For a sporting nation we’re not very sporting
30 September 2008
When Adam Gilchrist ‘walked’ during the semi-final of cricket’s World Cup in 2003, it was front page news across the land.
Why? Because such an act of sportsmanship, by an elite Australian athlete, was deemed to be so rare. Yet, perhaps Gilchrist would have been an exception at any time.
Have we mythologised our past to disguise the reality – that a ‘win’ is a ‘win’ – at any cost?
Indeed, looking beyond the sporting arena, have Australians in all walks of life embraced the motto, ‘do whatever it takes’?
Watch this debate:
Speakers
Chair:
Simon Longstaff is Executive Director of St James Ethics Centre. Simon spent five years studying and working as a member of Magdalene College, Cambridge. Having won scholarships to study at Cambridge, he read for the degrees of Master of Philosophy and Doctor of Philosophy. He was inaugural President of The Australian Association for Professional & Applied Ethics and is a Director of a number of companies. He is a Fellow of the World Economic Forum and a member of the International Advisory Committee of the Foreign Policy Association, based in New York. Simon has been Executive Director of St James Ethics Centre since shortly after it was founded.
For:
Gideon Haigh is a renowned Australian cricketing writer, for which he has also gained an international reputation. Gideon has been a journalist for twenty-eight years, writing on sport and business issues. He has authored twenty-one books, many of them on cricket, including the definitive Cricket War: The Inside Story Of Kerry Packer’s World Series Cricket and The Border Years (1994). He has several times been editor of Wisden Cricketers’ Almanack.
Tracey Holmes is an international broadcaster having worked for over twenty years in Australia, Hong Kong and Beijing. Her passion is sport, particularly the role sport plays in every society around the world. Increasingly, she believes it is sport that is building bridges between rivals and tearing down the barriers along enemy lines. Recently returned from the Beijing Olympics, Tracey has also been lucky enough to cover two World Cup Football tournaments. In the lead up to the successful Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, Tracey was international media spokesperson for SOCOG, Sydney’s Organising Committee and established a deep understanding of, and lasting relationship with, the International Olympic Committee. Tracey is also a published author, and was an advisor to China Television’s Olympic planning for the Beijing Games in 2008.
Dr Brett Hutchins is a Senior Lecturer in Social Sciences at Monash University, Melbourne. His research focuses on sport, and its role in society. He is author of Don Bradman: Challenging the Myth, a searing challenge to the Bradman legend. He has studied the twin impacts of commercialisation and globalisation on gamesmanship and sporting codes. His research is cited regularly in both national and international scientific journals, and he has received several Academic awards for excellence in teaching and research.
Against:
Adam Gilchrist is famous internationally for his sportsmanship in cricket and his performance as one of the greatest wicket keepers and batsmen in sporting history. Adam has taken a world record 472 dismissals in one day international games, and scored over 9,600 runs at a phenomenal strike rate of almost 97 runs per 100 balls faced. He made crucial contributions in each of the team's winning performances in the 1999, 2003 and 2007 World Cups. In the 2003 World Cup semi-final against Sri Lanka, Gilchrist won worldwide acclaim when he overruled a misjudged call by the umpire, and voluntarily proclaimed himself ‘out’. More than his statistics, it is the manner and spirit in which Adam played the game that makes him one of the world's most exciting and popular cricketers. He retired from cricket earlier this year.
Peter FitzSimons was a member of the Wallabies, playing rugby union for Australia during the mid 1980s. He then lived in France and Italy playing rugby for the next five years while learning both languages as well as Spanish. Upon his return to Australia he again played for the Wallabies, under Bob Dwyer, going on to play seven tests. He gained a Bachelor of Arts at Sydney University, majoring in government and political science. He writes regular columns for The Sydney Morning Herald and the Sun-Herald, as well as occasionally appearing in overseas journals including the London Daily Telegraph and International Herald Tribune. He is a best selling author, and is the biographer of World Cup winning Wallaby captains, Nick Farr-Jones and John Eales.
Adam Spencer holds a first class honours degree in Pure Mathematics and has an immense interest in science. He is a well-known broadcaster, first coming to prominence by winning the Triple J Raw Comedy championship in 1996. Adam serves on many boards and authorities, including the Senate of the University of Sydney, the NSW Premier's Advisory Committee on Greenhouse and Global Warming and the NSW Health Department's Clinical Ethics Review Committee, as well as being an ambassador for the Fred Hollows Foundation and helping out with numerous charities. His outstanding achievements include being voted ‘Best Speaker in the World’ at the World University Debating Championships. Prior to this, Adam was captain of the Australian Debating Team for three years. He was winner of the National Championships and winner of the Australian University Championships.
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