When I was in grade school, I was one of those smaller kids who got nailed in every single dodgeball game. Still, I didn't care because I loved playing the game - great fun!
Playing dodge ball was a fun staple when I was in school. We loved it and often played it during gym class and lunch period in the gym.
Then, when I was in 7th grade (around 1962), we got a new principle. He gave an introductory speech in the auditorium. The only thing I remember about it was his announcement that there would be no more dodge ball played on school grounds.
I thought getting rid of dodge ball was a stupid, irrational idea then, and I still think that.
A game of Red Rover would cause more of a meltdown than dodge ball in today’s emasculated society.
More proof (as if we needed more proof) that liberalism is mental illness.
So if dodge ball is out I suppose “smear the queer” is completely verboten...
Definition of smear the queer: “Smear the Queer” How it Works: The kid who has the ball (or stick, or balled up shirt, or whatever object is used) is “it” and therefore the “queer”. The rest of the kids chase the “it” kid down until he is tackled (usually in a dog pile fashion). The caught kid then tosses the object away where the other kids gather around it and wait to see who has the guts to pick it up and start running. There is a big advantage to being quick on the pickup so as to get a better running start. There are no scores and no one “wins”. It is a childhood game of bravado designed to blow off boyhood energy.
The use of the word “queer” is not homophobic in this game. It’s used as catchy name to describe the game. The “queer” in this sense is just the kid who’s it. Because it’s completely voluntary to be the “queer”, and being the “queer” requires a certain amount of bravery, it is not used in the derogatory in this this particular usage.
This was a game we boys played 40 to 45 years ago...One time one of the fourth grade male teachers overheard someone say, “smear the queer.” He stopped our game and asked us “what does queer mean.” To which we all replied “the guy with the football.” He shrugged his shoulders told us to continue and walked away.
At my little school, we called it “Kill Ball”, and everyone loved it, especially when the PE coaches got involved.
We also got to play flag football and occasionally the PE coach would play with us. We were all determined to take him out (get his flag). I did, once. Unfortunately I blind-sided him (because he was concentrating on evading the bigger male students) and he accidentally ran into me, knocking me off my feet and several feet away. “Last Name! Are you okay?” Me, still on the ground: “I...got you!” Everyone started laughing. It was awesome.
Peach
I LOVED dodge ball!
We played. Game in elementary school called “smear the queer.” Basically the guy holding onto the ball was the target for a dog pile. The games we payed in the Corps were even worse. “Bull in the Ring.” Four squads inside a 30’ ring marked in the ground, with the object of kicking/throwing all the opposing squad members out of the ring. No holds barred.
We played a variation of dodgeball called prisonball. We’d pump a baskeball up so hard it was like getting hit by a rock. I got into a fist fight over a violation of the “no headsies” rule (no head shots). It was the most fun game ever.
I clearly remember an episode from 4th grade. The whole class had to play. We divided on either side other gym. The rules were that getting hit directly or by a bounce off the back wall sent you out of the game. I wasn’t the most athletic kid by any means, but I wasn’t stupid and had a head for strategy: I knew I didn’t want to be either in the back or on the front row, but rather right in the middle where I could watch and react from both angles. I was cold and calculating like Ender’s Game. It came down to me and one other kid, a popular athletic kid. We circled each other several times, the crowd was cheering, and suddenly...
They’d have a field day with “Smear the Queer”.
Oh good God.
Look,I was always the hated one (I was too ugly, and maybe too nice), always last picked, and not very good at any of these athletics. Nonetheless I liked to play Greek Dodge and Wall Dodge and tried my best both ways. I never hated the game, BTW....just wasn’t fond of my torturous foes, who would harass me whether these games existed or not.
I did OK regardless. Actually, it all depends on the crowd....at HOME, I played happily with my actual neighborhood friends and cousins, no problems. The problem was bunching all kinds of kids together in a school who are completely different people which includes those who would taunt and bully, and being forced sometimes to play with them.
Until recently I led a Trail Life USA Troop of Boys. When given the choice for gym games, dodgeball is the overwhelming favorite.
The writer left out “Bean-O”.
These people need to get a life and let kids be kids.
What gets them about ‘dodge ball’ isn’t how it is played but what it was actually called in Middle America...it wasn’t called ‘dodge ball.’
It was called Smear the Queer, and it was a blast, great fun to play, and a game where even awkward, less athletic kids could win, and small kids had a slight advantage, being harder targets to hit. It was infinitely better than softball or the other more rule-laden, structured sports. It was just a game that let kids blow off steam before a math test or after a glassy eyed session on grammar.
Probably the name originally meant ‘smear the oddball,’ but even when I was a kid the meaning of queer had already changed from anything ‘merely odd’ to specifically ‘gay’ limp-wristed people... Just as the word ‘gay’ once meant ‘joyous.’
I never heard of the other games they mention, ‘butts up.’ Sounds queer. I don’t think the farm kids in my part of the woods would have stood for it if some kid had suggested it.
We used to play red- ass
When you lost the game. You had to to to the wall and put your butt up
Then the winners got to throw balls at your ass
This was allowed at school. Ca. 1976-9
Now they try and ban dodgeball ? Still allowed at my kids school. Soft balls
I used to equal opportunity blast anyone I could. I took the return blasts like a pro. WTF is wrong with America today? This new America would NOT have won WWII.
No more head shots on unsuspecting classmates?
I was third grade dodgeball champ at my school, Then a heart murmur sent me to the doctor. They found out I had rheumatic fever and they threw me in a hospital bed for three weeks. Never got a chance to play it again. So much for my shot co-starring with Vince Vaughn and Ben Stiller. LOL