I liked it when we were actually playing and disliked it when the mean kids seemed to use it as an excuse to pick on the unpopular kids and hated it when I was the unpopular kid being picked on... though even then I found it somewhat satisfying that I was always a lot harder to knock out of the game than people expected.
I think it kind of depended on the gym teacher - we had some who were so completely ineffectual and/or assholish that they didn't care if the entire thing degenerated into a beatdown, and others who actually ran it like any other game/sport.
I think that probably hits the nail on the head-- the teachers. I *never* experienced the stereotypical mean kids picking on people or the beatdown thing, nor ever saw it happen to anyone else. Maybe the kids at my school were all supernaturally nice, but it's more likely I just had teachers who were good at keeping things in hand.
And, come to think of it, it was the same school and the same gym teacher from K through 6, so I really only had to get lucky the one time. :)
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I think it kind of depended on the gym teacher - we had some who were so completely ineffectual and/or assholish that they didn't care if the entire thing degenerated into a beatdown, and others who actually ran it like any other game/sport.
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And, come to think of it, it was the same school and the same gym teacher from K through 6, so I really only had to get lucky the one time. :)