[Ansteorra] Not as it was, but as it should have been

[Hywel Penbras]

This may have been said, but I have not had my ADD meds in a while so I'm not about to go through the 100+ posts about gender issues and the SCA. So, please bear with me and here we go.  
 
I have always viewed the SCA like this.  If we were strict recreationalists, then we would be conducting our activities much differently.  From what I remember of my SCA history, the society was first founded to protest the modern world in 1966.  It was created as a bastion to leave the modern worries behind, momentarily, while we played a game of adult dress-up with like minded friends.  Once we start bringing mundane worries, fears and anxieties with us into our dream, then it no longer becomes the dream.  
 
What was the purpose of a tournament?  Was it just a way to show off, exchange property, thin the ranks of the nobility?  What was the belief system behind the tournament in the dream we have of the middle ages?  Think back to that movie "Excaliber".  The first tournament we saw was one that which the winner was given the right to try to pull the sword from the stone.  The belief was (please go with this dispite how the movie turned out) that the most worthy would be the one who would win the tournament.  Now, capture that mindset and transfer it to crown tournament.  What I am getting at is the idea that the concept of a martial tournament brings forth not the crown we want, hoped for or desired, but the crown we diserve by whatever power you may believe is guiding the actions of mankind.  Who are we to say that so and so cannot participate in a chance at divine providence?  Is this not the dream?  Is this not the way issues should have been
 decided in the way it should have been, if we hold the belief that the tournament is much more than just two stick jocks having at each other? 
 
Thank you for indulging me.  I hope my ramblings made sense to some of you in my Friday afternoon, work addled state.  Now, I have paperwork to complete before I can continue dreaming.  
 
Hywel