In primary/elementary school, you learn that bad behavior is punished and good behavior is rewarded with gold stars. Later, good progress in school gets you good grades and bad progress gets you bad grades, but there are no longer gold stars. Bad behavior still gets punished though. You eventually learn about crime and the fact that if you get caught by the police doing bad things, the government will send you to jail and give you a criminal record, but if you get caught by the police doing good things like giving to charity or cleaning up the neighborhood while not on Community Service or otherwise legally mandated to, nothing happens unless what you did was phenominally exceptional (read: it won’t happen to you). In the working world, you find that doing a good job merits continued employment and an occasional promotion or raise, while doing a bad job merits swift and terrible judgment from up on high.
Militaries seem to be pretty keen on giving “gold stars”/medals to troops seemingly at the drop of a hat. this thread goes into some of the difficulties in getting an equivalent recognition in the civilian world.
Are there any societies/clubs/religions/fraternities/countries/jobs/schools/anything really in the adult world outside of the military and possibly games or sports where you can “rack up” lots of “good points” or other positive awards in a meaningful way, even if they are not immediately useful outside the community? E.g. is there some organization (say, a community service and social justice organization) I can join where I can boast that I’ve been formally issued three “Helping The Community” certificates for volunteering at the food bank on three separate days, five “Good Citizen” medals for making it through 5 calendar years without a criminal conviction (one year for each medal), and a “Strong And Healthy Man” trophy for passing a physical fitness exam?
I know I’m being a little immature, but come on, isn’t there anything out there?
Good idea, but I was more thinking about virtue and the fact that US society as a whole is very quick to punish vice (e.g. theft, murder, tax evasion, aggravated mopery with intent to creep) and very slow to reward virtue (e.g. giving to charity, visiting widows and orphans, cleaning up the neighborhood if not hired to do so, volunteering at the food bank, etc.). You don’t get money for giving to charity. You do often get a tax break but it doesn’t make you richer, it just makes you get poorer more slowly.
You hear plenty of “at least I don’t have a criminal record” nowadays. What you don’t hear is “not only do I not have a criminal record, I have been regularly recognized for my shining virtue, upstanding and excellent morals, and endless kindness and benevolence for the community, region, and country.”
Not quite the same, but I’m involved with a theatre company, and every year they give an award for the most outstanding volunteer/member. I won it the first year I was a member of the company.
Other than that, well, as we say in the theatre biz, “your motivation is your paycheck.” Except that I only get paychecks for my day job, not my theatre work. :smack:
The major “service clubs” such as Rotary International, Kiwanis, and Lions, basically have as their official mission various kinds of charitable service, and they sometimes give medals and other awards to people who make outstanding contributions to their communities.
The college where I teach has various awards and prizes for students awarded annually, and a few of these are specifically for “character” and/or “service” rather than, or in addition to, some designated level or type of academic achievement. I believe most colleges and universities have the same sort of setup.
Google “community awards” and you can find zillions of awards for community service handed out by various companies or nonprofits.
However, I’m not sure these quite meet your criteria, because they all involve honoring particular individuals who are deemed in some way to have outstanding records or achievements in “good behavior” overall, rather than keeping a running tally of “good behavior points” for everybody. On the other hand, usually the smaller and more local the organization, the easier it is to get a prize of some kind for not-really-all-that-remarkable achievement, so maybe it would count after all.
Interesting, but I’ve spent the better part of my life being “good, but not good enough to be #1 and win the award”. I look at the Army and see that you pretty much get loaded down with awards for showing up, doing your job, and not being a loser.
Like, for example the US Army has the “Good Conduct Medal” which you get for completing three years of enlisted service without being found guilty of a criminal offense under military discipline.
You literally get a freaking medal for going three years without getting (or adding to a prior) a criminal record.
I remember reading a news story years ago where a city had decided it would be fun to try pulling over drivers and giving them commendations for good driving or wearing their seatbelt. What happened, though, was that they were catching just as many people with expired registrations, outstanding tickets, open containers, etc as they did with normal traffic stops, but they weren’t allowed to act on them because they weren’t actual legit traffic stops.
We have to pay to renew our licences periodically, and I just got my renewal in the mail today. For never having any sort of traffic violation (speeding ticket, etc), I get my renewal at a discount… I think it said 25%.
Alcoholics Anonymous gives periodic recognition in length-of-sobriety chips.
Civilian government agencies will often give little coin-sized medallions or small wall plaques to memorialize participation in a particular project, but those aren’t regular. Similarly, lawyers on a corporate merger might come away with a little Lucite gewgaw from the company.
In theory, and to some extent in practice, the way our society works is that money is supposed the reward you are given for being a productive and useful adult, contributing to society as a whole. Of course, this system has been around for a very long time, and has long since become thoroughly corrupt, and messed up in other ways too, so that very often the most useful and deserving members of society don’t get much of it, whereas some of the most useless get a lot. However, that says nothing about the system’s intent. It is supposed to do just what you say. If you introduced some other system of reward for good behavior, working in parallel alongside money, and if the rewards were (like money) genuinely worth having, it might help a bit for a while, but it would inevitably eventually become just as corrupt as (and probably would merge with) the money reward system (as, for instance, when governments start selling honors and titles for cash).
In our society, money just is the serious, institutionalized way of rewarding adults for good (pro-social) behavior.
This is not confined to the military. I have three different chunks of decorative glass on my desk at work celebrating the fact that the corporate powers that be haven’t gotten rid of me yet.
At my job, any employee can give another a star for going above and beyond the call of duty (in their opinion; I don’t think they need to explain why). They go in a box. Whoever has the most stars at the yearly meeting gets some sort of prize.
Most non-profits (schools, museums, etc.) will put your name on a plaque or name a room or a wing or something after you if you give them enough money. Charities like United Way list their most charitable members, etc. So this kind of combines the ideas of proving your value (by earning money) and virtue (by then giving it away).
At my job, there is an annual holiday decoration contest. The department that wins gets a free lunch. My department won four years in a row.
And sort of like what Sister Vigilante is talking about, we can nominate fellow employees for outstanding service. There is a ceremony where recipients get a framed certificate and a button. I have two. My name is even spelled right on one of them!
I teach college students. Whenever I grade a perfect assignment, I draw a smiley face on it, and I would give gold stars if I knew where to find them. And yes, the students do seem to appreciate it.
There is an award named after my father in his town [and a small reflecting garden next to an office building in the next town over] based on his philanthropy [non money based, it is based on ‘good works’ more or less.]
In the Boy Scouts you can collect endless merit badges, rank insignia, belt loops and other tangible paraphenalia to hang all over yourself in recognition of your achievements.
This is also true for adults who participate in Scouting as leaders and volunteers. They wear uniforms and have their own array of stuff to put on them to show how much service work and training they have done.