I wholeheartedly agree with the premise of the benefits of teaching school children contract bridge (“A trumped up education,” Editorial, Feb. 26) but fear that you may be accused of overbidding your hand by stating “There’s no sex . . . ” in bridge.
I submit that there is a sexual aspect to bridge and that it is a good thing for the children whom you would teach.
I would advocate the notion that, as a rule of thumb, boys and girls should be partnered up when receiving bridge instruction. The reasons for this are:
Boys will learn that girls can be full partners in a sporting endeavor and can be expected to pull their full share of the team’s load. Boys will also learn that, if you focus on the pretty face across the table instead of your cards, then you will have your head handed to you on a platter.
Girls will learn what full team membership among the boys is all about — the joy of competition, the thrill of team victory, the agony of defeat — firsthand.
A pretty face will not be a substitute for doing one’s best.
Both will see one another not as just a sexual object but as someone whom they must be able to depend upon. This is a healthy start to sound adult relationships.
Among the adolescent population, if sex is analogous to heroin, then bridge is analogous to methadone. The analogy’s flaw is that bridge offers a marvelous “high” of its own.
If Bill Gates and Warren Buffett succeed, moralists may be driven to distraction as such folks consistently believe that anything this much fun must be immoral, illegal or fattening.
— C.P. Hall II
Brookfield
