In admitting a psychological setback, Simone Biles illuminated the ways in which the predominant view of mental toughness in ultracompetitive sports can be harmful. RyuSpaeth writes
Photo: Mike Blake/REUTERS Everyone knows that sports test a person’s mental fortitude as much as her physical capabilities. Any Little Leaguer is familiar with the ways that fear and excitement can dictate the concentration of her gaze and the swing of her arms as the ball floats toward the plate.
That all sounds great. Healthy. Life-affirming, even.
Surprisingly, the response to Biles’s bowing out has been overwhelmingly supportive, a sign that our expectations for how athletes should behave in the face of adversity are changing. An army of conservative trolls did come out in force to condemn Biles for being a “quitter” and the like, though, as Charlie Warzel and others have noted, this predictable response seems engineered to juice cynically designed social-media platforms for culture-wars-style engagement.
However, in an era in which superlatively credentialed athletes push themselves harder and longer than ever before, and middle-aged freaks like Tom Brady can be seen gunning for yet another trophy for their cabinet, it is still shocking to see someone refuse to play through it — to say, “Enough.” It feels like an important intervention into a kind of pathology among the most elite athletes in the world, which has in turn set the audience’s expectations for athletic accomplishment.
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