Nowadays, children receive rewards for almost anything. Weather it’s perfect attendance or a participation trophy, children are seeing an increase in rewards. Although at times not a major problem, it does spark the question of a trophy society. In the United States, the children of today are given trophies for minimal effort. The purpose of this would be to raise the child’s self esteem, going off of the idea that everyone is a winner. This kind of thinking isn’t just wrong, but dangerous to the human psyche and humanities future.

When receiving an award, a child would more often than not feel happy, excited, and proud that he achieved such a feat. This achievement would then raise this child’s self esteem, feeling that he or she was more exceptional in one area compared to their peers. However, if everyone got a trophy, then there wouldn’t be any more pride or joy. Although in theory making everyone happy by making everyone a winner, no one truly would be. As a child, one might think that they aren’t special, since the person sitting next to them would've had the exact same award. For children who do find joy in getting a surplus of awards, they may be psychologically damaged in the future. In the real world of today, one isn’t given award after award for completing a task. For children growing up under this idea of action equalling reward, they may not be inclined to do some task, knowing that a reward is not in place. In other words, some children wouldn’t want to work if they don’t receive a bonus, pay raise, or promotion immediately after. Similarly, some future workers might feel that since trophies come so easily, then there would be no need to work as hard. If a child grows up knowing that their presence deserves an awd, then why should they both working? Off of this assumption, some children in the future wouldn’t work as hard, believing that by merely sitting in an office would get them their salary. This would ultimately stimulate a lazy and unproductive nation, which would backfire once the new generation kicks in.

The counter argument for this case is that a trophy society essentially boosts the moral of everyone. In other words, by giving someone a trophy, it would help their self esteem and they would feel better about themselves. After all, who doesn’t love getting an award? Similarly, by giving everyone an award, people won’t be feeling sad if they didn’t get the same award as another. Instead, all of the awards would be the same, or at least very similar. However, this argument is a false statement. By giving awards to everyone, one would prevent the ideas of risk and rewards. Trophies are typically given out to those who are still in elementary school, so children of this age are still learning the fundamentals of society. A child receiving an awards, especially if they didn’t deserve it, would significantly hurt their overall understanding of the world. If a child believed that rewards, weather in the form of payment or trophy, is given out easily, then the drive for success would be much less than it should be.

Although trophy societies in theory make everyone happy, it never truly does. Instead, a trophy society makes everyone a “winner”, having the truly exceptional become shadowed with the fact that everyone is more or less the same. Due to this and the overwhelming facts of how psychologically damaging a trophy society could be, people should fight against it. However, this trophy society is already in place, and has made a huge market for itself. Trophy production companies are thriving with a never ending demand for participation trophies. In order to rid of this cause, people will have to understand that not everyone is a winner, and that loesing is a vital and fundamental part of growing up.