[aurora1920]

I browse around in these blogs about competitive bridge even though I've no interest in ever playing it, because I've written a book, and now have a blog (http://bridgetable.net). My cause is to promote sociable bridge (and that will grow serious bridge as well) and I frequently say "there are two kinds of bridge--serious and sociable." Now I find out here, there's two kinds of serious bridge--friendly duplicate and deadly duplicate.

Here's excerpt from recent NY Times article about Dr. Marty Seligman, a psychologist and ardent bridge player, on why some people "keep joylessly playing bridge?" [Sounds like category 2 players.] It was a blog by Linda Lee that alerted me to the article's existence.

Dr. Seligman noticed them at bridge tournaments, "They never smiled, not even when they won. They didn't play to make money or make friends. They didn't savor that feeling of total engagement . . . psychologists call flow . . . they were quite willing to win ugly, sometimes EVEN WHEN THAT MEANT CHEATING." [caps are mine reflecting my surprise at the statement.]

"They wanted to win for its own sake even if it brought no positive emotion . . . They were like hedge fund managers who just want to accumulate money and toys for their own sake. Watching them play, seeing them cheat, it kept hitting me that accomplishment is a human desiderata in itself." That's a fancy word for something needed, wanted by human beings.

But how can winning "ugly" by cheating give any NORMAL person a feeling of accomplishment? At some level you must know you're a fraud.

Seems to me as total outsider that those willing to cheat to win, and those who've become too friendly in their duplicate games, need to be ignored (or form their own organizations/tournaments and ACBL concern itself with what's left.

[phil_20686]

aurora1920, on 2011-June-29, 11:36, said:

"They wanted to win for its own sake even if it brought no positive emotion . . . They were like hedge fund managers who just want to accumulate money and toys for their own sake. Watching them play, seeing them cheat, it kept hitting me that accomplishment is a human desiderata in itself." That's a fancy word for something needed, wanted by human beings.

But how can winning "ugly" by cheating give any NORMAL person a feeling of accomplishment? At some level you must know you're a fraud.

I think your pschologists have misanalysed. These players want to be "respected" and often feel that they do not get the recognition due their skills. You only get recognition as a good bridge player by winnings stuff, so the cheating is not a means to win, but to acheive that respect that they fell is their due. Since they feel that they are wrongfully denied that respect, their cheating is only "righting an obvious wrong" and they class it as a "white lie".