BUT compare India's non-solution.

You use the word patriarchal in a strange sense. Isn't a more accurate term 'autocratic?'

Promoting those that do good and confronting those that do bad--same here. Just a little different slant on which is which.

[cbayer]

19. It's patriarchal in that the men made the rules and the women had to follow them.

Who had the primary responsibility for controlling their reproduction? Who had the primary responsibility for finding and obtaining an abortion? Who put a higher value on males than females?

They could have told all the men in the country that they had to be sterilized after they were responsible for their very first pregnancy, couldn't they have? That's never going to fly. We have trouble getting men to have vasectomies in any society, be they religious or not. It's part of the patriarchy.

When you see all of one thing (religion) as bad and can not see the good, then I can understand how you come to your position, even though I strongly disagree with it.

[dimbear]

20. OK, see where you're coming from.

You're right--as it always seems to be, women endured the worst of it.

I'll try not to keep thinking of the big patriarchal religions when you use the word in the future.

While we're here, let me clear up one point. Religion isn't all bad, it's bad on balance. Summing up the pluses and minuses, one comes to a minus total. That's my position. This is the internet. It's a lot easier to follow the discussion if I stick to the negatives.

[cbayer]

21. Is it easier for you to follow the discussion if you stick to the negatives

or do you think it's easier for others to follow the discussion when you stick to the negatives?

I'm glad to hear that your POV is more nuanced than just seeing all religion as bad. You seem far too intelligent to have adopted that position.

[dimbear]

22. The idea is having consistency. Those who come here often enough

know what I think.

If you put all the good church folk (present and past) in my family together, you'd have quite a presentable choir. Suggesting as I do that the time for that is past, that time (and money) in the future is better spent elsewhere, that the future lies in the secular arena
and that the old religious ways are a danger to the planet is just my duty as I see it. What they did was probably theirs.

Not to discourage others from mind-reading me otherwise.

[cbayer]

23. Too much "consistency" could be construed as a rather close minded rigidity, though.

But I understand that you have a cause and I support it to some extent.