- Joined
- Jan 20, 2017
I’m not sure I understand this.
I haven’t ignored anything this fact is simply not important to me for whether the ISU should have age limits. I’m not ignoring it, I am deliberately not giving it any weight.
So far only gkelly has offered an idea why ISU might think age limits are important while USFSA and other national events don't think it's important to have age limits on senior.
People claim and give reasons the ISU age limits are good, but the very counterargument is that USFSA hasn't fallen apart or "become uninteresting" to watch at the senior level and they didn't need to use age limits to "protect" senior level.
gkelly:
One possible reason:
Skaters competing internationally are representing their country and given a responsibility to deliver results for institutions that are counting on them. That can be considered labor.
Skaters competing nationally are responsible only to themselves. (Of course parents or generous donors who are funding the training may expect results in exchange, but theoretically the parents' primary interest is in the child's well-being rather than immediate return on investment.
Actual sponsorships in which a skater represents a corporation's interests in exchange for financial reimbursement are rare for younger teenagers. I think there have been some for skaters who did well enough at 13-14-15 to bring medals home to the US. And that would be considered labor. Does that include Alysa Liu, whose international opportunities are limited by the ISU's stricter age limits?
I already responded that I think it's a bad reason because we have child actors who work as children:
Interesting thoughts. We have child actors that get to work under special conditions. I don’t see why you wouldn’t do the same for a figure skating prodigy. As long as the contract doesn’t say: “thou shalt win gold medal or else!”
But at least it offers some rational explanation for why ISU is possibly different. The other reasons people give for why age limits are good are based on irrational fears that haven't proven true at the national level where there are no age limits. Other fears are caused by poor judging standards, and age limits are being used as a "band-aid" to poor judging quality, instead of removing the age limit and simply fixing the judging standards.