Why Are There No White Kids Playing Chess?

I want to preface this post by saying that I am welcoming of any race, color, gender or sexual orientation playing the game of chess.

 

That said, I have noticed that a very low number of white children compared to other ethnicity groups. Now, this could be local to my area and my chess club. It seems there are a higher number of Asian and Indian children playing.

 

Once again, I don't have a problem with this. I am merely curious why this is. I, myself was one of three white kids (in my county) who took chess seriously when we were much younger (around age 12). I'm not saying we were great players because we weren't, but we loved the game and we played every day for hours. With that in mind, I remember going to chess tournaments then (this was around the year 2004) and there was a good mixture of races in the scholastic tournaments.

 

However, now days, at least at the tournaments that I've been to, I just haven't see any, not one. I have a big tournament coming up that should draw a lot of people into it, so maybe I'll see a few there (but I doubt it since it's not a scholastic tournament), but really it kind of feels like the NBA which is nearly all black with a few foreign white guys here and there.

 

With the adults, the mixture has been an almost even split from what I have noticed, and in some cases I have actually noticed more white adults playing the game. I have a theory on this and it all ties back to Bobby Fischer (doesn't everything tie back to Fischer, haha?) I think that when Fischer put chess on par with the NFL, NBA and MLB back in the 70s that it created a massive influx of players in America. America is mostly white, so of course there were a lot of white people learning the game (both adults and children.) However, over time the public interest in chess faded away thanks to Bobby Fischer disappearing from the face of the earth and refusing to defend his title against Karpov. I don't know for sure, but I think in 1992 when Fischer returned to play Spasky again, this generated a lot of interest in chess again, and it was revived, only not nearly on the same level as before, but nevertheless, a lot of Americans started playing chess again. This was also around the time the Movie "Searching for Bobby Fischer" was made, and Joshua Waitzkin was seen as the next great hope.

 

Now, Fischer has been dead and it's well known he had antisemitic views and hateful views towards the United States, but course Fischer suffered from mental health problems as well. This was the last time chess was big in the States, and has since then declined in popularity (I assume anyway, though I can't prove it), so now only people who see the supposed educational benefits of chess toward critical thinking push their kids to play the game, and it just so happens that Asians and Indians value education more than most white folk. Again, I am making an assumption with that statement and could be completely wrong, but this is the only answer I can come up with.

 

 

Once again, I want to reiterate that I am very happy for the anyone playing the game of chess. If these other races were not playing then the game would have a very bleak future (and present for that matter.) In fact, unless something changes, in 40 years or so most chess clubs will have an extremely low number of white people playing.

 

What are your thoughts on this matter?

The main thing to research when making a post like this is solid statistics. Anecdotal evidence like this lacks intellectual validity so it's impossible to comment on this from an academic sociological perspective, which is the only way to comment at all without being a racist. This is only sure to attract vile people and racist comments.

You might find this link interesting which pretty much shows the complete opposite of what you are saying.

http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview/id/752764.html

in Britain this is quite the contrary (for where i am) i only know of three non-white chess playing children.

 

1818 ---  :  "The main thing to research when making a post like this is solid statistics. Anecdotal evidence like this lacks intellectual validity so it's impossible to comment on this from an academic sociological perspective, which is the only way to comment at all without being a racist."

 

1.  I think it's possible to comment without an academic sociological perspective.  TomRiddle89 is using his free speech rights responsibly.

 

2.  People who are overly quick to condemn another by irresponsibly invoking the epithet "racist" are not helping.  It actually cheapens the term when it's irresponsibly used.

 

3.  TomRiddle89's observations may really be a geographical observation or regional observation.  If you really wanted data that has a reasonable basis for it, just go to the listed entries to a tournament and see how many names look to be of an Asian descent or an Indian descent.  Total them up and compare it to the total list of entries.

 

4.   Perhaps you might prefer a title that says that "Asian and Indian Participation Rates in Chess are on the Ascent."   That would perhaps be more palatable to those who are quick and eager to be offended.

 

All in all, I don't think Tom Riddle's observations are unreasonable, at least on a geographic basis.  

Agreed. Especially considering the fact that academics and sociology enjoy a long tradition of their own intentional and systemic racism.

sociology is simply the scientific approach to this - basically don't give me anecdotal observations, show me statistics. Anecdotal observation is how people become racists. Statistics separates emotion and simply tries to understand. Any scientific approach can be abused to promote racism, it doesn't mean that racism is inherent in any approach.

Note I never said the OP was a racist, just that without valid statistics there's no point in talking about this because there is nothing to be learned. Wildly guessing and saying "well I think you may be right," has subtle undertones of racism simply because it's not based on factual evidence but rather emotional observation. These discussions easily turn extremely ugly if not approached from a purely academic lens.

 

Academics has been used to justify racism.

Yes, I just acknowledged that. I also said that it doesn't make racism inherent in the academic/scientific approach, which is also true.

You can't learn or understand anything without statistics.

"There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies and statistics."

  --attributed it to the British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli.

 

You said this:  "These discussions easily turn extremely ugly if not approached from a purely academic lens."

 

Are you familiar with this observation that's been popularized by Mark Twain:  " "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics."

In my experience, it really comes down to who is given the exposure to chess.  Obviously, chess is not for everyone.  But in my classroom, we play a LOT of chess (I'm a teacher of a high school elective where chess is somewhat useful to the curriculum and is regardless a good learning game).  I'd say probably a good half of the kids, regardless of background, race, gender, really anything, fall deeply in love with the game and want to play it after school instead of going to do other things.  Probably another 20% or so enjoy playing, but really only want to do it in class instead of doing other things (that they're supposed to be doing! <grin>).  The other 30% or so just aren't really interested.  So maybe it's just that in your area or peer group or whatever, maybe the white kids just aren't being exposed to the game of chess much?

For what it's worth, if you look at the USCF rating lists for the top juniors, close to half seem to have Asian/Indian names. This is mirrored in my local area too: our tournaments have a lot of kids of Indian/Asian (mainly Chinese) descent. We still have plenty of white kids too, though.

My guess is that the Indians experienced the equivalent of a "Fischer boom" when Anand became world champion. I'm not sure what would have caused the Chinese boom, though.

in the united kingdom white working class boys are the worst performing ethnic group at school according to the equality and human rights commision, so what are the chances of them being exposed to chess, the game wasn't even mentioned at my school

well said

Maybe white kids have it too good, they are sheltered and don't have the need to apply critical thinking skills to their lives sadly. I've noticed a lot of people from countries in turmoil play chess, they understand a sharp mind is crucial to survival. White kids don't have the need for chess, to them life is posing with the latest Starbucks trend for likes on instagram. Life is a popularity contest to them and nothing more. I know I'm generalising but I'm white so I can lol

 

Whoever is the first to be offended and start crying wins.  

It probably will, aye.

 

And that's how it is today.  That's the way issues get "resolved." The Eagerly Offended "Wins!"  

Happily, no one has really come in yet with any particular stereotypical crap (other than the claim it will go that way, of course).  Maybe it won't.  It would be nice if we could just have a good discussion without it going that direction.

 

Truth is, there are probably any number of factors at play.  Hard to zero in on just one thing making that big of a impact, and especially when it's starting off with just an anecdote.